How to Create a Profitable Freelance Writing Career Within 30 Days!
I’ve been retired from copywriting for a while now. I remember how crazy it was to finally make money as a freelance copywriter. Is it tough initially? Yep. You may think, “I don’t know how to start a freelance writing career!” But step back and rethink that sentiment. Freelance writing can be profitable very quickly. It’s still going to be tough to start up.
You Too Can Make Money As a Writer! Sure…
Okay, this is the standard line that you get from every blogger out there. “If you follow these simple steps, you too can work from home in your PJs:
- Research your target market
- Find clients who will pay the rates you want
- Network like crazy with other freelance writers in your field and industry
- Create a portfolio of work that showcases your best skill set (copywriting)
- Have patience; it often takes time before getting started making money from freelance writing jobs.
That’s not a system that you can build your business on. It’s good advice, but not really enough for someone who has no clue what they’re doing.
This is a system. It’s not the only way, but it’s worked for others.
1. Decide What Your Niche Will Be
Be a specialist. It’s cheaper in the short term. You’re going to take 30 days out of your life to get yourself going. Map out what you’ll be doing every day for the next 30 days to build your business.
Find your specialty. Are you into health and fitness? Finance? Cosmetics? Pick your field from your broad interests because you’re going to be living in it for a while. Now is the time to figure out your schedule and get your production calendar ready.
You’ll need to plot out your action steps for the next 30 days. If today is your first day, read this entire article first. Sure, you can come back to it, but give it a full once-over before doing anything else.
Plan on writing at least 100 articles in your niche in the next 30 days. Post them on a popular platform (like this one). You’re going to need practice. That’s just four articles a day. You can do it. Start writing.
2. Start Researching The Best Of The Best In That Niche
While you’re writing your heart out, you’ll be studying from the best in your field. You’re going to live and breathe in your niche. Guaranteed, you’ll be brimming with ideas by the middle of the month.
You’re going to be tempted to share them with the world. In a few weeks, your significant other, family and friends (and even your goldfish) will run the other way when they see you coming.
Keep writing.
3. Start Working On Your Brand
As you work on your craft, you’ll be thinking about your company name, your UVP (Unique Value Proposition) and the color of the living room drapes in your new mansion. Dream big!
Do some research to see who is doing what you’re going to be doing (but are already successful) and hang out in the company of other copywriters (very brief visit).
You don’t have a lot of time, so budget about 30 minutes a day to hanging out. Ask amazing questions and offer some well-researched answers to questions that others post. Don’t forget to read articles and posts related to your industry of choice.
How’s the writing going?.
4. Learn Everything About Your Target Market
Let’s say you chose copy writing for Shopify stores. You browse the list of top trending products and start looking at stores that are ranking high in particular niches.
You’re taking a class on how to succeed on Shopify, so that you know about their best practices and how to rank content on that platform (like a boss).
Oh, and you’re still writing.
5. Select Your Dream 100 Clients
It’s time to home in on your “Dream 100” client list. The late Chet Holmes taught us a simple and effective marketing strategy. Invest your energy in finding 100 companies that you can serve and focus your energy in crafting solutions you can present to them.
You’re going to take a while to accomplish this one, so start early in the month. If you’ve been doing your homework, you should know what you can offer your prospects that will fill in that gap they’ve overlooked for so long. If not, keep studying.
Find prospects that have similar gaps and start developing your solutions. Keep learning your craft and think of some cool names for your company and your patented process.
Get going on those articles.
6. Start Filling Out That Project Calendar
It might look something like this; daily tasks:
- Write on my calendar.
- Content planning.
- Writing articles.
- Researching niche examples.
- Researching prospective candidates for the Dream 100 list.
- Stop by the posse for half an hour.
- Study my craft for an hour after dinner.
- Publish articles.
7. Develop Your Pitch
Even though you don’t have a web presence, a huge following or any clients, you’ll need to practice your pitch and presentation. That means you need to develop one. This will take a while, so start early.
What goes into the pitch? Here’s what you’ll need.
- Unique Value Proposition.
- Your Big Idea.
- The overarching challenge that your prospects didn’t want to admit that they have.
For example; many Shopify stores have terrible marketing processes. A store without customers is a website with a shopping cart on it. Their presentation is bland and they haven’t established a sales funnel or retargeting system for capturing leads.
If you’ve been doing your homework, you’ll have some solutions in your notebook for your particular market segment. Keep going. Your first week has been a killer!
8. Record Your Training Presentation
Why in the world would I have you recording a training presentation in the first week of your learning about a new market? Because you’ll need to take all that information you’ve gained in just 7 days and distill it in a format that is easy to understand.
You’ve been writing articles on the subject at this point and now you get to teach what you know to others. The presentation is a great way to solidify your knowledge of the subject and clarify it in your head for later.
Distill what you know about your solution into a 30 minute presentation. PowerPoint is fine. Think of it this way; a 30 minute presentation is about 3900 words.
An interesting headline and two full paragraphs is approximately one minute. Start working on that first draft of your presentation.
Don’t forget, you still have articles to produce today.
9. Listen To Your Work
Take a break from writing today. Record your presentation on your phone or computer. Just read it aloud. Check out your progress and take a break. Think about the drapes in your castle. How big is that infinity pool going to be?
10. Find the places where your future clients congregate.
Okay. Now we should have enough information on who you’ve helped and how you plan to help them. You may not be finished with your training, but you’ve got a pretty good grasp on copywriting for your particular market segment.
I hope you feel proud of yourself. Most people never make it past day #7. After you complete your articles for the day, head over to the writers’ lounge and let the folks know how well you’re doing. Discuss marketing and prospecting.
Now you need to complete your search for contacts. Take some time to check out where your prospects are hanging out. Be sure that you have names, email addresses and any other piece of information you’ll need to get in touch with them.
11. Build Your Top 100 List
Chet Holmes says: The goal of the Dream 100 is to take your ideal buyers from “I’ve never heard of this company” to “What is this company I keep hearing about?” to “I think I’ve heard of that company” to “Yes, I’ve heard of that company” to “Yes, I do business with that company.”
Step 1: Develop a Strategic Plan for Your Dream 100
So how do you get businesses that have never heard of you to do business with you? Develop a simple idea that will help them in a very particular area of their business. Do they all have a terrible home page? No follow-up process to capture leads once they leave the shopping site? No email marketing sequence?
Build a framework that is easy to explain. You’ll have to tell them over and over, so make it simple to repeat.
Step 2: Determine Your Dream 100 Client Profile
- What are their buying habits?
- What frustrations and stresses keep them up at night?
- Where do they go to solve their problems?
- What are the ultimate goals they set for themselves?
You’ve been shadowing them and collecting information on the companies that meet your specifications. Time to sort them out to find that magic 100 that fits all the parameters for your solution.
Step 3: Create Your Dream 100 List
“If there were 100 clients that, if you’ve got them all, you could explode your business…”
Ok, I know you’re only 11 days in and there seems to be so much to do. You know how to do this part.. Write articles.
12. Sort Your List Of Companies On A Spreadsheet
- Contact person
- Title
- Phone number, email, mailing address
- Social media handles (like LinkedIn and Twitter)
- Company information from their website.
- Any unique detail regarding the problems you’re about to solve for them.
Oh, please don’t forget the articles for the day.
13. More Work On Your Presentation
Step 4: Design Your Dream 100 Marketing Collateral
Remember that presentation you were working on? It’s time to revise it. You’re going to create a sales sequence that touches your target prospects at least seven times. That means you’ll be contacting the company in various forms to get them to a presentation.
Apple ran a test to see how many times they needed to get in front of a prospective buyer to make a sale in their stores. The result was eight “touches” on average to generate a sales conversion.
That means you’ll need to figure out how to reach your prospects at least eight times with your brand. Remember, you want to go from stranger to valued consultant. That’s going to take some effort.
This is called a marketing sequence.
It can take many forms, but here’s an example:
- You email with an invitation to a webinar replay of your presentation.
- Your collection of articles on solutions to their challenges.
- There’s a video of you on YouTube about that solution you created.
- One of your cohorts in the writers’ room interviews you for her podcast.
- That Facebook live presentation that you did is now edited and ready.
- Got a few more relevant articles? Of course you do. Email your list.
- Send out a personal pitch to the folks with an offer they can’t refuse.
- Send them a link to get free training.
I think you get the point. By the way, none of this stuff will be developed just yet. You will prepare them in the days ahead. Everything you decide on goes on the production calendar.
Don’t forget your articles today.
14. You’re Building Your Website This Week
Select the platform you’ll publish the site on and gather up your materials. Learn whatever you need to publish on your preferred web platform. Focus on getting all the content ready this week.
Write the copy for:
- Home page
- About Me
- Training
- Rates
- Services
- Samples
- Sign up for Free Offer
- Contact
- Privacy Policy
Take a break from the articles.
15. Choose Your Domain Name
- Call it something directly related to your niche.
- Get all your web copy completed.
- Set up your email system.
- Be sure to have your payment system connected.
- Get your articles completed.
16. Collect Your Web Assets
Videos, images, PDF docs; etc. Check all the links and ensure that your copy is optimized. Have your site reviewed by some of your cohorts.
Yep. More articles today.
17. Finalize Your Data Collection For The Dream 100
Take out your list of 100 prospects and visit their websites.
Start the ball rolling on your campaign.
Oh, get those articles out.
18. If The Videos Aren’t Completed, Get Them Done
Thought I forgot about those? Post your videos and make a pitch to your prospects to watch them.
How are those articles doing? You should be ready to promote them now.
19. Promote Your Work on Social Media
Start promoting your blog posts and articles on various social media sites.
You can create a few paid ads and run them for a week. Do this during your Facebook contact or LinkedIn contact with your prospects. This allows them to see you on Social Media.
You should have some followers on your blog; not much, but I’m sure that more will show up as you keep going. That’s right; publish!
20. Follow Up With More Useful Information
Get articles done.
Keep up the marketing campaign. One or two may already be responding. If so, rejoice, but keep going.
21. Continue Promoting Yourself
Part of your notoriety will come from your active integration into the writers’ groups and on sites where your prospects may be congregating. Keep a high profile.
Publish more articles.
22. The Next 8 Days Will Be A Bit More Hectic
You’ll be starting your Dream 100 strategy every other day.
You may be tasked with answering questions, calling or emailing back and forth. Things will move faster now. If you have phone numbers, call them.
23. Did You Miss Your Article Writing Session?
Do more follow-ups and…
Get your articles done.
24. Check That You Have Everything You Need
Are you ready for actual work load? Do you have all the tools you need to get the projects out satisfactorily? Mentally, you should have no problem. You’ve been busy writing articles and blog posts every day. A small project from a client should be no big deal for you.
25. Your Writing Skills Are Paying Off
You should have a few presentations under your belt out of your Dream 100 campaign. If not, keep touching bases with the companies. The odds are in your favor.
Yes. Get those articles out.
26. You Are A Little More Experienced
You’ve gone through the front end of your campaign and should hit your stride. Call backs and follow-ups are no big deal for you now.
Keep writing.
27. A Lot Of No’s, So A Yes Is Right Around The Corner
By this time, there are a few good ones that fell through, but others are still hanging in there.
Oh, look! Your fan following is growing.
28. Did You Get A Project Approved?
Great! Get to work.
Check your calendar and ensure that you get all your information for the project included and get going.
You can get more articles done tomorrow.
29. You May Be Tired, But You’re Working On A Real Job
You’ve done what 98% of the Internet will never do. You’ve sold your skills online and helped other people with their challenges.
Sneak an article in during your downtime.
30. Take Another Meeting
This may seem like a fantasy to some folks, but for many of the people who have put in the time after their day job was completed, you know how this feels. Count yourselves blessed, and be impressed. You’re getting it done.
I recommend checking out Chet Holmes’ book. “The Ultimate Sales Machine”. Learn how to develop your core story and select your dream clients who will pay you what you’re worth. https://predictableprofits.com/the-dream-100-strategy/
Don’t forget to write.
For a huge list of online assets and apps to speed up your content marketing career, check out my blog at https://contentmarketingmagic.co/blog
