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Category: Content Advice

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7 attributes of great financial copywriters

A great financial copywriter

Financial copywriters are a specialist breed and you need to make sure you are hiring the right one.

Some of the attributes you’ll be looking for from your financial copywriter are obvious, some not so and may surprise you.

But all of the things in this post are important to consider if you are about to trust your brand to a writer.

Copywriting experience

Well it goes without saying right?

But really, if you are looking for a copywriter then hire a copywriter, don’t think that someone from the office can do it because ‘it’s only a few words’.

Copywriting takes skill and is harder than it looks.

You might want to find someone who understands SEO or who has experience writing for an insurance company or someone who is really good at making techincal subjects accessible.

But whatever you want you’ll need a copywriter

Financial experience

This is always helpful.

OK so some financial copywriters are amazing even though they have never worked in financial services but not many.

Frankly if you want someone to write about your accountancy software or your B2C loans or your whizzy new fintech app then it’s going to be a lot easier if the person understands a chart of accounts and APR calculations.

It saves you a lot of time explaining things too!

Financial copywriter at his desk
5 ways a financial copywriter can help your business

Something to add

What’s the difference between a good financial copywriter and a great one?

No it’s not a joke.

Genuinely, the difference is that a great financial copywriter will add something to your business.

They’ll come with ideas, tips and tricks to make your copy stand out.

They’ll have something to add to the conversation and it might even be totally unrelated to the copy they are writing.

Good standard of English

You might think that this is a given in the copywriting industry but you’d be wrong.

I’m always amazed when I see work from other writers that just doesn’t make sense.

Or has speeling errors (just my little joke).

Or has clearly been written by AI.

If that spelling error is annoying you then think what it will do to your clients.

Attention to detail

This isn’t just the details that go along with copywriting; it’s the detail that goes along with the gig.

Answering emails

Asking questions is they don;t understand

Making sure their copy is accurate

Delivering on time.

This is one thing that gets my goat. You have a deadline and I’d expect to deliver my copy by then if not before.

Some copywriters just don’t bother.

They get you

This is one of those ‘soft’ things that can’t be quantified but it is absolutely imperative.

They have to get you.

They have to get your company.

They have to understand your tone of voice.

If there’s a mismatch then it’s likely that the copy they provide, whilst great, doesn’t quite do what you want it to.

A great financial copywriter will understand what you are about and how to add real value to your team.

You like them

People laugh when I say this but one of the reasons that I went freelance is that I wanted the freedom to work with people I like.

And you should like your copywriter too.

Life is too short for tetchy meetings and awkward email exchanges.

It’s Friday PM and you want to talk about your campaign but you don’t mind having a little bit of a laugh too.

You have to like the people you are working with, otherwise the time passes very slowly indeed.

Financial copywriters are a different breed

We work differently and we think differently but we’re not that odd!

Someone who has worked in finance for any length of time will understand that there are some things you can say and some you can’t.

They’ll be as invested in the work as you are.

And they’ll add to the project by bringing their knowledge and experience to bear.

If you’d like to have a chat and find out how I can help your business then click the button and let’s talk.

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

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5 items of content marketing that every accountant must use

Two accountants content marketing discussion

For go-ahead accountants content marketing is the way to go.

If you are looking to grow your practice, or if you just want to make sure your current clients are more engaged and understand all the services that you offer, then you need to be producing content.

And there are some bits of content that are absolutely essential for your content marketing.

So here’s my list of the top 5 things you need to be doing to make sure your accountancy firm stays ahead of the game with its marketing.

#1 – Blog posts

You have got a blog haven’t you?

This the absolute number 1 thing you need.

Firstly it shows your clients that you are an up to date, current practice rather than a firm that put a website up just because it was the done thing.

Make sure you are producing useful stuff though, and make sure its relevant to your focused target market.

And if you don’t have the time then pay me to do it.

Yellow tomato - content advice for accountants
Find out why choosing your focus is so important here

#2 – Technical updates

OK so I’m not talking about technical updates in the way that you or I understand them.

What I am talking about is a digest of a technical development but presented in an easy to understand format.

The aim here is to inform your clients about changes like MTD, IR35 or RTI but in a way that makes is accessible for them.

Essentially you are saying “here’s a problem, here’s how we can solve it for you.”

#3 – Videos

OK so I know you don’t like to see yourself on the screen and you hate the sound of your own voice but 82% of Twitter users for instance consume video content.

But don’t worry. It’s perfectly acceptable to employ an actor to voice or present your videos and they can be surprisingly cheap.

You can also use things like Powtoon to produce an animated video that doesn’t even need to feature you as a talking head.

#4 – Webinars

Remember that you aren’t really selling anything on your site, as a professional what you are looking to do is to increase your credibility in the mind of the client.

Webinars on specific subjects of interest to your clients are a great way to do this.

Look at linking up with other professionals who may have more experience and pool your resources and this can be a very cheap way of driving traffic.

Just make sure you record it so that users can watch it later on.

#5 – Expert reports, white papers or eBooks

One of the first questions that academics get asked when they are looking for a job is “what have you published”.

It’s a way of potential employers understanding how much of an expert the professor or researcher actually is.

So that’s my question for you – “what have you published”?

Producing a meaty piece of content that explores a subject in depth and cements your reputation as a subject matter expert is perfect.

It’s also great for using in an advertising or link building campaign.

Use content marketing for your accountants to grow your firm

Content marketing has a great ROI and done properly it can be long lived and very cost effective.

There are tens, maybe hundreds of types of content marketing that accountants can use but you MUST have these five.

Admittedly this takes time and may need a bit of expert advice and that’s where I come in.

call now or drop me a message and let’s talk about how I can help you boost your practice marketing.

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

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What is Bounce rate?

bounce rate image

Bounce rate is a measure used to work out how useful your site is to visitors.

Bounce is one of those things that people will tell you is massively important whilst others will tell you it doesn’t matter at all.

In fact, the likelihood is that it is somewhere in between and, together with lots of other metrics go to show search engines that yours is a good site.

So how is bounce rate worked out?

Bounce rate is fairly simple to work out. It is just a percentage score of how many visitors consume your initial content and then go on and read something else – or more accurately don’t!

Check out the vid about bounce rate!

In general terms zero bounce is good, 100% bounce is bad.

So if your visitor reads a second piece of content then it reduces your rate which is a good thing.

But…

Low bouncing isn’t necessarily good (and a high one isn’t necessarily bad)

It really depends upon what sort of site you have.

So a shop site would expect a very low bounce rate whilst a site that is all about getting people to sign up to a mailing list would be fine with a high one.

And that’s the problem with looking at this in isolation – it ignores what your site is for.

If you have a mature site and your bounce rate is ridiculously low (say 20% or lower) then it kind of suggests that something is wrong with your analytics.

If you have a brand new site and you are at 100% then that’s absolutely fine because it takes time to get a wealth of information on your site so that people have something else to read.

In general services type sites are good if they are in the 50% range and shop sites need to be under this but again, a shop site with a bounce rate that is 50% but converts 5% of visitors to customers is better than one with a 30% bounce that converts 2%.

More resources
Want more resources to help with your website? Click the image

What can you do about your bounce rate?

The first and most important thing is to have good, relevant content on your site.

The more content you have then the more likely it is that people will read more than one page.

Reduce the size of your pages too.

People may not want to read 2,500 words but they would happily read three posts of 800 words each.

Also make sure it’s easy to navigate round your site.

Split your content into chunks so that people read one and then naturally follow to another page to read the next part of the story.

You can also make sure that you point people to related pages. After all, someone who reads one post about SEO is clearly interested in the subject so may like to check out more of your SEO posts.

And finally give people more value if they read more pages.

So have a page that is an introductory part of a subject then follow that up with more in-depth pieces and finally a really useful downloadable.

You can find a more technical explanation of bounce rate from Google here.

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Need marketing help?

I’m a specialist in writing copy for financial and professional services companies so if you would like to get your bounce rate down then get in touch and let’s talk.

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

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What is TLDR and why you should care

TLDR (or TL;DR as it used to be known) means ‘Too Long;Didn’t Read’.

Simple.

So why should you care?

Well TLDR is really important when you are composing your blog posts and web content and I’m about to tell you why.

In this post;

Truth is no-one likes a wall of text

Have you ever been faced with a wall of text and just decided that life’s too short?

That’s TLDR in action.

A massive wall of text on a webpage is offputting.

Sure if you are sitting in the garden with a white wine spritzer and a copy of catch-22 then you can spend some time enjoying the experience of reading, but if you just want to find a recruitment consultant then you haven’t got enough life left to make it worth while.

Research has shown that our attention span reduced from 12.5 seconds in 2000 to 8.25 seconds in 2015 and the trend is continuing.

This means that as a blog writer you need to make sure your posts are snappy and to the point.

Otherwise your readers will drift away

person drifting away from a boat
If you’re not smart your users will drift away

Split up your text

So what can you do about it?

Well for a start you can practice writing in short, snappy sentences.

Long paragraphs of text aren’t attractive at all so you need to avoid them and make sure you use easily accessible language because the average reader won’t be wanting to read acres of jargon.

Make sure you break up your text with relevant images too that illustrate your point.

Text for your homepage

So here’s the thing – Google says you need plenty of text on your homepage to tell it what it’s about but in reality your users won’t read it. So what do you do?

You start off by getting to the point above the fold.

Above the fold means the bit you can see without scrolling.

If you check out my homepage it says quite clearly above the fold – expert professional services marketing.

If you’ve come to the wrong place then you’ll know straight away but if you have come to the right place then you’ll scroll to…

Telling people what problems you solve

Look, we don’t want to read a page full of jargon, we just want to know what you are going to do for us.

So get to the point as quick as you can, the problem, the solution, who it’s for.

So don’t dance around your handbags for half an hour before getting to the point because your TLDR readers have already left the building.

I’d suggest that above the fold you go for your most important services.

Then as the user scrolls down you provide more detail.

And when they click onto another page you can expand your thought process.

TLDR for blog posts

Have you noticed that I answered the question right at the top of the post?

I did this for two reasons.

The first is for the TLDR people. They don’t have to read any further than line 1.

That’s fine.

If you are going to buy from me then you probably want to know much more than just the simple answer to the question.

So I am happy to give TLDR people the answer to their question because I know that they probably aren’t going to engage with me anyway.

The second reason is for Google.

Google likes posts that answer questions, and it likes to use the answers on it’s featured snippets panels.

So if you answer the question that people are asking quickly and succinctly in the first sentence then you are much more likely to be highly placed.

Free resources to help with your copywriting and SEO
Want free resources to help with your blog content and website SEO? Click the image for more

Chuck in a bulleted list

Did you see at the start of the article that there was a bulleted list?

This is designed to help readers get to the bit they want to read without scrolling or reading through the rest of the article.

Seriously though, with so much great information available why would people scroll past?

But they do!

Oh and set up page anchors so if you click on the item it takes you to the relevant section. Find out how to do page anchors here.

TLDR is important to keep readers engaged

So in summary then the principle of TLDR is important if you want to keep readers engaged in your blog and if you want site visitors to read more on your site.

On your home page make sure you get to the point right away and make it above the fold.

For blog posts, answer the question your readers are asking straight away as this will help engagement and will also boost your SEO score for the page.

And make sure you split your text up into manageable chunks and include the odd image here and there.

Here’s the ad

If you’d like help with your site, whether it be copywriting, marketing or anything else then give me a shout and let’s chat.

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

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5 ways a financial copywriter can help your business

Financial copywriter at his desk

Using a financial copywriter makes sense for businesses that have products or services that are in the finance sector or for companies that want to speak to companies that are based in this industry.

In this post, I’m looking at just a few of the ways that a specialist financial copywriter can help and where they differ from a more general type of writer.

A financial copywriter knows the regulatory environment

If your company is a regulated entity then there are some things you can say and some you can’t.

Working in a regulated firm is different to other companies because everyone is aware that the way you treat your customers, the way you market your business and the things you say are all subject to review and can end up with some sizeable fines or nasty publicity.

Professional copywriters who have worked in financial services are fully aware of the need for care and you can expect that they will produce copy that is compliant with all of the local rules and regulations.

You shouldn’t have to find yourself explaining your products to your writer before the project starts either and they should know their way around the FCA website!

You don’t have to explain the products

I’ve never really understood why people employ non-specialists to work on their projects.

For example, I wouldn’t pitch for a job writing technical articles about ASP.NET for the software industry because I simply haven’t got the first idea of where to start.

I’d have to research every article and someone from the company would have to teach me what ASP.NET is for a start!

However, you won’t need to explain the different types of mortgage to me, the difference between whole-of-life and term assurance or what a bridging loan is because I spent years working with these companies.

It just seems a lot easier working with someone who has a grasp of the types of product available.

Copywriting for B2B

If you have a financial product that is useful in the B2B arena then having an expert write your copy helps you to match your output to your audience.

The finance industry speaks in a different way, uses different acronyms and has a language all of its own and so you want someone who can adopt these aspects and use them as a way of forging a better B2B connection.

For companies that provide say, bridging finance or invoice factoring, the ability of a financial copywriter to understand and empathise with the problems that your potential customers have (possibly because they have faced them) is incredibly powerful.

Financial copywriter for software company
Learn how a financial copywriter can help your software company here

A financial copywriter will ask ‘smart-stupid’ questions

When I worked as a Financial Director my favourite thing to do with a new team was to ask what I called ‘smart-stupid questions’.

These are the sort of basic questions which are obvious to everyone in the company but that might not be obvious to people outside.

I once worked with a business and in my first meeting someone used a three-letter-acronym (which is a personal bugbear for me) and so I asked them what it meant.

Nobody in the room could tell me!

But they were all nodding along like it was obvious a few seconds before.

That’s a smart stupid question, so if you are using jargon or company-specific terms then a really good financial copywriter will be able to tease the real meaning out of it because you don;t want to confuse or confound potential clients.

Professional copywriting with a professional attitude.

I started writing many years ago and one of the things that surprised me was when a client told me why they liked working with me.

“You always deliver by the deadline” they said.

This was a surprise because I thought that everyone respected deadlines but apparently not in the creative industries.

Since then I have worked as a collaborator and a buyer with other financial writers and I can always tell the ones that have a professional background.

Now I am not saying that every financial copywriter that you employ will hit every deadline, every time but I’d argue that you have a better chance of getting the outcome you want.

If you have a financial product then employ a finance professional.

Personally if i had a company that sold dresses then I’d want my stuff written by someone who had some experience in fashion.

Same with financial services.

Additionally, if I was trying to engage with a company that was in the financial services or fintech sectors then I’d want someone who thinks like they do.

It just seems like common sense.

That’s why I would always suggest getting your copy written by someone with a level of expertise and training that will allow them to really communicate with your clients.

If you’d like to find out more then why not message me and we can have a chat about whether I am the right financial copywriter for you.

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

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A practical example of how great content helps your business

The impact of great content

There’s any amount of theory out there that will tell you that filling your site with content will get you more hits

And as we know…

More hits = more business

But many people may be sceptical and frankly, in my humble opinion, they are right to be.

The problem is that there are lots of people out there that will tell you something with absolute certainty that turns out not to be true.

It turns out that they are just great salespeople and not great content creators.

Who’da thought it?

So I wanted to give you a real-life example of a recent client that I have helped and show you what happened.

The real-life client

Most of my content is written ‘white label’. This means that to all intents and purposes the posts on the client’s page is written by them.

So naturally, they wouldn’t be happy if I blew the whole thing by telling people that it was actually me that wrote their stuff – but it was.

So I’ve anonymised the client concerned but I can give you some clues.

They have formed a newish company (back in 2018) and have developed an app for customers.

It’s a pretty good app, but there are competitors out there, so they don’t have the field to themselves.

Naturally, they have a website but it really wasn’t doing anything and it certainly wasn’t ranking on Google for any keywords.

So the brief was to start telling people about their service and how it could help.

So here’s the first graph.

The impact of great content

It’s a bit difficult to see but the story is fairly simple, they started off in April with no hits.

I got involved with them halfway through May and started writing content to an agreed plan.

2 posts a week. 500-1000 words each.

By November this had happened

The impact of great content

By August they had 5 keywords ranking in position 1-3 and as anyone will tell you these are like gold.

They had 10 keywords in position 4-10. Not exactly gold but still appearing on page 1.

And another 275 that appeared lower down than 11.

Although the latter may seem pointless what they are telling Google is that this is a useful site that has a lot of information around the client’s particular niche.

How great content can boost your SMEs sales
Want to know what to write about? Click the image abvove

So what does that look like a year on from the start?

The important thing to remember is that this client kept on doing it.

They didn’t do anything whacky, they just kept producing a couple of blog posts a week (or at least I did).

And this is what the graph looked like after 14 months.

You can see that it takes time to get going – so don’t lose heart.

We started the project in May and we had some good early success. Admittedly the business is a bit seasonal so there was a downturn in Dec/Jan and then in February, 9 months after starting they began to get a ton of hits.

Now for the reality check

So if I was just trying to sell you then I’d gloss over the actual numbers.

But I’m not interested in conning people so I need to give you a bit of a reality check here.

Because just posting a lot of stuff will get you a result a bit like my client got.

They didn’t have a lot of money to spend on outreach and they were working in a very small niche but even so they got to the point after a couple of months where they were getting 90 hits a month.

Now it’s worth saying here that 90 hits in a tiny niche is pretty good. Very niche subject areas don’t get a lot of hits, but they do convert to sales well.

By June this year they were receiving 290 hits, which is even better.

If it was about Premier League football or Elton John or the NFL then it would be much easier to get a shed load of hits.

And this is where it really is down to you.

You see the journey from content to hits to conversions is down to getting your content out there using postings, advertising and outreach to people like bloggers in your area.

The conversion from the 90 hits to actual sales is down to how slick your ‘customer journey’ is.

So although people may tell you that all you have to do is get your conversion right. or that you just need to do outreach, or that you only need to have a great looking website, they are all lying to you!

The truth is that it is a combination of things.

You need a website that looks good and works properly.

You need great content that is actually about what you do.

You need to push that content out to get noticed.

Finally, when you get hits you need to convert them to sales.

It’s a simple process but it is amazing how so many snake oil salesmen will pretend that it is only their thing that will provide you with a billion leads.

So what’s the next step?

Well let’s assume that your website works fine but you just don’t have enough content or it’s not finely tuned enough.

Your next step is to sort out a content plan around the keywords you want to hit.

Then get your content written

Then tell people you’ve written it.

Again, this is a simple process that anyone can do.

Your quick digital marketing guide
Want a guide to digital marketing – click the image

How Yellow Tomato can help

It’s distinctly possible that you don’t have the time to sit down and write a load of articles or you may not be confident in making your content plan.

That’s where I can help.

I can help you work through what you do and what content is likely to have the most impact.

I can write the content and, if you don’t know how to I can even upload it to your site.

And I’m pretty cheap as content writers go!

Get in touch now and let’s have a chat about how I can help you drive more sales.

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

Update: Nov 2020

So it’s been a few months since I wrote this article and I thought I’d do an update.

I logged on to the customer’s analytics and this is what I found.

What you are seeing there is the exponential growth of content.

One piece gets you a little bit of notice and 3 pieces gets you 10 times more.

Needless to say the customer is very happy indeed!

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How a financial copywriter can help your software company

Financial copywriter for software company

A Financial Copywriter isn’t perhaps the first person you think of to write content for a software company but read on, as you’ll find that there are some very good reasons why it makes sense.

You see you shouldn’t necessarily be writing for your own industry. (although it is possible you may want to, see below)

The people you are writing for are your customers.

It may seem obvious, but it’s actually a lesson that many people forget and they do so at their peril.

Technical feels good, but actually is bad

This is one of the main problems.

It doesn’t really matter what business you are in and we’re all guilty of this.

You see when I worked as an accountant I made the mistake of thinking that my clients wanted to know that I had completed the bank rec and that form CT600 was ready to go in…

It wasn’t until some way into my career that I realised that many of them wanted two things from me; they wanted me to tell them if things were good, or if there was something they needed to think about.

They genuinely didn’t care that I knew the HMRC code for the form I was sending in, and me telling them it was just me showing off.

Technical details interest people that are in the same industry, but they don’t excite clients to the same degree.

What interests clients is the effect that their application has on their business.

Tone of voice matters

Admittedly I am breaking my own rule here because tone of voice is a technical term used in copywriting.

It means the way things are phrased, the language used, the manner of writing.

The problem is that unless you are a member of the clan you are speaking to then you may not understand what the tone of voice should sound like.

We’re all members of clans and accountants are no different. We have a way of speaking but we are also customers.

I can promise you that if you start using IT type technical terms in a piece aimed at engaging accountants you will be wasting your time largely.

You can find out more about tone of voice by clicking on the image below

How do you choose your tone of voice
Find out more about tone of voice here

Credentials matter

So imagine this; you have an app that is designed to make running an accountancy practice easier.

You have two pieces written, one by your head of sales and one by an accountant who has run an accountancy practice.

Which one carries more weight?

Exactly. So having a copywriter who is experienced in the field as a guest blogger adds weight to your proposition.

Naturally you have to use their name and credentials and some copywriters may not be comfortable with that , but many are.

It’s not about features, it’s about effects

A technical or general copywriter can probably write a great blog all about the features of a piece of software.

But what your customers want to know is what the effect will be.

How will it help their practice?

How will it help their clients?

How will it help their staff?

If you aren’t able to articulate this in the tone of voice that your potential customer base understand then you can forget it.

Why you need a financial copywriter for your software company.

It doesn’t really matter what your software does, what matters is how you talk to your customers.

A great financial copywriter will;

  • Speak in the tone of voice your customers prefer
  • Use the language of your customers
  • Understand the effects and benefits of your app
  • Automatically understand the issues your customers are having
  • Add weight to your offer
  • Add credibility to your content
  • Be able to articulate all of this in an engaging piece of content.

So that’s it:- if you are wanting to sell into the accounting and bookkeeping space then you need a proper financial copywriter.

Now where can you find one of them?

Contact Stuart Now

Let’s have a chat about your content marketing needs or motorbikes

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Your free example project brief

Simply click the button to get your free example project brief and the download of your Word file will begin.

Download Now!

This is a simple example of how you can brief a copywriter.
It’s not complex or supposed to be the best example of a copywriter brief in the business – instead, I wanted it to be easy to use and understand.

Feel free to make changes as you see fit.

Personally, I’d save it off with a different name and then clear all of the examples I have used in the boxes. More than once I have had clients brief me on their single blog entry and then also order a “White paper appx 2000 words on the environmental damage of the average printer cartridge.”

Remember also to include things like SEO elements that your SEO specialist has asked for including links and keywords. If you have a good copywriter these will be second nature to them.

I’m not precious about you removing my logo either. It’s fine. Let’s add a little free stuff into the world but in return, it would be really peachy if you could link to one of my articles.

And if you haven’t got a really good writer yet ….

OOOh also, sign up for my free mailing list. I’ll send out advance notice of my posts and resources to help you with your marketing.

Things that copywriters like

We like to know what you want.

The worst clients in the world are the ones that don’t tell you what they want, then complain that you haven’t delivered it!

For example, I had one recently that wanted me to link to a specific site but didn’t tell me until I had written and delivered the piece.

I’m good guys but I’m not a mind reader!

Anyway here’s a list of things that we like;

  • A good title – often a title will dictate the entire article
  • A tone of voice – how do you want it to sound to your reader?
  • A clear deadline – now don’t be ambitious. I can’t do you 5,000 words by tomorrow morning
  • Keywords – always helpful
  • Links -if you want a link then say where
  • Specific points you want to make – what do you really want to tell your reader
  • What you are looking to achieve – this helps us understand what we need to say
  • Any useful resource – if you have an industry link then that really helps

Now here’s the thing. You may not know all of these or you might be unsure of what you can ask for. For instance you may not know what is possible in terms of deadline.

I’m always more than happy to talk my clients through this. It makes my life so much easier and I am much more certain that they will get what they want.

I find that my clients will fall into two camps; those that know exactly what they want and those that just want some content and want me to do the rest. Either is good for me.

Anyway that’s enough rambling now. It’s 5.40 Friday PM so it’s home time.

Just to say – remember to subscribe and if you want to chat then contact me and we’ll have an e-coffee!

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How to choose your copywriter

How to choose your copywriter

If you’ve never hired a copywriter before how on earth do you go about it?

In this post I’m looking at the way I think you should choose the best copywriter for your project.

Now this is heavily caveated by the fact that I obviously think you should choose me but we’ll gloss over that and move on

So read on and find out how you can find your ideal writer.

Personal recommendation

This is a great way to find someone and I heartily recommend it.

In fact I recommend recommendations.

Personal recommendations will tell you whether the person is good to work with, does a good job and produces their copy on time and on budget.

It won’t tell you anything about their style or whether they will get on with you or not.

So ask around amongst your contacts and see who has a good copywriter as they will be worth looking up.

Loving the style

So once you have a couple of names it’s time to do a bit of homework.

Check out things they’ve written and see if you like their style and more importantly, is it the style you want for your content?

Another method of finding a good copywriter is to find examples on the web of writing you like and then contacting the company to see who they used.

Although it might seem a bit cheeky, actually most people respond well to compliments and if you are telling them that you love their style so much you want to hire their copywriter then you’re on the right lines.

Use other networks

I belong to a fair few groups on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter etc. and generally speaking if I need something I can usually find someone who does it or who knows someone who does it.

Not quite as powerful as a personal recommendation to be sure but still pretty good and if someone has been helpful, has provided valuable input to the group, has a great sense of humour or just uses a cute cat picture as their profile then I don’t see why not.

Also, think about any other networks that you may be in. Lunch clubs, sports clubs neighbourhood associations or whatever. You’d be surprised where we copywriters hang out.

What about platforms like UpWork and PeoplePerHour?

Meh.

To be honest they feel a bit like a race to the bottom.

Now I’m not saying you won’t find decent copywriters on these platforms, and they do have a rating system that helps you choose people based on the feedback you get but in general, I’m not a massive fan.

If nothing else it takes forever going through the proposals from Indian Sql programmers who would be happy to write your lifestyle blog for you.

I do have time for The Work Crowd though. I have found a couple of great people there to help me and the site seems a bit less of a race to the bottom.

Should you interview them?

Yeah why not.

I mean it’s not like an ‘INTERVIEW’ interview but in fact, I’d certainly recommend a meeting if you are close by or a zoom call if not.

I’m massively in favour of working with people you like and trust. I have found over the years that gut instinct works really well when choosing who to work with.

So if you do a call and get on like a house on fire then that’s another positive tick in the box.

Should you ask them to write a test piece?

Yes if you like.

But it should be a paid piece and you should make this clear.

I don’t think I’m the only copywriter who has had people trying to con free work out of them by saying it’s a ‘test piece’ for an eleventybillion pound mega order that’s just around the corner.

Some writers will refuse and that’s fair enough.

Some will be happy to write a test piece and you can use this to see if they deliver in terms of style, deadlines and research.

I sometimes offer to write a paid test piece but to be honest clients who have already booked a bigger run of articles or an eBook always get preference. Sorry.

Remember to choose people who are good at the thing you want

Not everyone is good at everything.

In fact, the best copywriter I ever met had an awesome reputation due to the fact that he immediately turned down things that he knew he couldn’t do. See the dunning-kruger effect for more details.

I’m very good at working for professional services firms due to my consultancy background with finance, HR and IT.

I’m useless at writing descriptions for ice cream. Useless.

Great copywriter for accountants - not so good at ice cream
I’m useless at writing about ice cream

Found a good copywriter? – Hang on to them

If you’ve found a good copywriter that you like and trust then don’t let them go.

Someone who can write exactly the sort of thing you like is worth their weight in gold so think about looking at a retainer type contract.

You have to remember that a good copywriter will be in demand so they won’t always be able to look after you if you just feed them the odd job.

Also don’t hide them.

If you have liked their work then tell people because we are business people too and we love recommendations and positive feedback.

Choosing a good copywriter is important

A good copywriter will do wonders for your business and should be pretty much self-sufficeint in an ideal world.

You won’t need to manage them and you shouldn’t need to give them too much direction.

But more importantly they will supercharge your marketing and bring an added dimension to what is already a superb offering.

OK so that’s me. If you’d like to talk than click the big blue button and if you have any questions about the process then why not drop a comment down below?

Oh and like and share!

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How does the copywriting process work?

How does the copywriting process work?

If you have never engaged a freelance copywriter before then you may be wondering how the whole copywriting process works.

Well wonder no more!

This post will tell you how the process works from start to finish so that you can go ahead and commission that urgently needed piece of content.

I’ve also included a template for you to download, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
Let’s start at the beginning

Decide what outcome you want to achieve

This might sound stupid. After all you just want some content don’t you?

But actually there’s more to it than that.

The outcome you want will change the type and style of writing you need.

For example, if the outcome you want is that you need a professional website that allows people to check your credibility and qualifications, then that is a completely different type of writing to a company that needs a sales funnel filling.

By the same token, commissioning content that will boost your search engine ranking requires someone with what’s called ‘on-page SEO’ skills.

So deciding what the output is forms a key part of writing your brief.

Write your brief

I’d always suggest putting down in writing what you are after. In media terms, this is called a ‘brief’ and it simply sets out what you are wanting and when you want it by.

I’ve produced an example project brief which you can download and use as your own and you can find it here (don’t worry you don’t have to give me your email address!).

Your brief needs to set out some housekeeping like who the writer needs to contact and their email or phone number.

It will also include stuff like a project name if you have one or maybe a Purchase Order (PO) number if your company uses them.

Importantly it will include details about your project such as deadlines, what you actually want to be delivered and what tone of voice you’d like it in. (find out about tone of voice here)

You don’t have to do a project brief but if it’s the first time you have ever worked with this particular writer then it’s a good way to start.

I have clients who just send an email with what they want and this is fine where it’s a short project and you’ve worked together before.

Find your writer

I’ve written up a guide to finding the right writer (or the write righter) here but suffice it to say that this is the point in the copywriting process that you probably want to go out and find a writer.

It’s quite usual in the industry to send out a brief to more than one writer or agency but you don’t want to overdo it.

You’ll probably be wasting the writers’ time and yours because it takes time to decide.

Be prepared to meet up or have a chat on the phone/zoom. I always prefer to do this as it can often stop misunderstandings happening.

If you’d like to know how much a copywriter costs then have a look at this post here.

Once you have chosen your writer then you need to agree terms and often your writer will ask for a deposit and possibly send a contract.

This is quite normal in the creative industries and a deposit will normally be around 1/3rd to half the eventual project cost but varies depending upon writer or agency.

The message has to be – get it in writing.

If your writer doesn’t send you a precis of what was agreed then you need to send it to them. Email is fine, hard copy is fine but write it down.

Leave them alone!

This is pretty important.

When you have agreed what you want, you’ve paid your deposit and you’ve written it down then you need to leave them alone.

Don’t start to panic until the deadline arrives.

Every time you phone your writer you are interrupting their process and you’ll slow down production.

I’d say 70% of the copywriting process is actually thinking and structuring and I can promise you that constant calls and emails don’t speed this up.

In fact this morning I was working out how to structure this post on a cycle ride down to the beach!

If you have chosen a good copywriter then you’ll get a draft copy at this point.

Make amends

This doesn’t mean you have to make up for something you’ve done wrong – amends is simply the shorthand way of saying amendments.

Most copywriters will include at least one round of free amends and you shouldn’t be shy about using this, writers are used to sending out a draft and then altering it later.

Just one point, I prefer to send out my draft in a finished version. What I mean by this is that when I send out my draft the client could just copy and paste onto their website.

Other writers will send things out with spelling or grammatical errors and then only correct at final draft stage so don’t be too disappointed if your writer works in this way but you should ask them if this is how they work ahead of time.

Agree future work

A good copywriter is hard to find and if you have happened upon one that does a good job and who you get on with then you should hang on to them.

Give them constructive feedback and if you have future work that you need doing then talk about it.

Often businesses will need regular content for things like their blog or social media so agreeing a future work plan is a good move because a good copywriter’s time will fill up quickly.

The copywriting process in a nutshell

The copywriting process then is pretty simple

1 – Decide what you want

2- Write up your brief

3 – Find your writer

4 – Agree terms and pay a deposit

5 – Wait for the output

6 – Feedback your amendments

7 – Feedback and agree future work.

So that’s it. The copywriting process in a nutshell.

If there are any questions that I haven’t answered or you want something expanded then please do leave a comment below and don’t forget to share the post if you have found it useful.

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