I have this desire to always respect the audience, assume they’re intelligent people, and write content that treats them accordingly. I really do not want to write at a fifth-grade level.

At the same time, conventional wisdom always recommends using the most basic language possible. Short sentences are encouraged. Simple copy is always preferred.

So where is the line between eloquence and verbosity? Or between accessibility and stupidity?

There are no real answers to these questions and everything is context-dependent but I’m curious to hear people’s thoughts on all this.

Thanks so much for doing this AMA.

I have a couple of questions, if you don’t mind.

1.) How did you get started originally? Did you get a marketing degree? Gain good connections early on? Did you get your feet wet doing SEO content mill stuff before moving on to bigger, better, more lucrative projects?

2.) At what point did you raise your rates? Was it a gradual process, or did you eventually start getting requests from people you knew had the budget to pay what you’re worth?

3.) How’d you get past the “imposter syndrome” that creatively gifted people tend to have? It’s really hard to judge your own talent and skill level objectively, and I think for a lot of us, that gets in the way of having the confidence to charge higher rates.

4.) It sounds like content marketing is working great for you. Now, the freelance writing market is a pretty saturated and competitive place these days. You mentioned in another comment that you need really good content to stand out from the crowd these days. What, in your opinion, separates the great, truly insightful blog content from the mediocre stuff? (Because let’s be honest here, with all the digital marketers preaching “Content is King” and “Make Great Content,” there’s a fuck ton of content out there on every subject imaginable, but most of it is derivative or mediocre.

5.) Do you primarily do “content” (i.e. blog posts and such), “copy” (which I’d group as things like email marketing, landing pages, anything that’s sales-oriented rather than being upper-funnel and primarily informational), or a mix of both?

6.) I’ve been writing copy and content since early 2014, both as an employee and as a freelancer. Over the years, I’ve come to the conclusion that today, in late 2016, it’s a good idea for writers to move away from doing content that’s primarily SEO-centric. It seems that this market has been in decline, and that it tends to be primarily low-paying work for small business’s blogs that no one will ever read. (When was the last time you read a blog post from the plumbing company down the street?) Would you agree with this sentiment, or am I missing something in the current market?

I know these are a lot of questions.

No worries, I’ll answer best I can below:

1.) I never did marketing at all in my formal education (I have a useless political science degree actually). I owned an eCommerce business starting in college and several years later started an email list for it. After learning about copywriting and applying the principles of copywriting to it, the email income went way up. I also had a blog online that started getting popular, and that’s when people started emailing me asking, “I love how you write, can you help me write something?”

2.) I started consulting for $80/hour on my blog. I sold 4 spots and they sold out quick. So I raised it to $120. Then $150. Then $180. This continued to now where I charge $597/hr.

3.) I get that in times of weakness….so when I’m feeling really GREAT about myself (maybe after a fresh cup of coffee!) I’ll say “fuck it” and post my rates and offer somewhere. I have bits of Imposter Syndrome, but for the most part am relatively confident about what I offer. I really make my clients more money, so I don’t feel I’m ripping anyone off ever. ALSO, I would now hate to get just $100 for an hour, it would piss me off, so I naturally raise my rates to a level where I’d be happy to spend that hour on a client.

4.) What separates good content? Sorry for being “braggy” by posting my own articles, but it’ll give you context: Actual real-world experiments (check this out: http://kopywritingkourse.com/street-advertising-experiment/), actually scraping and analyzing data (see this: http://kopywritingkourse.com/copywriter-salary/), actually making templates and giving them away (see this: http://kopywritingkourse.com/one-pager-examples/). THAT’S the difference between great helpful content and just mediocre articles that would’ve been cool in 1995, but will no longer cut it.

5.) I do lots of blog posts, maybe 2-4 per month. I also do LOTS of emails, generally 2 per week. My email list has grown, so I always make sure to send out emails regularly. I wasn’t sure I totally understood the rest of part 5 of your question! Ask again and I’ll be happy to answer though!

6.) I think unless you’re going to make a full-time concerted effort to rank in the search engines, it’s not worth it. It takes time and effort, it’s HARD and takes maybe 1 to 2 years! But I take it seriously so it works. I think content is still king, just not in the form of ONLY blog posts anymore. There’s a shit-ton of social media content being generated, and direct mail (that plumbing company would benefit more from direct mail than blog posts, see this: http://kopywritingkourse.com/direct-mail-marketing/ and search the page for “Air Conditioning”).

Thanks for the questions, lemme know if have more!

Hey there Neville!

First of all, a huge thank you for taking the time to do this AMA and offering your invaluable insights and experience and another thank you for kindling some fire into /copywriting!

So, I’ll grab this unique opportunity and ask a few questions myself:

Would you advise for or against specializing in a specific niche? A lot of copywriters argue that you can make much more money this way since you have extended experience in a specific niche and businesses from that field would pay a premium. My personal reservation is that I like being able to work on different topics from time to time, it adds some variety and versatility and I am afraid that I will get “burnt” writing just for one topic

In your experience what would you say is the best way to network and acquire more clients? You already mentioned that your blog is the main channel from which your get new clients, but for someone like me – whose blog gets the 1/100000 the traffic yours gets – and it will take me years just to build such a valuable blog, what would be the next best thing? aka how do I get clients if I am not Neville from Kopywritingkourse?

3)If you could give just one advice to an aspiring copywriter what would that be?

4)At the moment I work as a freelancer but I am contemplating joining an agency and then later on (depending on the situation) returning to freelancing again with much higher rates. Do you think that would be wise? Have you always worked as a freelancer or have you been an agency/in-house copywriter as well?

5)Lastly, a personal one: the general consensus supports the definition that “Copywriting is salesmanship in print”. (the print part is irrelevant nowadays) do you agree with that? Personally, I consider copywriting as much science as it is art. I think of it as the perfect combination of these two elements – on the one hand you have the raw creativity and on the other hand the “laws” and the rules of copywriting that have to distil and filter said creativity in order to deliver something truly unique. What do you think?

I am really sorry for the long/many questions but it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity having the chance to ask you anything so I couldn’t resist!

Thank you again for this AMA Neville! Oh and happy holidays! 🙂

Thanks George! I’ll answer my best:

**1.) ** They’re right. Being more specific brings in more money. For example, if you were really good at writing articles for lawyers, I would make it clear you specialize in 3 things, one being writing articles for lawyers. This will command much higher prices than being “just some dude who writes words.”

**2.) ** Great question…..and it does take work in the beginning. make it your goal to be a “celebrity” in groups such as Cult of Copy on Facebook (or other specialized groups). Create a Google Doc as your portfolio and log every piece of work you do. If you commit to helping anyone in those groups for 3 months, you can write 40+ pieces. Offer people to do “free consults” or “free reviews”. OR just flat-out provide reviews when people request….and log each of these. You have to essentially PROVE to people you are good. Just because you say “you’re a copywriter” doesn’t mean anyone should hire you. List if you have any experience in specific fields (Ex: I was the top shoe salesman at Foot Locker for 4 years and know the shoe industry backwards and forwards). Things like that boost your credibility big time.

**3.) ** Write a lot. If you’re not ALREADY WRITING FOR FREE (your own blog, reviews, fun projects)….you probably don’t like writing that much. Also, learn the tools of your craft well. Learning Photoshop and WordPress really has propelled me far beyond most copywriters since all they can do is type words.

**4.) ** Hell yeah! Having agency experience is big. First of all you’ll have a name to brag about, second you’ll automatically get to work with heavier weight clients than on your own. I say go for it, and continue to freelance on the side!

**5.) ** I personally don’t get too “romantic” about what “copywriting” actually means. I just work backwards from what the point of the article/email/post is. Is the point to SELL something? Is the point to get linked by other sites? Is the point to get email signups? Then go from there. I also keep a lot of screenshots and swipe file material on all my computers and phone to get inspiration.

I would suggest you learn to become a “Triple Threat” (http://thehustle.co/the-most-successful-people-are-a-double-threat-or-more) so you can be more powerful as a freelancer. Don’t get stuck in JUST banging out keys on a keyboard. Learn to make images, learn to build websites, learn some basic HTML editing, learn how to wrangle WordPress pages to look nice, learn to be a power user of Google Docs and Google Spreadsheets. These skills all add up to making one damn great copywriter!

Thanks for the questions George! Ask anymore if needed 🙂