VOLUME 21, ISSUE 11 – NOVEMBER 2022
THIS MONTH’S MENU:
I. APPETIZER: STRATEGIES FOR CATCHING & KEEPING CLIENTS
“You Had Me at PDF,” Refer Madness & Strategic Stalking
II. “FIELD” GREENS: THE FIVE VIRTUES OF A GOOD WRITER
Wisdom from Legendary Journalist & Author, Henry Hazlitt
III. MAIN “MEAT” COURSE: GOT PROJECT FATIGUE?
Six Strategies to Overcome (& Prevent) the “I’m-SO-Over- It!” Feeling
IV. DESSERT: COMBO SUCCESS STORY & TIP
Japan-based FLCW Lands BIG WS Gig; Boosts Income & Confidence
I. APPETIZER: STRATEGIES FOR CATCHING & KEEPING CLIENTS
“You Had Me at PDF,” Refer Madness & Strategic Stalking
Sometime back, I shared a story in the E-PUB about landing a client off LinkedIn, who was looking for help writing some press releases.
I’d shared with her a link to a mini-portfolio (PDF) of releases that I’d loaded to my site, and that was all it took to earn her business.
By focusing her attention on exactly what she was looking for, I made it easy for her to hire me.
That client became a regular: press releases, web copy, sales sheets, case studies, white papers and more. She loved the work I was doing, and whenever things got a little quiet, I’d reach out.
But, instead of asking, in essence, “Got any work for me?” I’d say:
“Hey ____, Hope you’re well! FYI, I’m in a lull between projects right now, so I’ve got some bandwidth in the short term, in case you’ve got anything on tap. Let me know!”*
As her “go-to” writer, she was hiring me steadily, she knew the quality of my work, and she’d know I was staying busy.
Letting her know I was free in the short term might just have her accelerate any upcoming projects before someone else grabbed my time.
Won’t always work, but given the 60-second investment, why not do it?
Then I found out she was taking a new job—a change that can often end a good run with a client.
But I barely had time to freak out because she made introductions to both her successor and a counterpart in a sister company (when long-time contacts leave, always ask for intros to their successor if they don’t offer first).
Both have turned into steady work, and the first one recently emailed me along with her counterpart in yet another sister company, and with these words:
“Peter, I wanted to introduce you to ____. He’s looking to ramp up his marketing efforts across the board and I told him you have been a phenomenal resource – so good in fact, I almost hesitated sharing your info!”
When you do good work for your clients, they spread the word. Yet, the subtext of her joke (half-serious, I’d wager…) is clear: “We want to make sure we can get access to him when we need to.”
I also reached out to my old contact in her new role, though, as yet, nothing has come of it. That said, I recently made multiple contacts—through LinkedIn—to another ex-client in her new job, and, after reconnecting, I’ve lined up a meeting with her new CEO to do a white paper.
The lessons? Develop these habits (to paraphrase Garrison Keillor’s sign-off): do good work, ask for referrals and keep in touch (through LinkedIn) with clients when they take new jobs.
If they liked your work in their past company, they’ll no doubt have writing needs in their new role. On that “keep-those-projects-coming” note, let’s eat!
*PS. While writing this little “check-in” script, I realized I hadn’t heard from one regular client about a monthly piece I do for them. I emailed her the cut-and-pasted script, and an hour later, got this: “Thank you so much for checking in! This month has flown by!” along with a new assignment. Just sayin’… 😉
II. “FIELD” GREENS: THE FIVE VIRTUES OF A GOOD WRITER
Wisdom from Legendary Journalist & Author, Henry Hazlitt
Came across this wonderful checklist-style piece (trimmed it down from the original, posted here) from journalist Dan Sanchez, who expands on timeless advice from renowned—and long-lived!—journalist and author, Henry Hazlitt (1894-1993).
While written for writers in general, it seems almost tailor-made for commercial freelancers. A solid reference/reminder with tons of useful detail. Enjoy!
Henry Hazlitt: “The reader who seeks to write well and think well should aim first at…the Five Virtues of Coherence, Clarity, Precision, Simplicity, and Brevity, and [vigilantly abstain] from the Five Vices of Incoherence, Obscurity, Vagueness, Pedantry, and Circumlocution.”
A few of my own thoughts on these writing virtues and corresponding vices…
1) Coherence is the quality of forming a unified, integrated whole. For a writing piece to have coherence, it must have a clear purpose, and every constituent part of it must contribute toward that purpose. Long digressions and non sequiturs can make a piece incoherent.
2) Clarity is about being easily understood by the reader. Often attaining greater clarity in exposition goes hand-in-hand with attaining greater clarity in your own understanding of the topic. Comprehension and comprehensibility are two sides of the same coin.
For a piece to be clear, it must flow well narratively and logically. Each passage must advance the story and/or argument of the piece in a way that naturally follows what came before it.
Clear writing must also be complete. It must not omit any points necessary for the reader to understand what you’re saying. Missing context will obscure your message. Unfamiliar…jargon will make your presentation opaque to the lay reader.
Remember the reader does not share all your knowledge. Be wary of presuming that a necessary connection will “go without saying.” (PB: Sounds like “The Curse of Knowledge” to me!)
3) Precision is about being exact and specific in conveying your meaning, and…is often a matter of “playing around” with a sentence to find just the right wording and phrasing to accurately get your meaning across. Consulting a dictionary and a thesaurus can be helpful for this.
4) Simplicity is about limiting your exposition only to the essential. Writers with extensive knowledge of their subject…often…over-share arcane details. Shoot [to provide] your reader an important lesson that is simple enough to be fully digested in one sitting.
5) Brevity is about getting your meaning across in as few words as necessary (but no fewer; brevity in excess can result in vagueness and obscurity). [C]ut, compress, and recombine wording to make sentences more concise and elegant.
Prune sentences that don’t “carry their weight”—that don’t contribute enough value to justify the additional work they demand from the reader.
III. MAIN “MEAT” COURSE: GOT PROJECT FATIGUE?
Six Strategies to Overcome (& Prevent) the “I’m-SO-Over- It!” Feeling
Great tips for managing a copywriting challenge we’ve all experienced—much of it excellent standalone advice—from friend, colleague, “business-building coach for writers and copywriters” (& E-PUB regular), Ed Gandia.
See if this sounds familiar.
You’re working on a client assignment and you’re enjoying the work for the first three-quarters of the project. But by the time you get to the last quarter, you couldn’t be more done with it!
Here are six strategies to prevent and minimize the pain of project fatigue:
Strategy #1: Step away
It’s amazing how differently you can feel returning to a project after even a short break.
If your deadline allows for it, try putting the entire project aside for a day or two. You may find you’re able to take one more solid swing at it when you return. If it helps, start building this “break” time into your project timelines.
Strategy #2: Take on multiple projects
Of course, putting a project aside is easier if you have other projects you can work on in the meantime.
Shifting your focus to another project can act as a kind of a break. (As the saying goes, sometimes a change is as good as a rest!)
Strategy #3: Take on more diverse projects
Project fatigue is especially prevalent if you write longer pieces of content (e.g., books) or write the same types of content over and over again.
Having a more diverse mix of projects can provide relief. Sometimes it helps to jump on, say, a quick blog post project when you’ve been deep into a white paper for days.
Again, this is something you can plan for. For example, if a client awards you six case studies, try to sprinkle other kinds of projects in between.
Strategy #4: Bring in help at the end
For me, it’s the final editing and proofreading that often sends me over the edge at the end of a project. If that’s the case for you, consider bringing in an editor or proofreader to get you across the finish line.
Having a second set of eyes on your work is always a good idea—even if you’re not bored to death of it. And editing and proofing is easy to outsource.
Strategy #5: Bring in help at the beginning
If there’s a type of project that you do repeatedly for a client, consider bringing in a junior writer to handle the bulk of it for you.
You provide them direction at the start, and then come in again at the end to review and edit. This lessens your involvement—and can lessen your fatigue.
Strategy #6: Work more efficiently
Spending more time than you need to on a project can also exacerbate project fatigue. The more efficiently you work, the less time you spend on a project, and the less fatigued you’ll become.
That’s why I use the 50-minute focus technique (article on this archived here). It not only helps me work more efficiently, but it forces me to pace myself.
Because if you go gangbusters on a project for a couple days with few breaks, you’ll be pretty sick of it by day three.
You CAN Reduce Project Fatigue
Most of us will experience project fatigue at one time or another. But once you know the strategies that work best for you, you can take steps to reduce it.
When you do finally get that project out the door, take a moment to celebrate!
IV. DESSERT: COMBO SUCCESS STORY & TIP
Japan-based FLCW Lands BIG WS Gig; Boosts Income & Confidence
Got this cool success story from Osaka, Japan-based FLCW Tim McKnight.
All sorts of good lessons here: persistence; trying new approaches (I don’t typically recommend Upwork, but if you set your terms, as Tim did, it can work); shooting high on a fee (you can always come down, but it’s far harder to go up!); only reducing his fee in return for a reduction in project scope; quoting flat fees vs. hourlies; etc.
And yes, a few kinds words about my resources… 😉 Enjoy!
Hi Peter: Just thought I’d let you know I had quite a win recently.
I’d been resisting Upwork, but an acquaintance just said to give it a shot, nothing to lose. So, I made several pitches, but no companies posted writing jobs in my niche.
Then, as if by divine intervention, a plastics distributor—my niche—from the U.S. invited me to write a sample web page for them for $300, with an eye towards doing a major overhaul of their website.
They liked what I did—a blend of business conversational and technical—and invited me to write 40 new product pages for them!
When the marketing manager asked for pricing, I went in a little higher than she’d hoped, so we revised the scope a bit in exchange for a small reduction in the fee. In any case, it will come out to around $15K or so.
They’ve never worked with an external writer before, only graphic designers, and were happy to go with the fixed project fee instead of an hourly rate.
This has been a huge confidence booster, and now enables me to legitimately call myself a copywriter for my niche.
Thanks very much for your kind words of encouragement, and for putting together the tools of the trade. The Toolbox has been a great help in gathering information for the project.
Incidentally, my brother—a schoolteacher in Australia and a talented writer—is looking at copywriting as a career change.
I recommended TWFW so he bought a copy, and since then, he’s landed an interview and some small content pieces with a local ad agency. He’ll likely do well at copywriting if that’s where he wants to go.
So, bit of good news from a happy customer/client!
(NOTE: Tim’s client suggested he do one page of the web site first. On huge projects (i.e., big web sites, full-length books, etc.), if clients wanting an estimate don’t suggest doing a sample first (paid, of course), you should, as it will give both of you a chance to see what it’s like to work together, and, just as importantly, ensure you estimated accurately.)