Category: Freelancing

I am an introvert. Here’s how I went from fearing authority to speaking on stages.

“I was Patient Zero of losing a personal reputation on a global scale almost instantaneously.”

^^ Monica Lewinsky at a Women’s Day presentation I attended in 2017. 

Yes, that Monica Lewinsky. The woman who, by some POVs, almost brought down Bill Clinton’s presidency because she kept a certain blue dress. 

Her presentation was so well crafted on the subject of cyber bullying, I couldn’t stop watching. But it also felt like a warning: visibility can be bad. Making yourself into a household name might not be the business windfall you think

URL to post

How to Survive Your First Recession (or Any Other Disaster) as a Freelance Copywriter

While the world at large is discovering Zoom and hoarding toilet paper, I am celebrating a milestone in my freelance copywriting business.
No, it wasn’t hitting the six-figure mark.
And no, I didn’t score an interview on an episode of MarieTV. At least yet.
It’s that I received the following email from a client in response to the COVID-19 outbreak around the world….
And I turned down the offer.

Before you type out a “WHY DIDN’T YOU TAKE THE OFFER TO GET PAID EARLY” comment, let me be clear…
I am grateful that after

URL to post

Forget Ad Revenue. Here’s How to Monetize Your Blog to the Tune of $185,975/year, Ad-free

They say hard work is a reward unto itself.

But for most freelancers – you know, the kind with bills and a constant eye on their bank balance – it’s a lot more rewarding when work turns into hard cash.

Let’s face it: There’re only so many pats on the back you can survive on when you’re trying to make money from your blog.

Like, five. Maybe seven, tops.

Eventually, probably sooner rather than later, you need to take those pats on the back and turn them into bank account deposits.

In

URL to post

How to be a freelance copywriter when you suck at doing what freelancers are “supposed” to do

Back in 1949, a psychologist from the University of Wisconsin set out to study primate behavior.
Harry Harlow and a couple of his colleagues set up an experiment.
Source: Drive by Daniel H. Pink
They got some monkeys together, prepared a simple puzzle, put the puzzle in front of the monkeys and watched the scene unfold.
The scientists expected the monkeys to show disinterest.
But when the monkeys saw the puzzle, they began solving it. Immediately. With zero treats or incentives.
Over the next 14 days, Harlow and his team watched the monkeys problem-solve

URL to post

Is $5000 a lot to charge for a sales page? We asked 14 marketers who hire freelancers. What they revealed could help you land your next project.

I spent the last 4 days writing a long-form sales page for one of our Copy Hackers programs.
At my day rate of $5000, that’s a $20,000 investment.
Given what a long-form sales page can do for revenue generation, $20K is money well-spent.
But not everyone would agree with that. Few would. And, to be honest, even yours truly would have a very, very hard time paying a freelance copywriter $20,000 to write a sales page. I’d need… well, we’re gonna get into what people like moi would need in order to

URL to post

I used cold emails to 14x my freelance copywriting business. Here’s how. (Includes templates.)

Cold emails aren’t a numbers game.
You don’t have to send 1000s of emails just to score a disheartening open rate of 2%.
(That’s the often-touted open rate for cold emails, BTW.)
That’s all just a lie perpetuated by marketers who suck at cold emailing… and who want to make you feel like you’re as horrible at this delicate skill as they are.
Truth be told:
Cold emails can – and do – work.
How do I know?
Because I used 328 of ’em to launch my business and grow it 1400% in 4 months.

URL to post

Client Management the Mad Men Way

This July, we celebrate the 10th anniversary of the premier of season 1, episode 1 of Mad Men, the 1960s era show that validated and united everyone who’s worked in advertising.
Ten years later, we’re still nostalgically sharing marketing insights coined by Don Draper and consoling ourselves with Roger Sterling’s account management axioms:
“My father used to say this is the greatest job in the world except for one thing: the clients.”
Ahh… the double-edged sword of clients.
Despite his mastery of persuasion, Don Draper couldn’t handle client management on his own. After losing

URL to post

Note to Self, On Time Management

Dear Joanna,
This year, you gained 8 pounds.
You skipped the gym more than you went.
You sat at your desk (or a desk in a hotel) almost every single day of the year. At least 360 days of it. And when you were at a desk, you were there for eight or ten – sometimes 14 – hours at a time. Even on Sundays. Even though you promised Dave you’d take Sundays off.
Your almost-mother-in-law said you looked tired every time she saw you.
You cancelled your vacation to Hawaii. “Too busy.”
You cancelled a book

URL to post

The #1 Reason You Get Writer’s Block (and How to Fix It for Good)

‘That’s it – I can’t do this anymore!’
I was six months into my copywriting career, and I was ready to give up.
Here’s the crazy thing: I was making good money at one of the largest email marketing companies in the world… a $600m-a-year behemoth many people call the “Harvard of direct response copywriting.”
It was a dream job for anybody aspiring copywriter… and the perfect place to learn the skills I’d need to make SERIOUS bank in the years to come.
Yet I STILL wanted to quit.
I couldn’t handle the frustration.
You see…
I’d

URL to post

How to Set Up Your Home Office So You Can Be a More Productive Freelance Copywriter

I hate to break it to you:
If you’re a freelancer, the world is against you.
Well, maybe not the whole world.
But your partner, your family, email, Netflix, Facebook, the dog (or cat), the neighbors, your friends—they’re all against you.
It’s not personal. They’re against me too.
Oh sure, your friends and family say they want you to succeed as a freelancer.
But their actions tell a different story.
The people who love you are among the constant distractions that keep you from getting your work done.
Same with the dog. Or cat.
And email, Twitter, Netflix,

URL to post