When one first starts on the career path of copywriting, the instinct is to grasp at any opportunity to practice your craft – and put bread in the jar. In a minute I’ll share a secret that Jay Abraham shared with me that may help…
We’ve all been there. We have to do what we do to survive. However, your chances for survival will increase in proportion to your ability to become more selective. Not all opportunities are equal. Some are Dogs. Some are Stars. It’s critical that you begin to discern when your being asked to walk the plank, and when you are being asked to shoot fish in a barrel.
Be picky. Choose to work on assignments that are “rigged for success” – not for failure. Develop a mindset that you will only work on projects that have a high probability of succeeding. There are two ways you get those assignments: either the offer and list are right when you are approached, or you persuade the client to make alterations and make them right. Absent these two elements, don’t take the work.
The faster you are working on high probability copywriting jobs, the faster your portfolio of winners and your reputation will grow and the faster your making a great deal of money.
This ideal can only be achieved a few ways.
1. Courage. Courage to suggest major changes to a clients strategy, their lists, their offer. Great copywriters are not passive copywriters. They are Curmudgeons with an opinion. Learn to fight for your ideas. You don’t have to be hostile. But be persuasive and firm.
2. Stream of work. In the beginning you need more courage. As you progress you discover that courage is easier if you have a Disney Land Long line of clients waiting to do business with you. That means you need to work on your own prospecting, lead generation and reputation. Market yourself.
3. Discernment: The faster you are able to discern winning propositions from losers, the faster you’ll find your career arching upwards. Sadly, part of this learning equation is doing things for clients and failing. But, this process can be greatly shortened by studying other people’s failures and success.
You must realize that copy is only 20% of the success equation. The bigger part is list and offer. If you have a bad list and bad offer, your copy can’t pull this loser out of a dive.
So, seize the opportunity to study success and failure.
One last comment: One of the great copywriters, Jay Abraham, once passed on a piece of advice to me on this topic; I’ll pass it on to you…
“Set-ups, set-ups, set-ups!”
