November 2025

I. When Clients Change Their Minds

Learn PB’s template for responding to copy-direction changes.

Here’s some evergreen advice from Well-Fed Writer founder, Peter Bowerman, on how to professionally deal with a client’s change in content direction. Read and heed!

Sometime back, I was working with a client on a copywriting project, and based on our initial phone meeting and source material, I had generated a deliverable.

After she’d reviewed my work, she emailed me:

“I’m revisiting the focus of this project and would like to try again. I understand there will be an additional fee so please let me know what that would be.”

While, at least, she understood how the world worked, her note, if read by a less experienced copywriter, might have yielded a heavily discounted rate just to keep her happy. Needless to say, that doesn’t describe me…

I wrote back:

“Sounds like the project will have a very different focus from your original vision, yes? If so, then I have to consider this new work. That said, given some familiarity with the material, I can take off (~15%) from the original fee.”

Notice a few things I did here:

I reiterated what she’d told me to confirm that I’d interpreted her words correctly. Also, no words like, “I’m afraid I’ll have to…”; “Forgive me for…”; or “Is that OK for you?”

Just a matter-of-fact response to a matter-of-fact development in the project, with no need to explain or apologize.

Her response:

“That sounds fair. Can you send me a link to pay?”

Bottom line, when direction changes, the fee is renegotiated, and if the direction change is a significant departure from the original, treat it like you’re starting from scratch.

II. “Use-it-or-Lose-it” Budgets Equal Year-End Wins

Help clients hold onto budgets to boost your year-end earnings.

Holiday campaigns aren’t the only things clients are thinking about this November. This is also when many departments and teams submit next year’s budgets for approval. 

Some of those budgets are use-it-or-lose-it.

If your client doesn’t use this year’s allocated budget, they’ll be approved for less moving forward, which can negatively impact their plans for 2026. 

Outreach now could help clients solve this problem by using, and preserving, those budgets, while scoring you some extra work in the process. 

Contact clients who might be in this position, and see if there’s anything they could use help with before the end of the year.  

No time to take on those gigs before January? 

See if your client is open to a full, or partial, up-front payment to reserve your time in the New Year. They use their budget and stay on top of important projects. You don’t burn yourself out to make it happen.

Win-win all-around. 

Remember: Not all companies operate on a calendar-based fiscal year. Make a note of when your clients’ fiscal years end, and you can use this tactic at those times as well. 

III. Should You Drop Your Fee for an “Easy” Job?

One FLCW asks whether or not they should drop their fee for easy work.

As you might know, I’ve been working through some old reader emails for the new Well-Fed Writer Mailbag series, adding a second opinion from another experienced pro.

In the most recent update, Peter was asked about an “easy” gig with a stubborn client who offered a set rate that was a whopping 75% lower than this writer’s usual rate.

You can probably imagine our response: basically, don’t do it!

But their question touched on another issue we covered in a recent EPUB… why it’s rarely a good idea to charge hourly fees as a freelance writer.

So the answer to this one is simple, but there’s still more to consider than the initial yes/no.

Read both of our responses in the updated Mailbag post.

Do you have a question you’d like me to answer in a future Mailbag update? Email me at mailbag@wellfedwriter.com.

Do you have a FLCW success story or quick tip you’d like to share, or a question you’d like to see answered, in a future newsletter? Email your story to epub@wellfedwriter.com, and it could be featured in the EPUB.