It’s Monday — that means it’s time to open up the mailbox and answer YOUR questions!
You’ve heard the big bucks in copywriting (or, insert entrepreneurial career here) is in another niche…
And now, after developing some general chops, you’re considering a switch.
The only problem is, how do you do it? How do you go from something you know is good enough (to get by, to pay the bills, to do the work in, etc.) to something that could be great?
That’s the crux of today’s question.
Today is Mailbox Monday. Which means it’s time to me to dig into the ol’ mailbox, and answer a question from YOU, my loyal reader.
What’s that? You’re not the one who submitted today’s question? Well, let’s fix that. Click this link and you can submit your question on marketing, copywriting, selling, business-building, career-building, or life to have it answered in an upcoming Mailbox Monday issue.
Now, here’s today’s question…
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Roy,
What’s a good strategy that a copywriter can use to enter a new niche?
Right now, my niche is B2B healthcare (revenue cycle). I’ve got 20+ years of healthcare and B2B marketing experience, so it makes sense for me to start out there. My “problem” is I really don’t want to stay in this niche.
I don’t think that copywriting is as valued on the B2B side as it is on the B2C side. I would love to eventually jump to finance, consumer products, or another niche where copywriting is more directly tied to sales. Not to mention, I’m fairly sure the pay is much better as well! I’d love to hear your thoughts on the dilemma. Thanks!
Thanks,
SS
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Good question! Let’s start by looking at the career-change spectrum…
It’s really easy when you’re considering switching niches to adopt the employee mindset.
That is, in the classical world of full-time employment, you quit one job to get the next one. That’s on one end of the spectrum. Quit one thing, start another.
On the other end of the spectrum is a completely gradual transition. It may have clear markers of the beginning and end of the transition, in hindsight. As in, here’s my first project in X industry. And here’s my last in Y. But in between, you’re still working in the last niche while developing your prospects in the next one. This is a much more entrepreneurial approach.
By this point, I feel like you can probably guess my answer to the question. But I’ll dive deeper, and try to give you some more value along the way.
Mark Ford (aka Michael Masterson) has often written about “The Chicken Entrepreneur” strategy. That is, anything you want to start and grow can be started in your free time, around your other obligations, until it’s big enough to support you going forward.
When I discovered marketing, I was an employee, through-and-through. My wife was going into grad school, and we needed to eat. So I got a full-time job, with salary, plus benefits.
But less than two years later, I launched my chicken entrepreneur freelance copywriting career. I didn’t do it full-time. In fact, I only did a couple big projects per year, for the first couple years. I earned most of my income and spent most of my time doing full-time marketing and sales for my employer.
But, I was developing my chops. I was developing a reputation. I was getting to know the industries I wanted to work in.
So as the time approached, in late 2009, that my wife would be finishing her program and we’d be moving across the country again, I could ramp up my copywriting. Which, I did. And about 6 months before we needed to move, I launched my full-time freelance career. And it should be noted, my primary client that first year (and source of many referrals) was a client I’d already worked with for a while, as a part-time, mornings-and-weekends copywriter.
About a year after that, I transitioned into financial copywriting in much the same way. Among my many projects in personal development and business opportunity, I took a flier on a spec assignment for a smaller investment publisher. That project did well enough that they immediately booked me for three more projects. And when that contract was done, they offered me a retainer, and I was pretty tied up, and didn’t really take on more work from the previous clients.
The last time I switched niches or careers from the employee end of the spectrum was all the way back in 2005, when I got that full-time marketing job.
But by doing freelance work and easing into it, every switch since then has been a pretty smooth transition, because I’ve adopted the entrepreneurial — even, chicken entrepreneur — approach.
And so that’d be my best recommendation here. Stay in the niche you have credibility, background, and a track record in. Make the most of that, to keep paying your bills. But in something like 10% of your time, pick a future destination, and start working toward that.
That said, here’s a few more thoughts…
Get honest, and beware the “grass is greener” phenomenon…
It’s very easy to get caught up in the promises of a few marketing letters, designed to sell the copywriting business opportunity, and to decide that the only place to make real money is in the big consumer publishing niches of health and wealth.
And honestly, they ARE great places to make money. The established financial publishing world has huge lists of buyers who are always looking for the next big idea in investing, and copywriters like me who introduce those ideas are well-paid when we write a winner.
And, to your point, a big reason why this niche is so lucrative is because these publishers are ready, willing, and able to pay copywriters like salespeople for the results they generate.
But beware — as humans we are all subject to the flawed thinking best known as “the grass is greener phenomenon.”
That is, we are always looking toward what we don’t have, and assuming it’s better than what we do have. When, in all reality, if we truly cultivated the opportunity we’re sitting on, it could easily be as good or better than what we’re going to.
And to underscore this further, one of the things that happens when you think the grass is greener in other opportunities, is you’re constantly chasing the next thing, and the next thing, and the next thing, and never giving any one opportunity the time it takes to mature.
Realize that ANY niche will take time to build your skills and reputation. If you’re going to switch niches, be ready to be in it for the long haul. Be ready for it to be harder up front than you’re expecting. Be ready to put in more work than you think it should take.
If you’re prepared for that, you may be pleasantly surprised with successes beyond expectation. But if you take it the other way around — assuming a cake walk — you’ll undoubtedly quit early and never realize your potential.
IF you heed this warning and decide to switch anyway… Make sure you’re ready…
The power of a “war chest”…
One of the most important things I did to get started as a full-time freelancer was to save money.
This was above and beyond retirement savings. I built a “war chest” equivalent to a bit more than 90 days’ living expenses, even though I was also booked out about 60 days beyond the date I was quitting.
This meant that the day I walked out of my full-time job for the last time, I really had about five months’ living expenses covered, if I didn’t get another project.
While I 100% believe in the power of “gun to the head” situations where you have to succeed, or else, I haven’t wanted to take that kind of risk since I was young, dumb, and single.
When I quit my full-time job, I had a son who was less than a year old, plus my wife and I were readying for a cross-country move.
Having that security didn’t necessarily make it easy to make the transition, but it did make it easier.
Build up a financial buffer, in advance of any transition. (Actually, pretty much your whole life and career should be spent building an ever-increasing financial buffer against any negative financial situation — that is, save, save, and save some more.)
This is critical to you and your family’s sanity as you transition.
Expect that in any transition, there will be times where the money isn’t coming with the regularity you were used to. There will be times where you have to stretch a little bit, to make sure your bills are covered. There will be times of financial stress.
The more prepared you are for this — both financial and mentally — the better you’ll handle it.
Finally: If you’re going to do it, just do it…
One of the things that’s most persistently frustrating about being in this industry is just how many wannabes I see out there.
That is, there are a ton of people who SAY they want to do XYZ. Whether that’s become a financial copywriter, or become a copywriter in general, or start some other business, or whatever.
But when you ask them what they’ve done in the last 24 hours to make that happen? Or the last week? The last month? Even the last year?
Aside from BUYING MORE COURSES, the answer is almost nothing.
Not calling potential clients. Not submitting spec assignments. Not volunteering to do grunt work just to get in the door somewhere.
Nothing.
The people who I see being successful have one consistency between them: they do things.
And they keep doing things until they get results. If one thing doesn’t work, they try another. If one opportunity doesn’t pan out, they add three to the pipeline to get something.
When you adopt that approach as a HABIT, and you direct it toward a GOAL, you can probably get close to anywhere that others have gotten before you, and perhaps even further.
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
