Whether you’re new to writing or looking to relaunch your business, there are so many options and paths forward, you might feel like you’re spinning your wheels.
With all the possible opportunities worth exploring, there’s a simple 3-step process you can use, no matter your situation or end goal…
This will help you clarify your message, grow your confidence, and build good habits.
What are they?
Well, let’s take a closer look…
— Step 1 —
Choose One Project Type to Start With
Last week, Jen Phillips April talked about the value of mastering one project at a time as a method of launching and growing your business.
She shared a lot of wisdom. And I agree… to get started, one of the first things you need is a project you can offer… one that brings value to your client and that you’re comfortable writing.
You don’t have to learn all the different kinds of writing before you start marketing yourself, taking on projects, and growing your business. You really just need to have one you feel confident (enough) to do for paying clients.
Your first step, then, is to pick the project type you’ll learn first.
I recommend starting with a break-in project. These are project types that are on the shorter side, that clients tend to need a lot of, and that are low risk for the client. This means they can hire you, see if you’re a good fit, and pay you without any big potential loss.
Break-in projects include:
- Blog posts
- Newsletters
- Email messages
In my experience, most of these projects pay between $150 and $750 for each one you write. A typical client will need this type of content at least twice a month, and up to several times a week… and they tend to be focused on building authority, nurturing an audience, or driving traffic, rather than making sales.
Once you’ve picked the break-in project you want to offer, start learning it. You can get up to speed in as little as three weeks, if you do the following:
- Week 1: Read blogs and articles about the project type — one to three a day. Take notes… and pay extra attention to the suggestions that come up again and again.
- Week 2: Analyze examples — at least one a day. If you’re planning to offer blog posts, read at least one blog post critically each day. Based on what you learned the week before, look for things you think each post does exceptionally well. And look for things you would change to make the post stronger.
- Week 3: Practice your project. Craft one sample a day for seven days. This can be time-consuming, but it’s key to growing your confidence. If you chose blog posts as your initial break-in offer, write a blog post each day. After you write it, set it aside for at least an hour, and then come back and read it critically, like you did with posts in your second week.
After three weeks, you’ll have gained a lot of knowledge and practice with your project type — certainly more than the average small-business owner will have… which means you now have something of value to offer a lot of companies.
To dig deeper into your project type, you can also enroll in an AWAI course — here are a few to consider…
- How to Write Blogs for Yourself and Clients: A Step-by-Step Guide to Blogging Success teaches you the ins and outs of writing successful blog posts and planning out your content strategy for a blog.
- How to Write Engaging E-newsletters: Earn Ongoing Income by Turning Casual Prospects into Devoted Customers shows you how to write the most popular styles of email newsletters for clients big and small.
- How to Write High-Impact Emails gives you everything you need to know from soup (your subject line) to nuts (your call-to-action) to craft emails that get results.
Having a project type is important, but it’s only one leg of your getting-started strategy. You also need a market to focus on.
— Step 2—
Get to Know a Specific Audience
You need someone to make your offer to… that’s your audience.
At this stage, whatever market you choose as your target will be for practice. This isn’t necessarily where you’re going to land, if you decide to niche yourself… but it could be.
The point here is to give yourself an audience to study. If you try to tailor your offer to everyone, you’re going to feel overwhelmed, and the messages you send out won’t be very well targeted.
During the same three weeks that you’re getting a handle on your break-in project, also spend time getting to know your market:
- Week 1: Visit three to five websites in your market every day. Look at how they’re organized. Study how they speak to their audience. And most importantly, look at how they use your project type. Take notes about what you see and if you notice any missed opportunities.
- Week 2: During the second week, search out three to five online publications that cater to your target market. Each day, read two or three articles in these publications to get a deeper idea of what’s on your market’s mind and the types of problems they may need to solve.
- Week 3: In your final week, join two or three forums, Facebook groups, or LinkedIn groups, where your target audience might be hanging out. See what kinds of things they’re posting, what sorts of questions they’re asking, and what they’re worried about.
Through all of this, pay particular attention to the struggles your audience has with your project type. If you write email messages, pay attention to questions, discussions, and articles about email marketing. If you write blog posts, zero in on what people are saying about content marketing.
Once you have a project type and an audience you can help, you’re ready to start practicing a marketing strategy…
— Step 3 —
Start Connecting the Dots
After three weeks of study, you’ll have a project type you can offer, and you’ll understand the market you’re offering it to.
Even better, you’ll have some insights into the problems and headaches your clients face around your project type, so you can craft your messages around how you’ll help address those problems.
For example, if you’re writing email messages, and you see a lot of clients saying they’re struggling with a high number of Unsubscribes, you can talk about two or three things you’ll do to help reduce that number for them. Revisit your notes from studying your project type to mine for the best strategies or do some additional research.
As another example, if you offer blog post writing, and you see a lot of people in your audience talking about how they can’t keep up with timelines, you could focus your message on how you’ll always meet deadlines.
The next is to start practicing pitching your services to people in your market.
There are a few ways to do this…
You can find people from your audience on LinkedIn, connect with them, and then send them a message about how you can help them.
You can find companies within your market, research who oversees marketing and content development, and then send them an email message.
Or you could make a list of smaller companies in your area and send them a one-page letter through the mail.
This isn’t an exhaustive list of ways to practice your marketing, but these three methods are inexpensive and give you a place to start.
When you write your messages to these folks in your target market, keep these three things in mind:
- Most of the time, you aren’t going to get a response. People are busy, and if the timing isn’t right, they’re going to drive on without replying. Don’t let that get you down. Remember, right now, you’re simply practicing the art of outreach, so the process of doing it gets easier.
- You’ll get more responses when you personalize your messages. If you can spend a few minutes on a company’s website and then tailor your message to what you see there, you’ll have more impact than if you just send a standard message that’s the same for everyone. The tradeoff is, it will take more time to craft each message.
- Keep your messages brief. For this type of outreach, more people will read your message if it’s just a few lines.
Set a goal to send a certain number of messages each day — it could be one or two or five, depending on the time you have.
And then remember, it will take sending a hundred messages before you have an idea of what your response rate looks like, and if what you’re doing is working… so be patient and consistent.
You’ll also increase your response rate if you send follow-up messages to the people you’re contacting. These can be just a line or two asking if they’ve had a chance to read your initial message.
Keep It Simple for Better Results
When you do these three things:
- Choose a single service to get confident with and offer to prospects…
- Study a specific market and get to know its needs…
- Reach out steadily and consistently…
You’ll give yourself a manageable strategy to get your business rolling. And you’ll put yourself in the position to start succeeding with your business sooner.
Thinking about giving it a try? Share your project type and market in the comments!
