What I’m about to reveal to you might just blow your mind…
In part, because it breaks nearly every rule you’ve been told about marketing yourself as a copywriter.
I’m going to share with you something powerful.
It’s a website template.
A website template specifically designed for freelance copywriters.
Copywriters looking to get paid the big bucks.
Novice copywriters, and more advance pros.
Anywhere in between.
And it will be useful to you if you write direct response copy. If you write longer copy. Or if you write shorter copy.
It will be useful if you write copy to appear on a client’s website. Or Facebook Ads. Or Google Ads. Or other online ads. Or offline ads, such as for magazines, newspapers, or direct mail.
It’s a universal website template for copywriters.
Are you ready for the big reveal?
Ok…
Here it comes…
I’m really putting it off, because I want it to be “below the fold” on this article.
But this is probably enough teasing…
Here it is…
—
—
WHAT?!
Is there nothing between those lines?
Is something missing? Perhaps a screenshot?
Nope.
Nada.
It’s literally nothing.
“That’s crazy Roy, but I’ve been told I need a website!”
Okay. I know, I know. You’ve probably been sold on the idea quite a few times. Probably by people who either had a template to sell you, or a program on how to build a website, or maybe someone who was selling hosting or website building services.
They can all trot out all kinds of reasons why you should have a website.
But…
You really don’t need one! At least, not if you’re like about 95% of all successful copywriters.
Here’s a dirty little secret…
I don’t think I made a single sale of my copywriting services by having a website promoting my copywriting services.
I’ve had various websites over the years. I’ve put a decent amount of time into building and promoting them. But none of them got me business.
What got me business was proactively connecting with the kinds of clients I wanted to work with, and having conversations with them.
Anything you might put on a website, such as samples, can just as easily be sent with a Google Drive or Dropbox link.
I STRONGLY recommend an online scheduler like Book Like A Boss that allows you to more easily schedule phone calls and meetings.
And you should probably have, at least, a bare minimum presence on LinkedIn or similar that lets you control what prospective clients see about you online.
But in terms of just selling copywriting services, this is enough. You don’t need a website.
And most of the best copywriters I know don’t have a website selling their copywriting services either.
Here are the exceptions…
Like I said, probably 95% of copywriters don’t need a website.
Here are some examples of people that fit in the other 5%.
If you build a publishing business as a marketing expert, you should have a site for that. This is primarily to sell your published products. Though if you have it, you might as well put up a page that explains how potential clients can work with you. This will give the tiny percentage of people who want to ascend from buying products to buying services a path to do so.
If you have a scalable offer, with scalable service delivery, and can buy traffic, you should have a website. This is advanced, and probably turns you into more of an agency. But if you have a team working under you with under-utilized capacity… AND you’re able to buy targeted traffic to help good prospective clients find you, you could build a website to drive that traffic to.
If you do high-volume, bottom-of-the-barrel work, you should have a website. Let’s say you write Google Ads, or create simple lead generation funnels for small businesses. And every project is pretty much the same, is done fast, and isn’t worth a ton. This would mean you have to do a LOT of projects to make your monthly nut. In which case, you need an effective website to bring clients in, and you need to learn to drive qualified traffic to it.
These are exceptions. Remember, these are probably 1 in 20 — just 5%.
In some cases, they end up being the biggest copywriting businesses. Because each of the examples above (especially the first two) represents building a scalable business that isn’t necessarily you as a solo service provider.
And if you get any of these examples right, you can scale pretty effectively.
BUT…
If you’re an independent copywriter who wants all the freedoms of freelancing, you are not the exception. You are the rule.
If you insist on building a website…
Here’s what it should contain…
— A clear description of your core offer. What fundamental problem are you solving for clients? Why is that an urgent problem to solve? Why are you superior to other options for solving it? And what does it look like once you’ve solved the problem? How is their life made many orders of magnitude better because they work with you?
— NO price for your copywriting services. If anything, just say that they’re reassuringly expensive. You charge a premium, but clients are happy to pay it because of the results.
— Client stories of how you exceeded their best expectations. If you include samples, beware that most clients don’t know what works. So unless you have some off-the-charts numbers to share with them, minimize your emphasis on samples, and instead offer them on request.
— Other elements that establish your expertise, support your subject matter authority, and increase credibility and believability that you’ll fulfill on the promise of your offer.
— A clear next action prospective clients can take, such as an application process for them to go through.
In some cases, this can be a single page. In other cases, the site may be somewhat more complex.
No matter what though, the flow should be pretty straightforward.
I understand your problem… I can solve your problem… I’ve solved your problem for others like you… I’m an expert at solving this problem… Here’s how to work with me.
Even better…
The more you make it feel like the whole website is a way to SCREEN OUT all the prospective clients coming to you (while also still acknowledging how awesome you are), the more effective it will be.
And if you take my advice and don’t have a website for your copywriting services?
First, congratulate yourself on the time saved.
Then, pick a list of who you want to work with.
Find out who their marketing managers or copy chiefs are, through some research.
Reach out to them and tell them you’d like to chat with them about how you can help with their copy. (Make this super-short, personal, and write it in a way that expects a reply.)
Make sure you include your Book Like A Boss or other scheduler link, offering a quick call of no more than 30 minutes, but probably more like 15.
When you get them on the phone…
Talk to them warmly, and ask a lot of questions that show you’ve done your homework.
Try to get THEM talking as much as possible. Listen.
And when and how it makes sense, figure out how you can help with their copy needs.
If you have less experience, this will require you to be more flexible in doing what they need to have done.
If you have more experience, it will probably involve you bringing your expertise to the table because you’ve already recognized that it’s a match with their style of marketing.
Either way, you could probably prospect for, book, have, and follow up on at least 10 of these conversations in the time it would take you to build a decent website.
And if you’d built the website? You’d still have to end up doing this same work later, because no GREAT client is out there randomly Googling for copywriters.
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
PS: I typed “sales letter copywriter” into Google and got ads for “Sales letter writers from $34” and “Sales copywriter at $100/page.” Compare that to my $20k/project+royalties and you’ll easily get what I mean when I say things such as “high-volume, bottom-of-the-barrel” work. If you’re putting yourself in the search stream, you’re competing against commodity-level copywriting. If you’re hard to find and harder to hire and you can ACTUALLY get results, you’ll actually seem more valuable to clients.
