Not many people in the adult Web business can say they've worked for the three biggest companies in the field, made their own company a success, and have a track record of tripling revenue wherever they go. Even fewer can lay claim to the fact that before they got into the online porn business they worked in radio and for the gas company, and were courted for jobs as a private investigator, a recruiter, and in the morgue. Did I mention she's a photographer, can strip and rebuild a car with ease, and can put together a computer from scratch?
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Vivid Cash marketing manager Leslie Sharp.
"I've always been lucky when it comes to jobs," Sharp tells AVN Online. "I'm like a lemonade machine. Give me those lemons, I'll make something out of it."
Yet luck hasn't been the only factor in Sharp's rise to success. Hard work, a good head on her shoulders, a charming personality, and a knowledge of computers have played as much of a role in her career as being in the right place at the right time.
Born and raised in Puerto Rico, Sharp, whose first language is Spanish, moved to San Antonio, Texas for a year when she was 13 before settling in Riverside, Calif. for her teens. "Yeah, I did time in Riverside, the armpit of America," she jokes. "I was a punk as a teen and way into the whole Goth scene, with the blue-black hair and black fingernails and stuff."
She soon grew out of her punk ways and began to pursue a career. Despite her aspirations to be a social worker ("I wanted to make a difference. I was tired of seeing our ridiculous welfare system. I have this whole welfare reform plan that someday I will get out there"), while working through college Sharp found work in the gas industry, where she learned sales and marketing before she packed her bags and headed to Los Angeles for a career in radio. That was 1995.
"I wanted something more glamorous, but when the gas company met me, they hired me right away. I ended up computerizing the whole place, but I got bored of it after a couple of years and wanted to do something exciting. I almost became a P.I."
After spotting an ad in the paper, a visit to a private investigator's office left her taking the P.I. test after being told she was overqualified for a trainee position. "I can find out anything and get the juice on anything," Sharp laughs. "I have always been a computer geek. I was surfing the Net when it was DOS-based, so I knew how to search for stuff that they didn't. I'm just a natural snoop.
"The same day I interviewed for a sales job at radio station KGGI 99.1 FM. I thought being a P.I. would be really hot and sexy, but working at a radio station would mean concert tickets and getting to meet rock stars, so that'd be cool, too. It turned out I passed the test and got beyond the perfect score so the head of the P.I. company wanted to take me under her wing, but the radio station offered me a job first, so I took it."
Other unusual opportunities were knocking at her door ... or clawing from the inside of their coffins.
"At the same time, the morgue was trying to hire me," Sharp says. "I had some friends there and they really wanted to hire me because I was a tough chick and could eat cheeseburgers with them in front of the cadavers."
So, abandoning the world of flammable gases and decomposing bodies, Sharp headed for radio and found here, too, she excelled. "I was really good with the industry software applications and learned how to make the ratings look really good on paper, which did wonders to increase sales," she says.
After her tenure at KGGI, Sharp moved to Brentwood and migrated to rock radio station KLOS where she learned sales, people skills, and management. From there, she went to dance station Groove Radio and talk radio stations KLSX and KFI, where she handled sales and even promoted events.
Despite finally achieving the career she'd always wanted, she still didn't feel challenged and sought something else, something a little left of center. She had no idea how far left she would veer until chance encounter with a recruiter at a fetish party changed the course of her life forever.
"My assistant talked me into going to a fetish party at a mansion. I had never been to one before but was curious, so we went shopping for fetish gear to get all decked out. There, I met this technology recruiter. We hit it off and I gave him my card. He thought I was a regular at these things - geez, I can't figure out why. When he called me six months later and said he had a position just right for me at iGallery, a porn company, I was like, 'Porn?' Are you out of your mind? Who do you think you are talking to? My mother was going to be a nun!' I'd never even seen a porn movie. I had this whole image of what the porn business was like, filled with hoochie-mamas and pimps with gold teeth. I said, 'No way,' but he was very persistent and made me promise to think about it."
"I talked it over with my fianc� later and he said to go for it, that if they wanted me that bad and the money was good, I should check it out. He said the porn business was the only thing making money on the Internet, so I decided to meet with iGallery. The same curiosity that drove me to the fetish party drove me to the interview. I met with Greg Dumas and Brad Webber at iGallery and everyone was normal there. It was very professional. I had the Internet and marketing background for it, so how could I not give it a shot?"
Sharp spent three years at iGallery. She sold content and marketed their traffic program, tripling her revenue twice in the process.
"The figures went through the roof," Sharp gushes. "At the end of three years, Ron Levi at Cybererotica wanted to bring me on board. I created a content department for him and became the VP of sales. Ron wanted to take good care of me so he set up a deal with Jack Gallagher over at Babenet for me to help them with their marketing. I became their marketing director, had a lot of input with LifetimeBucks, which at one point dominated over 50 percent of all the adult Internet traffic."
Sharp says she was doing so well that she decided to set up her own consulting corporation and Cybererotica and Babenet.com became her clients.
"I did that for two years, helped them market and develop their programs and tours. When Babenet lost their processing it was probably the darkest day in Internet porn. It affected hundreds of people, all the accounts and all their Webmasters. No one got their commissions and no one could make their payouts. But everyone made so much money off Babenet I think they still came out ahead. But it ended, so I walked away and started picking up new clients, such as RSP Worldwide, who I was designing a posting program for, and that's when Webquest approached me.
"I had been doing business with Webquest since I started in the industry and they had just signed Vivid so we knew each other. I was definitely interested in them when they asked me if I wanted to run Vivid Cash for them. After successfully running my own company, I figured, 'If I'm going to start working for somebody else, there's nobody better out there than Webquest and Vivid.' They both have great reputations and integrity."
Sharp started at Webquest last May, hired as marketing manager of Vivid's new affiliate program, Vivid Cash.
"With Bruce's blessing and supervision, I pretty much manage everything," she of many hats says proudly. "Anything that has to do with our online presence, Vivid Cash, our affiliate program, I manage for them. I have a really great team of eight employees with terrific synergy.
"By the time we hit Internext and AEE in January, I'll have launched a Vivid Cash 1.5, added a Picture of the Day program, new members sections, and have at least 20 more Websites. We've already added five Websites, 50 free hosted galleries, and tons of free content which includes Vivid Girl greeting cards, icons, and screensavers which track the referring code and pay out the Webmaster on any sales generated from their traffic.
"In the last two months, the program has become 10 times what it was when we launched. We're up there with any other big program. The new hosted galleries are converting at 1 in 80, and that's already way beyond my expectations. Our type-in traffic converts at 1 in 30 on average. We are putting together so many marketing tools so Webmasters can get those numbers and our payout is one of the highest in the industry. Webmasters can get paid up to $35 per join or 60 percent rev share on our members sections. All of our content is exclusive, we don't license it out to anyone, which really gives us an edge.
"Surfers have to come to us to see our content. All of our smaller, niche Websites are paying and converting well. We've arrived."
So what is next for Sharp at Vivid?
"We are coming out with individual sites for all of our Vivid Girls. A directory will be available at VividGirls.com, which is a gateway to all the exclusive Vivid Girl sites. We'll give the Webmaster the chance to promote them together or separately. Webquest has a new board called GoldSponsors.com, which is a board for all of our programs, VividcCsh.com, FlyntDigital.com, CashQuest.net, and so on, where Webmasters can communicate. We join efforts with FlyntDigital on a lot of promotions and projects such as our rewards program, which will allow Webmasters to use their accumulated points from all programs toward prizes under the Webquest umbrella.
"We are also going to be involved with other niches as well," Sharp continues, "so we are a one-stop shop kind place. No matter what we do, we're going to be the best at it."
Yet beyond all of the individual programs Webquest and Vivid have to offer, it's the total package that is so attractive, the merging of two major forces into one mighty team.
"I expect that we are going to be the strongest adult porn star affiliate sponsor program," Sharp says with conviction. "With Webquest and Vivid working together we have the best of both worlds. Our Webmasters don't need to worry about anything and are going to profit. Vivid has been here for 20 years and will be here for 20 more. When Webmasters try us out they are going to want to stay with us. We have the Vivid brand name and Webquest behind us; with Jettis processing, Webmasters don't need to worry about being paid.
"No matter what, Webmasters are always going to want to do business with us. And we're going to keep providing more tools and ways to make money for Webmasters. The goal is to be where Webmasters can tend to all of their needs, surfer-wise, within one program. We're going to be around for the long haul."
You can see some of Leslie's photography at her site www.mistressleslie.com; or e-mail her at [email protected].
