Archive for February, 2012

Raise Your Prices & Get Better Clients

By | February 29, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Freelance Copywriters | No comments

You might think that increasing your prices will scare away potential clients but that’s not necessarily the case as James Tennant explains. Read on…

If you’re just starting out as a freelance copywriter it might be tempting to keep your prices relatively low to attract more clients (I know this because I thought it was a good idea when I first started out).

While there is some validity to that (people are always looking for a great deal), the type of clients you’ll be attracting are certainly not the ones you want to be working with for years to come.

Why?

Because these clients are bad clients. They want plenty of work but they’re not willing to pay a fair price for it. If you charge low prices then you’ll have to do an astronomical amount of work just to pay the bills, nevermind enjoy yourself from time to time, and that’s not good. On top of that, by charging low rates, all those big clients that you dream of working with will ignore you outright.

You see copywriting is a service and the prices you charge reflect the quality of that service and the confidence you have in yourself. If you charge a low price you’re basically telling your clients that you won’t get great work, but it’s nice and cheap.

By charging higher prices (we’re not talking stupid numbers here, just a fair price for your time and expertise) you’re telling your clients that the work you offer is of a high quality and that you are very confident in your ability to deliver great work. This is far more attractive to those big clients who often have the budgets to pay for any copywriter they want anyway.

Don’t Sell Yourself Short:

You know that working as a freelance copywriter is much more than writing. You have to run the entire business yourself. That means sorting out your taxes, keeping records of all of your invoices and receipts, travelling to networking events and meetings, paying for all the equipment you need as well as writing all the copy you’re hired to write. The working day often extends beyond 8 hours and can sometimes creep into the early hours of the morning.

If you’re married with kids then the need to charge a good rate is even more important so make sure you don’t sell yourself short. You offer a professional service that takes many hours and plenty of hard work to provide so charge your clients accordingly and don’t make any apologies for the price either. There are many copywriters out there that believe you should never charge below $50 per hour, and that’s just a recommended rate for newbies!

Provide Your Clients With Proof:

Obviously, you’ll have to back up your higher rates by providing your potential clients with evidence that you can deliver the quality of work you say you can and that means creating a portfolio page and a testimonials page for your website (I assume at this point that you know you’ll need a website.)

Only show off your best work but include all of your testimonials. As you get more work and flesh out those pages you’ll be able to increase your rates again and again.

If you don’t have a portfolio or any testimonials because you’ve literally just taken the first steps towards becoming a freelance copywriter then click here for some tips to help you bag your first client!

By raising your rates you’ll attract better clients, you’ll earn more money and you’ll enjoy your job a lot more.  So revise those rates today!

26 Great Tools for Copywriters

By | February 24, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Copywriting, Guest Blog | 2 Comments

By Glenn Murray | Advertising Copywriter, Website Copywriter, Article PR Specialist *

After more than 12 years as a professional writer, I have more effective copywriting and SEO copywriting tools at my disposal than I could poke a stick at. I’ve already shared this list at the Divine Write Copywriting Forums, but thought I’d distribute a little wider.

Hope it helps…

(Note: If you run a copywriting business from home, you may also be interested in reading my three-article series on home business technologies.)

  1. Microsoft Word(EXPENSIVE!) – No real need to describe, but some features that warrant a mention as particularly useful to copywriters include:
    • Macros (Tools | Macro | Record New Macro) – particularly useful for automating those tasks that copywriters perform over and over each day. TIP: If you plan to delete a macro that’s assigned to a button in a toolbar, delete the button first. Some versions of Word won’t let you delete the button after you delete the macro. If you do happen to get caught by this gem, you have to re-add the macro – without assigning dragging it to a toolbar – then delete the button, then delete the macro again.)
    • Track Changes (Tools | Track Changes) – Previously called revisions. Great for clients who like to make changes in the document. Just make sure you turn it on before you send the doc for review, because many people don’t know how to turn it on themselves, or won’t bother.
    • Templates (File | Save As and set the file type to .dot) – Define all your styles and page setup in a template, then double-click on the template to create a new document based on that template – your new doc will inherit all of the styles, page setup, macros, etc., from the template.
    • Dictionaries for multiple languages (select all, then click Tools | Set Language and choose your language – when you do your spell check, it will default to the correct dictionary)
    • Word count toolbar (select View | Toolbars | Word Count)
  2. Macromedia Contribute trial version (FREE) – I don’t actually use Macromedia, but by installing the demo, you get a great PDF creator. It’s been a while since I downloaded my trial version, but I suspect you still get the PDF creator.
  3. Notepad (Start | Programs | Accessories | Notepad) – Great for those times when you need something written in pure text from the outset. Notepad comes as part of Microsoft’s operating system.
  4. Puretext (FREE) – A fast way of pasting as pure text. Great for use with Microsoft Word. Instead of having to select Edit | Paste Special | Unformatted Text or copy and paste via Notepad, you simply paste as text using user-defined short-cut keys (e.g. Ctrl | T). (And let’s face it; as copywriters, we do a LOT of copy-pasting…)
  5. Mozilla Firefox Internet Browser (FREE) – Allows you to supplement its native functionality with lots of add-ons that let you do cool stuff. One of the most useful is the word count calculator. Simply select the text you want to count, right-click and select Word Count (excellent for copywriters who need to quote for the rewrite of an existing site and the client wants approx the same word count). Apparently Firefox is also more secure than IE ‘cos it’s not integrated with the operating system. This is what I’ve read, anyway; don’t know if it’s true.
  6. Google Desktop (FREE) – A great way to search your computer for stuff. Especially useful when you’re having trouble finding an email or Word document that you know you’ve written, but you can only remember a phrase or a few words. (What copywriter hasn’t experienced this dilemma?) I find it HEAPS better than the Find function in ‘My Computer’.
  7. Google Adwords Editor (FREE) – If you’re a copywriter who manages / works on lots of Google Adwords projects, this tool is great as you can do everything locally, and only upload on completion. Makes things a lot safer and faster as you’re not working over the Internet the whole time.
  8. MessageSave & EzyDetach (approx USD $30 each but you can get a FREE trial version) – Excellent for managing and filing emails and their attachments to hard disk. You save the email / attachment as a file and the product automatically names it with the sender’s name and the date of receipt. This makes these products excellent for keeping track of client reviews of your copy and recording correspondence regarding your copy. Also significantly reduces the size of your PST file.
  9. Dictionary.com (FREE) – Contains a good thesaurus. Biggest limitation is that it’s in US English. (Well, that’s a limitation for copywriters who write in Australian or UK English!)
  10. DomainsBot (FREE) – Neat tool for turning ideas into names. Excellent for copywriters who work in the conceptual field or short copy copywriters.
  11. Ezemail Email / eNewsletter Distribution (Approx 5 cents per email) – Very useful for sending HTML e-newsletters. You can personalise your mailouts by including the recipient’s name in the Subject line and in the email body. Also tracks all sorts of useful recipient data (who read what, what they clicked on, etc.). Template based so you can re-use your email designs.
  12. Stock Photography (royalty-free photos from $1) – Excellent if you need to include photos in your copy or proposals, or if you have to manage a design project (both things most copywriters will do, at one time or another).
  13. Rhyme Zone (FREE) – Type in a word and find rhyming words. Something for jingle copywriters?
  14. Google Alerts (FREE) – Have Google notify you whenever it finds a page that contains a particular word or phrase. Particularly useful for identifying sites that have plagiarized your copy. (You’d be amazed at how many alleged copywriting sites have plagiarized the copy from my website!) Also useful for SEO. You can use it to find out when your URL or a client’s URL is published on page. (This generally indicates that a link to your site / your client’s site has been added.)
  15. Copyscape plagiarism detection (USD $0.05 per search for Premium, USD $4.95 per month for Copysentry) – Identifies sites that have plagiarized the copy on your site or a client’s site.
  16. Adeeze (AUD $20) – An ebook containing hundreds (maybe thousands) of headlines and slogans ready for royalty-free use. Great for all sorts of industries. I haven’t read them all, but the ones I have seem pretty good. Written by a professional copywriter with quite a bit of experience in headlines and slogans.
  17. Text to HTML converter (FREE) – I’m sure you’ll find a use for it!
  18. My SEO eBook (FREE) – Great for learning the ins and outs of search engine optimisation (SEO) and SEO copy.
  19. ArticlePR.com (FREE) – My list of article submission sites (aka article banks) to which you can submit your articles in order for them to be syndicated on other websites.
  20. Backlink checker (FREE) – A fairly accurate way of counting the number of unique backlinks to a site.
  21. Matt Cutts’ BLOG (FREE) – A handy resource for learning about all things SEO and SEO copywriting. (Matt Cutts’ is also known as the ‘Google Insider’.)
  22. Google Toolbar (FREE) – Great for getting a quick, high level picture of the search presence of your copywriting website or a client’s website. (Also very useful for establishing the credibility of online stores before you buy…)
  23. WordTracker keyword analysis (Approx $12/day -) – The best keyword analysis tool I’ve found. Type in a word, and it lists a whole heap of related words, tells you how many times they’ve been searched for in the last couple of months, and rates them all according to how hard they’ll be to target for SEO.
  24. Keyword density calculator (FREE -) – Copy and paste your SEO copy, define your target keywords, and it calculates the density of each for you.
  25. Search engine spider simulator (FREE -) – Great tool for seeing what your site (or your client’s site) looks like in the eyes of a search engine. It’s only an indication, but it’s helpful, nonetheless.

I hope you find these tools useful as you go about your day-to-day copywriting tasks. I’ve come to rely on them very heavily. Obviously, they’re a only a sub-set of all the really cool stuff out there, so if you have any other suggestions, please feel free to reply to the thread on my forum that hosts this list, at http://divinewrite.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=63.

* Glenn Murray is an advertising copywriter, website copywriter, SEO copywriter, and article submission and article PR specialist. He heads copywriting studio, Divine Write, and is a director of article PR company, Article PR. He can be contacted on Sydney +612 4334 6222 or at glenn@divinewrite.com. Visit http://www.DivineWrite.com or http://www.ArticlePR.com for further details, a FREE SEO eBook, or more FREE reprint articles.

Need a newsletter article or press release written professionally? Call Glenn in Sydney Australia on +612 4334 6222 or email glenn@divinewrite.com for a creative advertising copywriter, website copywriter, or SEO copywriter.

Copywriting Survey!

By | February 24, 2012 | Non-Copywriter | No comments


ProjectCopy, in an effort to learn more about what copywriting clients want, need and expect from their copywriters, have come up with a very quick online survey for all you copywriting CLIENTS to fill in. (This ain’t for you copywriters, so stay away!)

Find the survey here!

Once the information has been gathered and scrutinised, a blog post will follow along with an infographic (potentially).

The information collected will go a long way towards improving the quality of service and work you receive from copywriters in the future!

Thank you very much for reading.

Kind regards,

James @ ProjectCopy

From Around The Blogosphere

By | February 23, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Inspiration | 2 Comments

Great! It’s another Thursday which means you lot get another fantastic dose of exceptional content from around the blogosphere!

The following articles are all must-reads so make sure you set aside some time to read em.

In the words of the Joker: “Here…we…go.”

1.Copywriting Secrets Worth Millions

2. Create A Copywriting Cheat Sheet

3. Become A Better Writer In 2012

4. 3 Self Promotion Tips From A Sales Copywriter

5.  Becoming A Copywriter

Please let me know what you think of the articles. Personally I like ‘em all…that’s why I put them in this blog…

James.

Five Stellar Tips For Making An Effective Landing Page

By | February 21, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Copywriting, Freelance Copywriters | No comments

Landing pages are akin to sales letters in the way they they are designed to get the audience to perform a certain action. In sales letters that action is to buy a product or sign up for a service. On landing pages that action might be to buy but it can also be to sign up for a newsletter or subscribe to a blog.

Landing pages are very powerful tools when it comes to engaging your prospects and boosting sales.

As mentioned on The Copywriter’s Crucible:

A finely tuned page will catch visitors when they land, push them through your benefits pitch, testimonials and success stories and then park them safely at the checkout till. Landing pages need to keep hold of a reader’s attention, have no distractions and a pitch so convincing that they’ll be falling over themselves to sign up or buy.

While snobby writers often find the hard-sell approach of landing pages to be quite ugly, the general public, more often than not, find the pages to be very compelling when they’re searching for the solutions to their problems. I mean, landing pages must work for a reason right?

Onto the tips.

1. Write down all the problems that you think people are faced with that relate to the product. If the product is a cleaning item then think of the issues most people run into when cleaning and work out which of those problems the product solves. Reminding people of the issues they have to deal with is a powerful marketing tool. Especially when combined with…

2. …the benefits! Now you have to write down all the benefits of the product. You need to tell your audience how the product solves each and every one of the problems you listed above. List the additional benefits too. These could be saving money, saving time etc. Be aware that features are not benefits. Your customers don’t care how your product does something (even if you do), they only care about the benefits they’ll enjoy because they bought your product.

3. Write in short, easy-to-digest paragraphs, you don’t want to write an essay here. You need to maintain interest and the best way to do it is to keep the content clean and concise. Tell the audience only what they need to know. Use bullet points and plenty of subheadings.

4. Use testimonials! Make sure they’re legitimate ones too. The last thing you want is to betray the trust of your audience. That’s a sure fire way to completely kill any credibility your product and business might have. Testimonials are incredibly powerful sales tools that do a great job of persuading people to do what you want them to.

5. Always repeat the best parts of your landing page right at the end. Reinforce what you’ve told your audience and remind them of the greatest benefits they’ll enjoy should they buy/sign up/subscribe from/to you.

Remember it’s going to take time to perfect the art of writing landing pages but with these tips hopefully you’ll get off to the best start possible.

Thanks for reading.

Bad Client Habits: A Lack of Communication.

By | February 18, 2012 | Copywriting, Freelance Copywriters | No comments

It really does not take long to send an email...so do it!

For me, there’s nothing more frustrating as a copywriter than sending off a draft to your client and then not hearing back from them for days or weeks at a time. Even with follow-up emails there’s sometimes a continued lack of response. I understand that my clients might be busy (funnily enough I am too!)  but not having 5 minutes, or even 30 seconds, to write a quick reply to let me know that you’re looking at the draft or let me know an approximate date when you’ll be able to get back to me in full is totally unbelievable.

One of the hallmarks of my service as a copywriter is getting back to any emails within a few short hours. Why? Because communication is the single most important aspect of business and without it nothing gets done. On top of that, throughout a project, I like to send regular emails to my clients to let them know how the project is going, ask any questions I might have or bring up any issues I’ve come across. I treat my clients as I would like to be treated so when I don’t hear back from them for a month, it’s safe to say I don’t appreciate it.

Unfortunately, there’s little I can do except encourage communication from the get-go. Phone calls often get my clients back on track but that is a last resort tactic for me as I don’t want to come across as a pest.

By no means am I saying that all my clients are like this, in fact it’s only a tiny percentage but I needed to get this off my chest!

So thank you all for reading this rant, writing this blog post has been very therapeutic for me.

What about y’all? Have any of you come across clients like that? Let me hear your ‘bad client’ stories!

From Around The Blogosphere

By | February 17, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Inspiration | 2 Comments

Here’s ProjectCopy with another great collection of articles from around the internet.

Make sure you read them and absorb the excellent advice within!

1. 3 Vital Copywriting Secrets That Filthy Rich Marketers Use to Keep Their Prospects Engaged!

2. Top 10 Copywriting Tricks To Dwell By

3. PPC Copywriting Basics

4. The Alfred Hitchcock Guide To SEO Copywriting

5. Busting the 4 Most Common Copywriting Myths

Enjoy!

Keeping Productivity Up

By | February 15, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Copywriting, Freelance Copywriters | No comments

OK this might be a little extreme but it gets my point across...at least she's drinking water.

I know very well that, as a freelance writer, there are often days (or even weeks) when your levels of productivity plummet. That lull can be due to a few different reasons: Sickness, stress, writer’s block or even just feeling blue (the latter of which can be quite common during the Winter months).

To combat those less productive days, I came up with 3 easy-to-remember tips that should help you get back on track.

1. Go for a walk – Going for a walk can be incredibly therapeutic. It gets you away from your office space and the fresh air helps to clear your head. Make sure you’re out for at least 15 minutes and don’t think about work while you’re out. By the time you come home you’ll feel refreshed and ready to go.

The bonus here is that exercise is good for you anyway and you shouldn’t be sitting at your desk all day. Try to go for a walk several times a day if you can, you’ll feel much better for it.

2. Eat right – I know that working from home can be very unhealthy. You’re surrounded by snack foods and unhealthy sweets and the temptation to keep eating is a hard one to resist. If you work from an office away from home this is less of an issue but it can still be a problem. Caffeine, sugars and too many carbohydrates will just drain you both emotionally and energetically.

To combat the problem, make sure you eat only healthy snacks such as fruit, vegetables and good proteins (nuts, peanut butter, beans etc.). Also, drink plenty of water. It’s amazing how much better you feel after a glass or two of the clear stuff.

3. Get enough sleep – When you work from home the tendency is to sit at your PC or laptop all day. Because you may not have a set time to wake up in the morning, you might think that you can stay up as late as you want and just get up when you feel like it. The problem with that attitude is that it may lead to a lack of sleep. Sleep is essential for keeping your energy levels topped up and therefore your productivity levels too.

In addition, try to set yourself a bedtime. Sticking to a routine when it comes to getting sleep can work wonders for productivity. If you’re the kind of person that goes to bed at random times throughout the week, that lack of routine might spill over into your work and that’s never a good thing in a job that requires so much discipline.

The best thing about those tips? They’re things you can do straight away that will make a huge difference. You don’t need to buy any equipment or spend a great deal of money (fruit isn’t too expensive) to feel better and become more productive.

What about you? Do you have any great tips that help you when you get lost in a funk?

Let us know!

Clients! Here Are 3 Tips To Get The Best Out Of Your Copywriter!

By | February 14, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Copywriting, Freelance Copywriters, Non-Copywriter | No comments

I’ve worked with many clients and I’ve enjoyed a very fruitful and enjoyable business relationship with most of them. However, admittedly, there are some clients who make life very difficult for me.

So what separates a good client from one who can be frustrating? I think it all comes down to preparation and understanding how a copywriter goes about his or her work. It’s not necessarily the case that the client is just a difficult one, they just need a little enlightenment.

So, with that in mind, I’ve decided to help out all of you businessmen and women out there who are looking to hire a copywriter.

1. Copywriters need a lot of research – In order to write the most effective copy, copywriters need access to a lot of research and a lot of it needs to come from you, the client. Without research how can a copywriter possibly write accurate, informative copy? As John Anghelache puts it, “It’s like asking a marksman to fire blindfolded.”

In addition to your research, a good copywriter should provide you with a brief sheet full of questions for you to answer to get things started. If you don’t have a lot of extra information to pass on to the copywriter, your brief sheet answers should at least point them in the right direction.

2. Getting your copy perfect takes time and co-operation – Don’t think that any copywriter will be able to write exactly what you want them to the first time around. That’s almost impossible. The road to great copy is paved with edits and plenty of useful communication between client and copywriter. If you’re not willing to put the time and effort in to help the copywriter, then don’t expect amazing results in turn.

Be willing to provide your input and answer any questions the copywriter might have and you’ll soon be blessed with profit-enhancing copy.

3. Lastly, make sure you set reasonable deadlines! – The bigger and more complex the project, the longer it will take to complete. If you rush the copywriter, you’ll get rushed work back that won’t be as effective as it could be had you given the copywriter enough time to work his or her magic. When you’re spending the kind of money you’ll be spending hiring a copywriter, isn’t it in your best interests to get the best possible quality of copy in return?

Give your copywriter enough time and I promise you’ll not regret it.

What do I mean by enough time? A ten page website or long-copy sales letter can take from two to four weeks whereas an email might take a few days to a week. If in doubt just ask your copywriter how long they realistically need to provide you with the best possible copy.

By following those three simple steps you should make life much easier for your copywriter and if you do that, you’ll get more effective copy in return so it’s win-win.

Discussion time!

Copywriters: Have you worked with any clueless clients recently?

Clients: Have you got any questions about copywriting methods? We’d love to answer them.

Testimonials And Why You Need Them!

By | February 11, 2012 | Advice & Insight, Freelance Copywriters, Promoting Yourself | 2 Comments

Testimonials are vital business tools

Ahh the testimonial. Along with samples of your work, testimonials are the single most important thing you’ll need to get more work and enjoy more success as a freelance copywriter.

Why? Because any prospective client is going to want proof that you can do what you say you can and one of the best ways to show that you’re not full of hot air is to show them testimonials from past clients.

The testimonial is a vital part of any business and you’re going to need a bunch of them if you want to succeed. Testimonials are easy to read and they highlight your best qualities. The best part is, you’re not the one bragging about the quality of your work and service, it’s other people. And groups of people all saying the same thing is a very powerful persuasive tool.

For example: If I wanted to buy a donut and I heard from 20 people that Donut Shop A sold amazing donuts, then I’d go there and buy one. It’s as simple as that.

You need proof that testimonials are as powerful as I say they are? Look at this report about how adding testimonials to a landing page increased this company’s sales by 34%! Amazing.

Amy Harrison over at HarrisonAmy.com has some great advice about the best way to ask for testimonials right here.

Here’s a snippet from her blog:

Remember, to get a simple but specific testimonial which paints a compelling story for your service, ask your customer to answer the following 3 questions:

  • What problem were they suffering from?
  • How did the product / service help (and were there any surprise bonuses!)
  • What were the specific results?

 

 

← Older Entries