The first week of January always has the excitement that comes with fresh starts. We have an entire year ahead of us to take action on our goals. There's so much opportunity! To commit to making the year ahead the best one yet for your copywriting business, let's lay a foundation for taking action on our goals. After all, even if we just spend five, 10, 30 minutes each day … [Read more...]
Using Improv to Improve Your Copywriting
In many areas of our lives, we're improvising without even knowing it. Even the most careful planners know that it's extremely rare for any event to go exactly as intended. Even if we think we know what someone is going to say or how someone is going to react, the outcomes of conversations or events may surprise us. As Patricia Ryan Madson, author of Improv Wisdom: Don't … [Read more...]
Fight These 10 Fears with a Systematic Process
For many copywriters, the transition to becoming a copywriter is filled with the fears that come with any major life change: inadequacy, uncertainty, being judged, and, the overall fear of failure. In the The Bravest You: 5 Steps to Fight Your Biggest Fears, Find Your Passion, and Unlock Your Extraordinary Life, author Adam Kirk Smith breaks down these common fears and six … [Read more...]
Can You Become a Copywriter if You’re Not a Grammar and Punctuation Dynamo?
A confession: I can’t diagram a sentence. I mean, I could once. In seventh grade, I was a master. But now…participles, gerunds, modifiers? I’ve got no fricking idea. Here’s the thing about rules of English—which is pretty much the same for any set of rules, really—it’s important to understand them so that you can intelligently break them. Unless you’re teaching English … [Read more...]
One Question That Can Literally Change Your Life
Okay, the bad news is that your mind doesn’t want you to be happy. (There's good news coming too, but bear with me for a moment.) Truly: The oldest part of your brain, the lizard brain, doesn’t care if you’re happy as long as you’re safe. And that means it’s going to use aaaaaall kinds of sneaky tactics to keep you in your comfort zone—even if the rest of you wants out of … [Read more...]
Will the Market Be Flooded with Copywriters?
A few nights ago, someone left a comment on one of our Facebook ads essentially saying, “Your training is all well and good, but when the market is flooded with copywriters no one will be able to find work and everyone will have to work for peanuts.” Well, that’s a pretty dire prediction. But as you’ve likely heard me say before: The people who know the least about a topic … [Read more...]
Is Handwriting Ads a Real Way to Get Copywriting Practice?
I first started hearing about this a few months ago. Someone left a comment on a post asking if there was any use in hand-copying other people’s ads to learn copywriting. Then, someone else sent an email through to us. And, after that, I found out that a few copywriting courses make hand-copying ads major pillars of their teaching. Let me make something very clear: No, … [Read more...]
The Very Common Assumptions That Will Cut Your Copywriting Business in Half
There are a lot of tasks that require focus and persistence when you’re building your copywriting business. What we’re talking about today is not one of them. The process of compiling the companies that you’re going to pitch should be easy, light-hearted, and fun. This is one part of your business-building in which I’m going to actively encourage you to go down rabbit holes. As … [Read more...]
The Perspective Shift You NEED to Make to Be Successful as a Copywriter
Here’s a short one, but an important one: When we’re writing copy for our clients, it can be tempting to view the project and your copy through your own perspective. After all, that’s the perspective you’ve been viewing things from for your entire life, right? But, when you can’t escape your own perspective, you’re doing your clients—and your career—a disservice. If you’ve ever … [Read more...]
8 Must-Listen Podcasts to Amp Up Your Digital Marketing Knowledge
If you want to stay on top of your game, you can never stop learning. And thank goodness, right? How boring would life (and our careers) be if we never had to learn anything new? Well, good news: as copywriters, we’re in the world of digital marketing and that world is always changing and developing. With new sites, programs, and even means of communication (hello, … [Read more...]