Why You Should Hire a Copywriter in 2019

If you’ve been hesitant to hire a copywriter, I can sympathise. Making the decision to outsource your web content, social media posts or ads can seem like a daunting process. After all, your company is your pride and joy - and handing over the creative reins to an outsider involves a lot of trust.

You needn’t worry. Professional copywriters are experts, and we exist to help you. If you need a simple press release writing, that’s what we can do. If you need a full website’s worth of content creating, you can count on us to deliver exactly what your brief describes.

A relationship between a copywriter and our individual clients is all about communication. We trust you to give us all the information and support we need to create exceptional content – and in return, you can trust us to work hard to deliver content you need that goes above and beyond your expectations.

Here are some more compelling reasons why you should hire a copywriter in 2019, and why I think the job I do can help out businesses of all kinds all over the world.

A copywriter knows exactly what you need - even if you don’t.

You might be unhappy with your web content and need an overhaul. You might be working on a brand new website for a startup. You might have heard about Instagram ads and want to get involved.

You might know this, but you don’t know what next steps to take.

This is what we copywriters do. We can talk through your options, and together we can work out the best possible plan of action. Then we get to work. Simple as that!

Copywriters only do what you ask us to do.

If you’re afraid that hiring a freelance copywriter will somehow start a chain of events that leads to you paying for content and fees you didn’t want to pay, don’t be.

Good copywriters can send a clear contract to you for every job you ask us to complete. If we think more work needs to be done – for example, keyword research or a spot of competitor analysis – we’ll flag this, but ultimately it’s your call.

If a copywriter is charging you more than you can afford, it only takes a conversation to rectify the situation. After all, we work for you, not the other way around.

Freelance copywriters have experience - and lots of it

Believe it or not, most freelancers don’t have one, specific niche. This is a good thing. It enables us to flex our mental muscles, turning copy into well-rounded, well-informed information.

We might know everything there is to know about your particular industry, but in the background we might also be experts in retail management, extreme sports and professional cleaning services. They don’t feel connected, but a wide spectrum of reference points helps our writing feel less robotic - and that’s what you want.

A copywriter understands how important your content is

If your team doesn’t have time to give your content the precision and care it needs, your business could suffer for it.

A copywriter understands how vital your content is, and will work hard to ensure it is perfect before sending it back to you for your comments. We are also great at making amends, sometimes several times, so that the content you want is the content you get. We understand. It’s important to you, so it’s important to us.

A copywriter gives you space to achieve

 Whenever I speak to potential clients, I want to make sure that they are making the right choice for their business. I also want to convey that by handing over this work to a professional copywriter, they will be freeing up headspace, time and resources. It makes a huge difference to be able to pass work over.

The most common comment I receive from my clients is that I’ve given them time to think, and to work on important projects that in turn have helped their business to grow.

In that sense, copywriters offer two things in one: a chance to turn your mind to more important matters, and the truly essential resource of a professional who can write content that takes your business higher.

If you’d like to chat about how we could work together this year, please get in touch. I’d love to hear from you.

Creating a Blog Schedule That Works

How do you create a blog schedule that works for you? Well, it’s a completely personal thing. I don’t mean to sound vague, but every business has a different way of doing things; a way which other companies might find impossible to replicate or a challenge to maintain.

Your blog is your website’s main source of fresh content - and as you’re probably aware, it’s vital to keep it up to date. But whose job is it to take care of it? who should be coming up with post ideas? Most importantly - how can you be sure that the rich resources you’re ploughing into it are going to yield results?

Once you’ve understood the importance and potential power of your website’s blog, it’s easy to feel a little overwhelmed at the prospect of keeping up with it all.

So, here are my tips to help you harness the power of your blog, while keeping that content-hungry beast under control.

Include it in Your Inbound Marketing Plans

Like a bouncy little puppy, your blog wants to get involved in everything your company does. It’ll stick its nose into meetings, snoop around in your sales metrics and roll around in your website analytics. You’ll even find it eagerly wagging its tail during team training events.

Whatever you’re doing, it’s relevant for a blog post. You need to stop thinking of your blog as a time-consuming afterthought and start incorporating it into everything your business is working on.

Your inbound marketing strategy will be unique to your company’s aims and targets, but one thing’s for sure - your blog can only help you to achieve those inbound goals if you let it in.

Get Everyone Involved

Blog posts aren’t just one person’s job and they most definitely shouldn’t be created in isolation.

To work your company’s blog to peak efficiency, you need everybody to understand how important it is - or you at least need to build a team of keen content creators who can manage the blog between them. This team will ideally be made up of people from all areas of the business, who can write from different points of view and who can create different types of content to keep it fresh and attention-grabbing.

 For example:

●     Get a designer onboard to create infographics and illustrations

●     Seek the help of marketing pro to get the right messaging across

●     Find an industry expert for unique insights

●    Embrace the experience that long-serving team members have

●     Get a new member of the team to bring fresh ideas to the table.

Plan Quality Content

Now you’ve collected loads of ideas for great blog posts that’ll enhance your sales funnel and be useful to your customers, it’s time to plan out when you’re going to write them, and most importantly, when you’re going to post them.

Think about the times of the month when certain products are purchased, or when your sales team could use a helping hand. Think also about times when people are more likely to be interested in what you’ve got to say - for example, at peak holiday times, or during the morning commute. Keep in mind that quieter times are also good times to put out great blog posts because they can inform customers for later on down the line.

A lot of marketing is about gut feeling, but sometimes you can use a bit of social psychology and popular culture to your advantage. Try to get inside your customers’ heads and really think about what they might be interested in at that particular moment.

 Rework and Remix

Don’t throw all your blog posts out at the same time just because you’ve got loads of great ideas. Spread them out, rework ideas to get three posts out of one and generally make sure you’re getting as much out of them as you can.

Each blog post you create takes time and resources to create, so you want to stretch them out and rinse out every possible nutrient you can. For example: Imagine you’re the content executive for a garden centre and you’ve written a blog post about getting new season bulbs in stock. This gives you scope for a whole host of posts to tide you over the next few months, all linking back to your new stock sales page, such as:

●     When is the best time to plant spring bulbs?

●     How can I get the most out of my garden in early spring?

●     Jobs for your garden in late autumn

●     Our favourite spring bulbs for spring 2019

Schedule It

Don’t sit there manually posting every time it’s blog post day. Take some time each week, or each month (whichever works best for you) to get them uploaded to your website and schedule the times in using your site’s built-in scheduling tool.

Then, use a social media scheduling tool like Buffer or Hootsuite to do the legwork for you, and plan some buzz to promote your posts in the future.

The best thing about using scheduling tools is that they have great in-build analytics. Unlike trying to keep track of everything in your head and updating your accounts manually, they give you a solid focus and show you in real time what your followers are engaging and interacting with.

Nothing’s set in stone, either. If you change your mind about what you plan to do with your content, you can easily go into your accounts and change everything around.

Buffer even sends emails to the account holder every week to keep you informed on your progress, and it gives you a little nudge when it runs out of content to post. In short, Buffer is your friendly little social media content house elf, who only wants what’s best for your company’s online strategy.

Does creating a blog schedule sound like work you’re not in a position to add to incorporate into your workload at the moment? Don’t worry. This is exactly the type of thing I excel at. Give me a call or drop me an email today to find out how I can help you create a blog schedule and keep it packed with juicy posts your customers and clients will love to read.

How to Create a Blog Post Editorial Calendar for Your Business

Now that 2019 is rattling on down the track, well on its way into February, are there any goals you’ve already let slip?

I bet I can guess one of them: I bet your blog posts are falling behind schedule.

Don’t worry. It happens to the best of us. Blog posts are difficult to write, simply because they take time to research and plan - and that’s only if you know exactly what you’ll be writing about in the first place.

Often, if you haven’t got any ideas, it can take more time than you have spare just to sit down and think of an engaging topic that’ll grip your readers. Before you know it, a week’s gone by and your blog post is still in the planning stages. Is that where you’re at right now?

What you need is a blog post editorial calendar for your business.

Taking the time to create an editorial calendar will save you hours of anguish in the future, erasing the guesswork from writing your blog posts.

Here’s how you do it:

Step 1: Set Your Goals

Are you writing blog posts to enhance your branding? Are you using blog posts to promote your products? Do you want your blog posts to give additional support to your customer service team?

Whatever your aims, make sure your whole team knows exactly what you’re working towards.

Step 2: Plan Your Schedule

When do you want people to be drawn to your website’s blog? Mondays are great for new product releases. Tuesdays and Thursdays are unproductive days, when readers are more likely to be checking your blog out than getting their task list done.

Fridays are treat days - perfect for a flash sale. Plan out your blogging days and you’ll never miss another post.

Step 3: Define Your Audience

 Who are you writing your posts for? If you don’t know, it’s time to think about who you’re hoping to reach and what action you’d like them to take when they’ve read your blog post.

To make things simpler, group your target audiences into ‘tribes’ – for example, experts, new customers, information addicts, browsers. Then you can write posts targeted at one or more of these ‘tribes’, rather than sending it out into the great wide world with no set audience in place.

Step 4: Set Your Topics

 Pre-plan your topics based on your schedule and your audience ‘tribes’.

This is much easier than it sounds, because it means you can use the seasons, national holidays and big events to inform what you plan to write.

Stuck? Give the Hubspot Blog Ideas Generator a whirl. It’s an absolute marvel.

Step 5: Create Your Editorial Calendar

Whether you use a digital calendar or you write your editorial schedule on actual paper with actual pens – that’s what I’d do! – make sure it’s accessible to everyone who needs it, and can be edited to incorporate bright new ideas as you go along.

Step 6: Educate Your Team

Ensuring your team is entirely onboard with your shiny new editorial calendar is key to its success. Bring your team into the construction of your calendar as soon as possible to increase their personal interest, and make sure they know how important blogging is.

Once they see how much easier life will be using your company’s blog post editorial calendar, they’ll jump on it in no time.

Still struggling to get your blog posts completed? Need a little support with your web content and business blog? Not to worry. Get in touch with me today and I’ll talk you through all the different ways I can help your business keep on top of its content marketing.

Three Resolutions Your Business Needs to Keep in 2019

It’s the start of January - and you’re probably full of good intentions and big ideas. I love the motivation the start of a new year gives me; what about you?

A new year marks a new start – a clean slate where we can forget the bad habits we accumulated over the past 12 months and dive into a year where we never forget to respond to an email, never eat chocolate for breakfast and never, ever forget our business cards.

While some resolutions are doomed to fail (I’ll eat chocolate for breakfast if I want to, thank you very much) there are some great new year’s resolutions for your business that if you keep up, will help your enterprise grow and succeed. Here are some of the best new year’s resolutions you can make that’ll keep you motivated, bring in new customers and push your business to the next level.

Regularly Update Your Business Blog

Your company blog is vital to your success in 2019. Keeping your website updated with fresh content is essential for your search ranking, and it’s the perfect opportunity to talk about your new products, shout about your success and reveal new information about exciting plans that may be afoot.

Start off small. Setting aside half an hour twice a week to research, write and edit your blog posts means you’ll easily manage one blog post per week. Feel that achievement!

Of course, if you really don’t have the time, or you need a little support, contact me. Helping businesses out with their content is what I do best.

Keep Your Social Media Ticking Over

How’s your Twitter account doing? Are you answering all your Facebook messages?

Ignoring your social media accounts can seem like the only way to deal with them when you’re busy but honestly, in 2019, your customers will be reaching out to you via social media more than ever. Making your accounts a priority will make them far less scary and gain you new business. I promise.

Take a look at Buffer’s useful tips on using social media to your advantage, and while you’re at it, have a gander at their post scheduling tool. I use it, and honestly, it saves me so much time.

Carry Out A Web Audit Twice a Year

Ever wondered what your customers think when they reach your website?

Take some time to walk in their shoes by carrying out a web audit. If you’re not sure what one is, don’t worry, I’ve written about them before in my blog. A full web audit means talking a deeper look at the content on your website, and running through it with a fine-tooth comb to see what needs to be amended, what needs to be removed and what could be enhanced to make your website earn its keep.

Trust me, it’s well worth doing.

Want some help getting that new year’s motivation going? I’ve got plenty to go around. Get in touch today and let’s talk about how a freelance copywriter like me can help you make the best possible start to 2019.

Until next time..

2018: A Year in the Life of a Self-Employed Copywriter

Well, well, well…2019 has crept up on us all a bit, hasn’t it?! It seems like only…well, not as long as 12 months ago…that I sat down at my desk, pen in hand (yes, I still always write my to-do lists with pen and paper) on January 1 2018 to map out the year ahead.

I didn’t know it then, but 2018 would turn out to be my busiest year as a self-employed copywriter. I also didn’t evisage it being such a lovely, long, hot and sunny summer and that there would be so many slices of delicious cake to scoff. Okay, I did predict the last one.

I’ve decided to start my year off right by looking back on some of the inspiring projects I’ve been working on over 2018, with some absolutely top notch clients and friends. So without further ado, let’s dig in!

Relaunches and Rebrands

I was chuffed to be selected to work with London-based digital marketing agency Voodoo Park on the total refresh and relaunch of the C2C Trains website. I’m proud of how this project worked out, and I’m thrilled that my copywriting and web content skills were able to bring Voodoo Park - and its client’s - vision to life.

I was also happy to be the copywriter of choice for Leeds-based recruiter, Thorn Baker, as part of its new rebrand. It was a joy to work for a fellow Yorkshire-based company, using copywriting to help their website work exactly the way manager director, Paul, wanted it to.

As well as working with a number of acclaimed marketing and digital agencies in 2018, I also officially launched The Occasional Reporter, with its all-singing, all-dancing website. Shortly after its full launch, I took multiple orders for a fellow marketer for his clients for Christmas/corporate presents.

Excitingly enough, I’m also now in talks with a Premier League football club (I’ll be able to reveal who later this year) about stocking some of my The Occasional Reporter bespoke front pages in their club shop!

Hiring Some Help

I’ve been so busy over the past few months with copywriting, The Occasional Reporter (and scoffing cake!), that I’ve enlisted the professional support of two new freelancers.

Award Wins

In 2018, I was chuffed to win not one but two awards for my work as The Occasional Reporter. The first was a Jacqueline Gold #WOW award, run by entrepreneurial legend Jacqueline Gold, CBE, Chief Executive of Ann Summers’ and Knickerbox.

The second gong I was presented with was a highly sought-after Shooting Stars award. This award is given by Huddersfield Town Football Club Foundation to leading local businesses in the area, and mine was handed over by Sean Jarvis - the Commercial Director of Huddersfield Town.

You can read a bit more about my awards in this blog post, which I posted on The Occasional Reporter’s blog last year.

Getting Technical

Over the past year I very much enjoyed getting my teeth into some technically-focused articles for an engineering client on behalf of H20 Creative.

Engineering is a topic I don’t often get to write about and I relished the challenge of getting each and every detail exactly right. Thankfully, the client was chuffed to bits with the work I provided for them (full testimonial coming soon)

 I Enjoyed 5 Minutes of Fame. Well, Kind Of.

The Yorkshire Post is close to my heart, and I was glad that in 2018 I was able to write a piece for my favourite local newspaper (except the Examiner, of course!) about how my Dad’s love for music inspired my own passion for music and writing.

Brand New Clients

It wouldn’t be right of me to write a blog post about my past year without taking a moment to speak about some of the fantastic clients who’ve hired my services along the way. After all, what would a copywriter be without businesses to write about?

Thank you to Helen Taylor Aesthetics, the Breton Shirt Company, Agile Acoustics, Dental SEM, Ibiza Angels, MA Living and The Stoneacre Group for their support. I look forward to working together again in 2019!

Here’s to the New Year

And, as they say, that’s not all. As 2019 begins with earnest, I’m enthusiastically sending emails and signing off invoices with a flourish. No rest for the wicked! It’s time to knuckle down and get to work for an even better year ahead. I hope you’ll join me?

If you’re looking for a dedicated copywriter with experience in a whole host of industries from recruitment and entertainment to engineering and manufacturing, get in touch. I’d love to speak to you about how we can work together this year.

Until next time…