VOLUME 19, ISSUE 11 – NOVEMBER 2020
THIS MONTH’S MENU:
I. APPETIZER: YES, CLIENTS LIKE THIS ACTUALLY DO EXIST
Yours Truly Learns that a Really GOOD Client Is a Really SMART Client
II. “FIELD” GREENS: WORRIED ABOUT NDAs?
Yours Truly’s “Don’t Worry” Q&A with FLCW About Non-Disclosure Agreements
III. MAIN “MEAT” COURSE: GET IMPORTANT (BUT NOT URGENT) TASKS DONE!
Small-Biz Coach Serves Up Simple How-to for Outsmarting Your Human Nature
IV. DESSERT: SWEET SUCCESS STORY & TIP
UK FLCW Accepts His Client’s Perception of Him Over His Own
TIP: Multiple Stories of BIG Freelance Success (from Business Insider)
I. APPETIZER: YES, CLIENTS LIKE THIS ACTUALLY DO EXIST
Yours Truly Learns that a Really GOOD Client Is a Really SMART Client
So, I had an experience not long ago that reinforced for me the profile of an “ideal” client. No, we won’t always find ones this good, but having this as the goal will, at the very least, have you get close, and push back from anything that falls far short.
As a baseline requirement, with rare exceptions, I’ll work only with clients that won’t balk at my estimates, because they understand that strong skills require handsome wages. And when you take care of writers, financially, you get good performance out of them.
So, this client in question accepted my healthy quote with no questions asked, but here’s where she had me do a head-cocking, Scooby-Doo-style, “Huh??” Check this out…
In addition to not questioning my quote, she insisted that I charge her, not only for the PayPal fees I incurred by billing them for the job through PayPal, but also—you sittin’ down?—for the time it took me to review the relevant source materials in order to generate an estimate.
Yes, it was a small pile of stuff, but, who does that?? No one else in my 27 years in the biz, that’s who.
She told me she had a team of freelancers (writers, designers, photographers, etc.) she worked with (some of them for up to 20 years!), and who followed her from job to job. That of course doesn’t happen unless you’ve built up some serious mutual trust, and based, of course, on mutual benefit.
And a funny thing happened when I realized I was working for a client who took seriously good care of her writers…
I found myself devoting additional time, beyond the plenty I’d already invested. The day I was to submit my first draft, I decided to take one more look—to determine what, if anything, was missing or “off,” and coming up with other ideas to improve it.
Interesting dynamic: A client treating you right opens the door to you doing your best work.
Respect begats respect, and ends up yielding a classic win-win. And that just won’t happen if you’re working for a client who beats you up on your estimate, expects more than they’re entitled to, and in general, views you as a necessary nuisance vs. a valued partner.
Sadly, she got downsized in the wake of COVID, and she’s using the time to travel, and find the right opportunity. But, you can bet that yours truly is connected to her on LinkedIn, and checking in every few months to say hello. Clients like her are rare, and whenever/wherever she lands, I’ll be ready.
II. “FIELD” GREENS: WORRIED ABOUT NDAs?
Yours Truly’s “Don’t Worry” Q&A with FLCW About Non-Disclosure Agreements
Recently exchanged a few emails with a new FLCW concerned about a client, asking her to sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement). She wrote:
Peter: I’m feeling a tad iffy about signing an NDA and inadvertently putting myself on the hook for something down the road. I have no intention of sharing the organization’s internal info but when it comes to any ideas or concepts I personally develop, I wouldn’t want those ideas to automatically be considered property of the organization.
Although I’m not currently helping what could be seen as competitors, I do have a friend operating in the same space as this group. So, if I happen to want to share similar marketing ideas, strategies, contacts that I develop through the efforts of my own networking, then I want to feel free to do so. Am I overthinking this?
Any advice or thoughts for your newbie writer here? Not asking for legal advice. More like, “What would Peter do?”
My reply: NDAs are standard in the business. Nothing wrong with a company asking you to not reveal discussions you had within their four walls. Strategies or approaches you might choose to take with one entity that are similar to ones you took with another entity are a different issue.
Obviously, you wouldn’t use the SAME copy/concepts, etc., with one company that you already used with another, but sharing a similar (but not identical) idea/concept with one company that you employed with another isn’t covered by an NDA, especially if they’re in non-competitive businesses.
Years ago, I came up with a tagline for a construction company: We Build Certainty. Point was, by hiring them, you didn’t just get a good building, you got a predictable building process, which was crucially important for a company wanting to plan.
A few years later, I was working with a company that built materials-handling (think UPS) and baggage-handling systems (think airports)—a totally non-competitive business to a construction company.
I shared with them the tagline I wrote for the first company, they loved the message it conveyed, felt it matched their own value proposition, and based on that, we created a tag line for them: We Deliver Certainty.
Where many freelancers understandably have issues are with non-compete clauses. And while I’m no attorney, they’re generally unenforceable, and the conventional wisdom around them is that you shouldn’t sign one because it essentially limits your income, and closes off earning opportunities.
III. MAIN “MEAT” COURSE: GET IMPORTANT (BUT NOT URGENT) TASKS DONE
Small-Biz Coach Serves Up Simple How-to for Outsmarting Your Human Nature
Important, but NON-urgent tasks are the easiest to fall through the cracks. They’re things that mean something to you, but there’s no immediate fallout from not doing them.
Great piece from friend, colleague and small-business coach, Ed Gandia, with solid tactics for short-circuiting your normal inclinations, so you get those tasks done. Enjoy!
Do you have a list of things you really want to get done—or habits you want to start—but you just can’t seem to find the time?
Maybe it’s launching your newsletter. Or starting to create that info-product. Or even hitting the gym.
You know, the “someday” items. Items that are important but not urgent. And so that someday never comes.
Here are three strategies you can use to get your “someday” items done:
- Schedule your “someday” items first thing in the day: I start every day with a morning routine where I meditate, write in my gratitude journal and read.
Why do I start my day with these items? Because if I don’t do them first thing, they simply don’t get done (believe me, I’ve tried!). It’s been proven that when you schedule your someday items first thing in your day, those someday items get done.
- Bundle or “habit stack” your to-dos: Every morning, I have two tasks I want accomplish: my morning routine and spending time with my kids. Because I have the responsibility of getting my youngest child up and to school, this habit is hard-wired into my day. My morning routine, on the other hand, is something I might be tempted to skip.
To make sure that BOTH of these activities become habits, I’ve “bundled” or “stacked” the two of them together. By stacking them, I’m using the power of my existing habit to make sure that my new habit gets done.
For more on habit stacking, check out the excellent book Habit Stacking: 97 Small Life Changes That Take Five Minutes or Less by S.J. Scott.
- Reduce the friction in your to-dos: For weeks, I was determined to get to the gym, and decided that right before lunch was the best time to go. And I figured I’d use the strategy of habit stacking to link my new habit (the gym) to an existing habit (breaking for lunch). So, it should work, right?
Not really. Week after week, my “get to the gym” plans never materialized. Eventually, I realized the problem. I had too much “friction” in the task.
I work from my home office. The gym is a seven-minute drive away. It’s not far, but I still had to extricate myself from my desk, get in the car and drive to the gym. Believe it or not, this was enough of an obstacle (friction) to prevent me from doing the task consistently.
I reduced this friction by going to the gym right after dropping my youngest at school in the morning. I’m not saving that much time by going straight there. But I’m already in the car, dressed and ready to go. So, it feels easier.
This new approach stacks the task of going to the gym on top of the habit of driving my son to school, instead of breaking for lunch. And that’s made all the difference.
Use These Strategies to Get Your Someday Items Done
Think about all the items on your to-do list, whether habits or internal projects.
- Which ones are you already doing consistently?
- Which ones should you do first thing in the day?
- Which ones should you bundle or “habit stack” with existing habits?
- And where can you remove friction to get things going more smoothly?
If you apply these strategies, you’ll find yourself getting your someday items done consistently and with less effort.
IV. DESSERT: SWEET SUCCESS STORY & TIP
UK FLCW Accepts His Client’s Perception of Him Over His Own
TIP: Multiple Stories of BIG Freelance Success (from Business Insider)
A cool success story—of a different sort—from long-time UK FLCW (and email friend) Doug Jenner. He underscores the age-old self-belief gap that plagues so many writers (yes, me, too). I love how he connects the dots between his varying backgrounds and his latest career coup, something I’m always noticing.
My 15+ years of sales and marketing experience before I started writing, while not ultimately the best fit for me, proved to be enormously helpful in not only building my business, but in writing good marketing copy for my clients. Thanks, Doug!
After that, an inspirational link from Business Insider showcasing folks like us who’ve built thriving practices and how they did it.
Hey Peter: I was just thinking of the support you gave me during those early years, when I gave up a long and successful teaching career to have a go at supporting myself with copywriting. As you suggested, I used your book as a basic business plan and over time, it did the job for me, and I’m still standing after 12 or so years.
In your second edition of TWFW, you included a snippet from me on self-belief. I’d had no experience in marketing. I was a mere teacher. I saw that as an obstacle to be overcome. Funny how I look back now and realise I needn’t have seen it that way.
I now know that working as a generalist copywriter in just about every conceivable market sector has to make you into something of a marketing expert. As evidenced by the fact that, last year, one of my clients asked me to be their Head of Marketing.
I thought, “Little old me, a head of marketing? Come on!” But then, it’s always about the way others perceive you, isn’t it?
When this particular client first came to me, I assumed it was for some kind of copy. But no. We’d ended up having a long chat about processes, developing marketing stuff. The kind of change management I’d been involved with as a head of curriculum, way back in my teaching life. Stuff I still get enthused by.
I met with the Managing Director and agreed on a process to overhaul the entire brand. Over the next 18 months, we developed a statement of core values, a competitor analysis, tone-of-voice guidelines, a strapline, colour palettes, fonts and logos.
It all went in a new brand book, which we’re are now using to develop the company’s long-neglected marketing. In the wake of all that, they offered me the Head of Marketing role.
The processes, the strategies, the team workshops—all the confidence to do that came from my teaching background. The content in those workshops—all that came from my 10+ years of copywriting experience.
What’s interesting, from a copywriting perspective, is how the writing came so naturally, because it was part of the processes I was involved with. No need for the client to hire a copywriter; all that was part of the package.
So, this is a great gig, an ongoing contract, but I’m still a one-man-band and I know it could end before I want it to. As you’re so fond of saying, the self-marketing effort must be ongoing. And one big egg in the basket is dangerous, as I’ve found to my cost in the past.
The beat goes on, but no matter what success I have—and I know I’m pretty good at this now—I always doubt my ability to do the job. The imposter syndrome. But then, I also had that when I was a teacher.
I’ve been meaning to send you this for a while; I’m pleased I finally got around to it.
I recently came across a really cool compilation of freelancer success stories from the Business Insider web site, and complete with some mighty clever and resourceful strategies being employed.
In these weird and uncertain times, it never hurts to be reminded of what success as a freelancer looks like and how others have gotten there. Enjoy!