{"id":3907,"date":"2023-02-18T19:34:20","date_gmt":"2023-02-18T19:34:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ghostcoast.video\/?p=3907"},"modified":"2024-05-23T14:05:55","modified_gmt":"2024-05-23T18:05:55","slug":"a-look-into-ghost-coasts-daily-routine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ghostcoast.video\/blog\/a-look-into-ghost-coasts-daily-routine\/","title":{"rendered":"A Look Into Ghost Coast’s Daily Routine"},"content":{"rendered":"
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My Daily Routine As An Agency Owner<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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I came from the world of fiction, and when I was starting out, it was REALLY what I wanted to do with my career. I wanted to write books. Or novellas. Or short stories. You get the idea. I\u2019ve never thrown that away, a LOT of my ideas in fiction are relevant to my skills in copy.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But one of the big differences between writing fiction and writing copy is where you actually spend your time. You may think that a copywriter sits down in the morning, cracks their knuckles, cranks out a little masterpiece. Nothing could be further from the truth.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Being a freelance copywriter is like living that skit in I Love Lucy with the conveyor belt, 24 hours a day. It\u2019s an absolute FACT that I spend 80% of my workday shoving pieces of chocolate down my shirt.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Now in the past, I had a very large list of incoming clients, and I could barely finish one job before another came knocking down my door. \u00a0Since I\u2019ve left that world (whew), I would say I spend about 25% of my time actually producing copy, and about 80% of it trolling around for new gigs. Don\u2019t tell me that doesn\u2019t add up to a hundred, either. I\u2019m not a copymather.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Anyway, there\u2019s nothing WRONG with that. My big goal for 2023 is to grow my list of personal contacts and not be stuck with the same sorts of people and the same sorts of gigs over and over again. That requires a whole new personal routine. Let\u2019s talk about the stuff that goes into your routine if you\u2019re a copywriter or any other kind of service-based solopreneur.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Finding Prices<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
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The price\u2019s you quote are a little like making mystery meat. Nobody\u2019s going to actually dig their teeth into it and figure out what\u2019s inside except for you.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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First of all, you\u2019re going to think about your personal time. That means as you work you\u2019re timing yourself, you\u2019re thinking about what your income targets are for the week, for the month, and for the year. You\u2019re thinking about the value that you\u2019re providing to your clients, and obviously, the value that you provide is going to swing upwards as you find better clients. To be clear, when I say \u201cbetter client\u201d I don\u2019t necessarily mean temperament\u2026\u00a0 although that can help.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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What I mean is clients that have high stakes projects \u2013 they\u2019re investing a lot and have a lot to gain. Obviously, we\u2019re all different, but those are the kind of clients that I like working for. There are heavily leveraged and they\u2019re busy. Which gives me room to do what I do best.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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You\u2019re not just looking at your own business. You\u2019ve also got to know what your competitors are charging for similar work. Do you have the same resources they have in terms of software, connections, resume? What I think clients are looking for more than anything is a partner that has a built in advantage. That makes their business easier. That \u201cCLICK\u201d quite often comes from having a lot of experience. They kind of want to be part of an assembly line that understands their needs, but can still consistently earn for them.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Babysitting Clients<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
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It\u2019s so funny \u2013 clients will rake you over the coals if you\u2019re a couple of days late on a project, but more often than not, the clients are the bottleneck.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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When you make a big change, you\u2019ve got to show it to them.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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When you\u2019ve actually finished the work \u2013 you\u2019ve got to wait for final approval.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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If you\u2019re making a video course, you\u2019re going to have to show them an outline and get the thumbs up before you go ahead with it.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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And once you finished all of that, you\u2019re going to have to chase them down to get feedback and testimonials. You would be shocked at how many clients I love every single thing you do, only to\u00a0literally<\/em>\u00a0transform into mist when you ask for the cash, let alone anything after the sale.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Hey ma\u2019am. The holidays are over and I sent your invoice to \u2013 wait\u2026 hello?<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Fair enough, part of this is human nature. Most people can\u2019t get\u00a0anything<\/em>\u00a0done when the rubber meets the road. If I had a penny every time a freelancer that I hired personally suddenly got sick, got the flu, their mom was injured, whatever\u2026.the damn things would crush me to death.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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The day I get in touch with ISIS and hire them to write some articles for me will be the greatest triumph in American history. Fact.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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All you can do to cut down on the babysitting time is raise your prices and remember which clients are foot draggers. I mean, let\u2019s face it, they don\u2019t work for you.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Budgeting<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
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All of the really boring, terrible stuff that goes into building a regular business also applies to online business. You\u2019re going to be keeping track of who you\u2019re paying, sending out invoices, chasing down people who aren\u2019t paying the invoices, managing your tax situation so that the IRS doesn\u2019t break your window and steal your PlayStation 4 the moment you come back from the Best Buy, everything related to bookkeeping is STILL your responsibility, Pamela from HR isn\u2019t lifting a finger to help you.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Unless you have a lovely virtual assistant from Manilla named Pamela, I guess.\\<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Scheduling<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
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One of my biggest mistakes in online business has been getting into the grinding mentality. I dunno, I was taught that if you want success you\u2019ll WORK HARD and blah blah blah. So if I\u2019m doing a big project, I\u2019m DROPPING EVERYTHING and working on that day and night, so that I can come in ahead of deadline.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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That might be good in spurts, but what happens is that you lose your income and clients because you\u2019re not out fishing for them. You lose your social connections because you\u2019re not talking and nurturing those people, your friends and family give you an old-fashioned passionate asswhoopin\u2019 next time they see you because you don\u2019t answer the phone when they call\u2026\u00a0 it\u2019s just no bueno. Part of your business is going to be making sure that you have time for everything, and having a realistic appraisal of how fast you can accomplish certain tasks without going into a \u201ccrunch time\u201d scenario.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Marketing Yourself<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
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Speaking of which, your advertising is a big deal, even if you\u2019re IN advertising.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Posting on your website, posting on social media, posting on high-end freelance websites, all of that is part of bringing in new business and promoting yourself. If you\u2019re lucky enough to have a partner that does all of that heavy lifting for you, great! But if not, you are going to have to do that grinding yourself, and it can\u2019t stop just because you\u2019ve run into one or two good jobs. Your value goes up the more that people see of you. And even though it\u2019s good to have a big resume and portfolio of products that you\u2019ve done, people like to hear from you on a more personal level too. That\u2019s just part of your emotional overhead in terms of time.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Continuing Education<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n
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You would be shocked at how many weird ideas and systems I have to run into and learn as I produce.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Ever so often, your clients are going to get a bug in their butts about some thousand-dollar copywriting course that they\u2019ve invested in and you are going to have to\u00a0pretend<\/em>\u00a0to be conversant in it. Otherwise, their monocles practically pop out of their skulls and they get the fucking\u00a0vapors!<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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\u201cOh heavens, how can any truly proficient copywriter not know about Dan-Bob White\u2019s Generic VSL Academy 2017???\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Like, I\u2019m sure Dan-Bob is a great guy, but I\u2019ve got ideas that work for me. You need to be semi up to date in terms of software and information. Generally, I keep my ears to the ground, if pros are talking about it, or a client that I trust, then I\u2019m more likely to investigate it.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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But even so, watching Sarah Stockholm\u2019s\u00a0Hey Baby Badass Betch, Live Your Life Totally Flawlessly Cuz You\u2019re A Diamond Rockstar Rebel And You\u2019re Gonna Make It 2024 Webinar Retreat Thingy For Girls<\/strong>\u00a0can be pretty lengthy even if you\u2019re smacking fast forward once in a while.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/span>Boring Old Research<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n
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Personally, and don\u2019t tell anybody this, but I spend about half of the time I spend writing copy just researching. Researching the best-performing copy in the niche, researching Amazon reviews, looking at forums and Facebook chatter. The number one thing that I do is grab that target customers\u00a0experience<\/em>. I want to understand how they live in relation to this topic that they\u2019re talking about. I want to feel the things that make them feel insecure, pissed off, or humiliated. Clients generally are not going to dig with that much detail and it makes it hard for you to give quality quotes sometimes. You need to know your audience really well.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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You also need to know the product. That means if there were previous sales letters, you need to read those and not necessarily know them by heart, but definitely know the emotional beats by heart and know what\u2019s coming next in the copy.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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It\u2019s these seven things, seriously. They\u2019ve gotta get done before you can start writing, and before you can start writing anything\u00a0REALLY GOOD.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Given that, it\u2019s a minor miracle I\u2019ve got time to do anything else at all. Maybe I can be a #babybadassbetch and improve my technique somewhere.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My Daily Routine As An Agency Owner I came from the world of fiction, and when I was starting out, … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","filesize_raw":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"series":[],"class_list":["post-3907","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-linkedn"],"episode_featured_image":false,"episode_player_image":"https:\/\/ghostcoast.video\/blog\/wp-content\/plugins\/seriously-simple-podcasting\/assets\/images\/no-album-art.png","download_link":"","player_link":"","audio_player":false,"episode_data":{"playerMode":"dark","subscribeUrls":{"apple_podcasts":{"key":"apple_podcasts","url":"","label":"Apple Podcasts","class":"apple_podcasts","icon":"apple-podcasts.png"},"google_podcasts":{"key":"google_podcasts","url":"","label":"Google Podcasts","class":"google_podcasts","icon":"google-podcasts.png"},"pocketcasts":{"key":"pocketcasts","url":"","label":"PocketCasts","class":"pocketcasts","icon":"pocketcasts.png"},"rss":{"key":"rss","url":"","label":"RSS","class":"rss","icon":"rss.png"},"spotify":{"key":"spotify","url":"","label":"Spotify","class":"spotify","icon":"spotify.png"},"stitcher":{"key":"stitcher","url":"","label":"Stitcher","class":"stitcher","icon":"stitcher.png"}},"rssFeedUrl":"https:\/\/ghostcoast.video\/blog\/feed\/podcast\/ghost-coast-video","embedCode":"

A Look Into Ghost Coast’s Daily Routine<\/a><\/blockquote>