What do you actually tell people at parties when they ask what you do?

Nine years in and I still have no good answer.

"Digital marketing" makes people think I can fix their restaurant's Instagram. "I own websites" sounds like I am about to sell them a course. The honest version — "I rank pages in search engines and take a cut when people buy things" — is accurate and makes everybody's eyes glaze over about eight words in.

My current answer is "ecommerce", which is a lie of omission that ends the conversation efficiently.

What do you say?

"I run a small publishing business." True, boring, nobody follows up. Perfect.

I say I work in advertising and let them assume an agency. Nine years of peace.

"Software." Also true. Also ends it.

I tell the truth and enjoy the twenty minutes of questions, because explaining it to someone with no context is the fastest way to notice which parts of your own business you cannot justify.

I say nothing because I have made no money, so technically I am in a warehouse and that answer is easy.

My father-in-law has believed I work in "computers" since 2016 and I have decided to let him die believing it.

The Gremlin answer is annoyingly the correct one and I am not going to start using it.