Angela Booth's Writing Blog

Copywriting: create proposals for your current clients

The easiest way to get new work is to make proposals to your current clients. I do this routinely with my favorite clients.

For example, I write for a graphic design studio in Melbourne. The last time I was browsing their site I realized that they don't have a Company History page. It's a family business, around for 40 years. They've got a lot of history. So I proposed a page, which I created, but I've also been commissioned to write a 100-page book about the family and their business.

Create proposals. Think about your clients' needs, ask, and get on-going work.

Technorati Tags: copywriting

Tagging: Useful tool

Thanks to Random Bytes for the link to Keotag, AND the great explanation of what  Keotag does:

Enter Keotag. Essentially a social bookmarking metasearcher, this nifty little tool allows you to simultaneously query over a dozen of the top social bookmarking sites on any tag or keyword, finding sites recommended by people rather than produced by search engine algorithms or seo manipulations.

Excellent tool for research. :-)

Hand-rolled blogging with WordPress

I've only been WordPress-blogging for a week, but it's FUN. There are an amazing number of WordPress plug-ins so that you can customize your WP blog in any way you choose.

Since I use Technorati tags on all my blogs, I felt naked blogging without tagging, so I hunted around until I found the Simple Tags plug-in which lets you turn any word inside [tags] and [/tags] into Technorati tags.

If you haven't considered a WordPress blog, do -- I can recommend it.

Technorati Tags: blog how-to

Your new writing career begins NOW!

I've been exchanging emails with a blogger who's new to the writing-for-money field.

She's an excellent writer, and wants to turn her writing into a career. "Can I do it?" she asked.

"Of course you can!" I told her.

She's been blogging intensively for eight months, and loves to write, but has no idea how to market her skills.

I recommended that she start by writing for business. Copywriters and Web content writers are in huge demand. She can build her skills for a few months, while making some nice income, and then decide how she wants to build her career. My First Steps In Your Copywriting Career will help her to get started -- and it can help you too.

Pot-hole words: peak and pique; eek and eke

Here we go with more pot-hole words you can stumble into.

Peak and pique

"Peak" can be a noun, verb, or adjective. It's often misused in the verb form: "his interest was peaked [sic] when he heard she'd been seen topless in the local bar". As a verb, " to peak" means to reach the highest point of a value or time, viz: "The stock peaked at $46 a share,"' it doesn't mean to arouse interest, that's "pique".

"Pique" can be used as a noun or verb. As a noun, it means irritation or resentment: "when she dumped him, he threw the phone across the room in a fit of pique."

As a verb, to "pique" means to arose interest or curiosity: "the blood splatters piqued his curiosity". It can also mean to feel irritated: "she was piqued at his carelessness."

Eek and eke

I've seen "eek" and "eke" confused several times online, so it's a definite pot-hole. :-)

"Eek" is something you say when you're shocked: "Eek! I've just seen a mouse!"

"Eke" is a verb which indicates difficulty -- "he eked out a living on the farm".

Technorati Tags: grammar

Write for the Web: Writers are Web producers now

Want to write for the Web? Good! You can. The Web is a voracious beast screeching for more and more CONTENT.

That "content" includes not only text, but also images, audio and video. Inevitably this means that a Web writer is also a Web producer, because only the largest sites have a content management team. As a site's writer, you'll be required to be comfortable working on the backend and creating complete Web pages, with the copy (text), images, links, and even advertising.

Practice your Web production skills on your own Web site
You need to practice your HTML and CSS skills, and there's only one place to do it: on your own Web site. On your own site, you can tinker as much as you like.

Technorati Tags: Web writing

Pot-hole words: lose and loose

Find yourself tripping over words? In this series I'm covering "pot-hole" words -- the words we stumble over; words that it's easy to confuse and misuse, and that are often confused by online writers.

Let's start with "lose" and "loose".

Lose is a verb. You lose stuff -- your keys or your ambition. It's also the opposite of "win" -- when you don't win, you lose. It's easy to lose your way in the mountains. Did you lose the CD?

Loose is an adjective; it means not firmly fixed or tied in place; relaxed. Your belt can be loose, or your stride. However, you can also use loose as a verb, when it means to undo, or to free, as in: She loosened the ribbon around her gift. She loosed the chickens.

Technorati Tags: grammar

(Mac) Donation-ware Journler -- must-have writer's software

Two reasons I love my Mac: its system integration and GREAT software, which lead to enhanced creativity. I've had my Mac for around ten months, and now work equals FUN.

By "system integration" I mean that programs work together so that you're not confined by limits. If you want to do something, you can just do it. Curio is a superb example of this. I've mentioned Curio before -- Curio lets me keep track of all my bits and pieces for a project: outlines, research, notes -- I can see exactly where I am with any project, which is a great stress-reliever.

Curio handles all my projects, and I've been looking for a similar program that I can use for daily notes -- a Mac journal -- a program which lets me keep a entire day's worth of scratch notes: ideas for projects, notes for blog postings, and research URLs in one place, so I don't have to keep opening other programs.

Journler fills the bill: it's just what I'm looking for -- the perfect writer's daily journal. It's a real Mac program -- it uses Services, lets you insert images from iPhoto, voice notes etc. Just brilliant.

Technorati Tags: writers' software

Writing your family history

As the designated writer in your family, at some point you may be asked to write the family history, or be inspired to do it.

Genealogy is very popular, and you'll find lots of resouces online. To get you started, here's an excellent article: Writing A Non-Boring Family History.

Note: if you don't have the time to write the complete family history, do record the memories of the oldest members of your family.

Technorati Tags: writing

The copywriting e-course returns -- NEW material and format

The copywriting e-course is back -- in a new and more interactive format.

You can read the course details here -- it's a popular online course I created in 2003 for writers who want to build a copywriting services business from the ground up. Many writers have benefited from the course, building businesses or stepping into careers at copywriting agencies and marketing agencies.

New in the course:

* More interaction. Rather than receiving eight weeks of email lessons, and emailing me your exercises, we work together on the material at basecamp. I've been using basecamp with copywriting clients and it's a great service;

* Thanks to basecamp, you can contact me at any time and I can reply right in basecamp, so you've got the answers to questions right underneath the questions -- no hunting through email folders;

* New format -- the entire course comes to you as a PDF, rather than as individual email files. You've got all the material in one place as the perfect reference -- use it firstly to build your business, then to GROW your business;

* Coaching that builds a complete business for you through the right weeks;

* New material -- I send you additional material each week of the course, tailored to YOU.

If you want to develop a new exciting career that's a real business, we'll work together to build the infrastructure so you can earn the sort of income you want to earn.

If you'd love to build a whole new life around your writing skills and develop a lucrative career at the same time, enroll -- we'll have a great eight weeks as we work together. :-)

Technorati Tags: copywriting

Collect your brain drops

Great post: Warm, Partly Cloudy, 100% Chance of Brain Rain:

Keys to catching the brain rain:

• set aside 10 minutes, each and every day
• have pen and paper handy
• allow yourself the freedom to think crazy thoughts
• don’t worry if nothing really productive springs to mind right away
• periodically scan over your notes from these sessions as things may pop into your mind after they have “marinated” for a while
• if no ideas pop into your head pick a fun topic and doodle a bit

One of the effects of doing this is that you find that you're more creative throughout the day -- it's as if you've woken up your creativity centre.

Technorati Tags: creativity

SEO mania: Don’t get trapped in SEO copywriting hell

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the new mania in Web copywriting. (Deep, deep sigh...)

I’ve started advising my copywriting students NOT to accept these kinds of jobs.

Why? Dopey clients.

The challenge with accepting SEO copywriting jobs is that clients confuse visitors with sales. They’re so determined to get traffic to their site that they send you long lists of “keywords” to target. This is fine, but invariably this kind of client has no understanding of marketing and turning a prospect into a sale.

He (or she) has latched onto a useful strategy (SEO) as a magic bullet. The client is convinced that if only she can get all 300 of her favorite keywords onto a single page she’ll hit the top of the search query results and will have thousands of prospects swarming to her site and BUYING.

Heh. Getting prospects to the site is one thing, making a sale something else.

As a copywriter, you need to choose between doing a good job for your client and just taking the money -- that is, writing a compost-heap page, a page so stuffed with trash that no one will stay long enough to read the page, much less buy anything.

Educating this kind of client takes too long to make the task worthwhile.

Save your sanity, and pass on this kind of client.

Technorati Tags: copywriting

WordPress blogging: it's easy

Gotta blog yet? No, I'm not going to nag you about blogging. :-)

I've been setting up a new WordPress blog on my own site -- no link to the blog yet, it's still in the early cake-mix stage. I haven't decided what I want it to be, other than that I want it to be useful. I'm tinkering with the theme, the template, and WordPress's new widgets.

The blog was EASY to set up. If you've got your own site, and are (reasonably) comfortable with FTP, try WordPress. It's free, has amazing functionality, and many keen users. The entire installation took less than half an hour, mostly spent reading the documentation.

Great stuff.

Technorati Tags: blogs

New version of (free) word processor, AbiWord

AbiWord has just come out with a new version. It's a fun and easy program to use, and because it saves in MS Word format, it saves you buying multiple licenses of MS Word if several people in your company (or family) use it. It's multi-platform, so you can use it on almost any operating system -- Windows, Mac, Linux etc.

Does it work as a writer's word processor?

Yep, according to my standards it does: it counts words, lets you set up styles, and has a "full screen" option for the times you don't want to be distracted.

I often use AbiWord because MS Word takes a lot of system resources. Give the program a try.

.

Technorati Tags: writers' software

Endast: a real writer's font

I love fonts. Choose the right font, and you've said a lot about a topic without writing more than a couple of words.

While playing with fonts, I found this font, Endast, at My Fonts. Unique, isn't it? Reminds me of learning to touch-type in high school in the 1960s -- looking at this font, I can smell the chalk-dust, and relive long summer days cooped up in stuffy rooms.

Ever wondered about the fonts used in the logos of Web companies? Here's a great article on the fonts and font styles used by Web 2.0 companies.

Technorati Tags: fonts