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Recipe for Freelance Writing Success-- Take Massive Action
By Angela Booth
In 2000, when the dotcom boom turned into a bust, I watched as my writing income
as a tech journalist dried up literally overnight. It was amazing, rather than
scary. Magazines cut back on their editorial because merchants stopped
advertising. Less advertising means fewer editorial pages.
I went from working twelve-hour days to just a couple of gigs. I couldn't
believe the change.
And I didn't know what to do, because I hated to market my writing and writing
services.
How to market when you hate to market
Paradoxically, it turned out that the bust was the best thing that ever happened
to me, because it forced me to grow as a writer. Before 2000, I rarely marketed
my work. There was no need; I could send out a few queries and get work. I had
steady magazine and copywriting gigs.
Although I knew how to market others' businesses by copywriting, I never learned
to market my own business. Like many writers, I HATED marketing. I couldn't do
it. The idea of an intensive marketing campaign made me physically sick.
However, like it or not, I knew I had to market myself.
Take massive action
I started to do some self-therapy to try to get at the roots of my marketing
aversion, and I also began reading marketing books by people like Zig Ziglar and
Brian Tracy.
The experts advocated that I "take massive action." Well, I was unwilling, but
prepared to try. I couldn't let 20 years of writing slide into the dust: I had
to get writing gigs to replace the ones I lost. Because magazines were cutting
back on editorial, I decided to focus on copywriting.
The fastest way to get results is telemarketing, so I got out my Yellow Pages,
my lists of previous clients, and started pushing buttons. I committed myself to
50 calls a day for two weeks.
Did it work?
You bet. By day two of my two week campaign, I had three clients and couldn't
continue because I had a 32-page newsletter to write, as well as a major
publicity campaign to organize. There was no time for more phone calls. And my
bank account looked pretty healthy, because both clients dropped half the fee
into my account as a retainer without so much as a single quibble.
Those two clients soon developed into ten clients. I didn't solicit those
clients, they contacted me.
It's all about the numbers
From reading Ziglar and Tracy, I knew that my telemarketing results matched the
numbers. If you make 100 contacts, you can expect to get anywhere from one to
five sales, or have a 1% to 5% success rate.
These numbers don't vary, ever. You can take them to the bank. That's why call
centers and junk mail advertising (copywriters call it "direct marketing") are
so successful. That's why your inbox is crammed with sp@m. The numbers.
Remember: it's all about the numbers, which is why "take massive action" works.
So, how do you apply the numbers? You prepare yourself to take massive action,
just as I did with my telemarketing campaign. I was prepared to make 500 calls
over two weeks. Although I had to stop the campaign, I was prepared to persist
for the full two weeks. And of course, for longer if necessary.
You can apply the massive action formula anywhere, at any time. It always works.
It will work for you.
The biggest benefit of the massive action marketing campaign for me was that it
dealt a death blow to my fear/ hatred of marketing. That single campaign removed
any inhibitions I had about marketing. Some six years later, I LOVE marketing,
and consider it the most enjoyable part of writing.
I wish you much success with your own massive action campaign-- start it today.
Angela Booth is a veteran freelance writer and copywriter. She also teaches
writing. Visit her blogs-- Angela Booth's Writing Blog at
http://copywriter.typepad.com/ and Fab Freelance Writing at
http://fabfreelancewriting.com/blog/ for daily writing inspiration and
motivation. Subscribe to the Fab Freelance Writing Ezine at
http://fabfreelancewriting.com/ezine/fab-freelance-writing-ezine.html to
receive "Write And Sell Your Writing: The Power-Write Report" free. It's 21
pages packed with information to help you to develop a six-figure writing
career.
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