There’s a strategy used in copywriting, and it involves being authoritative, even aggressive. Putting confidence into your copy almost to the point of arrogance is pretty powerful stuff, and it works out great for a lot of people. It’s a lot better than sounding too soft, too unsure, too pleading. Begging people to like you and hopefully hire you will get you nowhere. Telling them you’re a good idea for what they want to achieve is the way to go. However, all too often this confidence turns to cockiness. From there, it moves into plain
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Did You Reach Your NaNoWriMo Goal?
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It’s November, which means that if you’re a fiction writer, it’s National Novel Writing Month for you. Given that the month is well underway, you may or may not be happy with your progress. And that’s the problem with NaNoWriMo. How do you measure your progress other than just finishing the pursuit of the 50,000 word goal. If you’re almost there, then good for you… but is it worth a damn? If simply finishing is your goal, then yeah, have a beer. Nothing wrong with that. Especially if you’ve learned something along the way. Like,
> Read MoreSMART Freelancing: Are You Being Realistic?
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After a small pause to let you all settle into your SMART freelancing techniques, Elizabeth Fayle is here to give you the next key to rockin’ out your freelance biz. If you’ve missed the series to date, you can read each post here: The intro to being SMART The first key: Specific The second key: Measurable The third key: Agreed Upon Welcome to today’s installment: being realistic. Are you staying up until all hours burning the midnight oil? Does your family refer to you as “the lump by the computer”? Do you not remember what
> Read MoreHow to Put Rumors to Rest
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I’d like you all to imagine a Jedi hand-wave right now, because that title doesn’t work nearly so well without it. There is no ebook. There has never been an ebook. We never referred to it obliquely a few weeks back. We haven’t been keeping it under wraps. We haven’t even subtly slipped it into place in our store without you being aware of it. Never happened. We did try to tell you there was nothing to this vicious rumor of a new, updated, expanded and generally awesome upgraded version of Write for the Web,
> Read MoreWhy You Shouldn’t Stick to Your Niche
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When people out of the blue get in touch with me and offer a guest post, I usually approach the situation with skepticism. It’s like dating – don’t make a move for a home run when we haven’t even gotten to first base yet. So I replied to FitJerk’s offer with the same skepticism, and then some. “I don’t GET why you want to guest post – my readers aren’t even your target market. You’re into athletics; we’re into business and writing. What’s in this for you?” In short, I couldn’t figure out his angle,
> Read MoreAre You Afraid of Success? We Bet Yes.
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I have discovered something about myself. I’m terrified of success. Not just terrified. I’m willing to put my health at risk, my reputation, and my financial security. I’m willing to do just about anything, if I can avoid being successful. You probably are too. Some of you are thinking that I am nuttier than a Planter’s convention, but I assure you that this blog post was not made on machinery containing nuts. My parents assure me that neither was my brain, so we are living in a nut-free zone, here. This is a harsh truth,
> Read MoreHow You Might Be Losing Clients Without Even Knowing It
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Most customer experiences you’ll have are fairly average. Not great, not horrible, just somewhere in the middle. Very often, that average experience occurs because the grand majority of people in customer service positions don’t have the training they need to give you exemplary service every time. Excellent customer service isn’t something we’re all born with. It’s learned. Yes, you’ll meet people who really stand out and make you feel great for having done business with them, but you’ll meet a lot more that just do their job and get by. You’ll also meet people that
> Read MoreHow to Keep Your Blog From Losing Weight During the Holidays
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When the holidays roll around, we people worry about packing on the pounds. But your blog has a tendency to lose the ability to throw its weight around. More distractions, parties, and yeah, good food means we’re more prone to neglect our blog writing during the holidays – and that means your blog looks mighty lean come the new year. So how do you avoid slimming your blog down during the holidays when you have other stuff to do? Here are three ways to keep your blog nice and solid. (As for managing your own
> Read MoreThe Freelancer’s Guide to Working With Clients That SUCK
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Today’s post comes to us from an international authority in copywriting and peer of mine that I respect highly, Dean Rieck of Direct Creative and
> Read MoreIs Your Website Copy Too Excited?
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This is going to be a hard post for some writers to read. There are the exclamation-point addicts out there, you see. They’re the writers who feel they really can’t put across the excitement, immediacy, or sincerity without that little extra boost (!) to make it feel super-charged. They’re the writers who believe that they should slap an exclamation point at the end of a written sentence anytime they would allow their voice to lift at the end of spoken one. They’re the writers who are just flat-out addicted, who punctuate nearly everything with a
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