The Copywriter Club Podcast

Most podcasts about email are pretty basic. Build a list. Email often. Create a lead magnet people want. That kind of tired advice isn’t very useful. So in this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I talked with copywriter Jacob Suckow about the skills and expertise it takes to succeed in this industry. This is a masterclass in succeeding as a six-figure email copywriter. Don’t miss it. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Get Jacob’s Playbook here The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   Transcript: Rob Marsh: Most podcasts about email don’t get into the nuts and bolts of how it really works. Until now. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. When you hear a podcast host like me say we’re talking about email on the podcast today, do your eyes glaze over? Do you think, here we go again… more advice about how you need to build your list, need to have a lead magnet, need to email regularly… or maybe you think of tired advice and adages like “the money is in the list” and “the more you hit send, the more you earn”. This is not that. This episode is not that. My guest on the podcast today is Jacob Suckow. This is Jacob’s second appearance on the podcast. The first time was about four years ago. And the change in his expertise and business is substantial. He was just figuring things out in that first interview. Today he runs a six-figure email business helping his clients grow their sales with high-level strategy using regular emails and email sequences stacked on top. How do you go from writing emails and pitching products to landing mulit-year retainers taking on not just the writing duties, but also strategy and responsibility for increasing response rates and sales? We talked about exactly how to do that in this episode. We also talked about exactly how much you could be earning doing email for clients… Jacob shares all three of his pricing tiers to give you an idea of what you could be earning… and using his pricing structure you could create a six-figure business with just 3-4 client retainers. And we talked about what it looks like to lever your experience with email strategy into a fractional CMO role and what that looks like too. Finally we talked about newletters and how this is probably the biggest opportunity for copywriters out there today… the opportunity to grow and own an audience, then partner with offer owners or create your own offers for the audience you own is huge and one that perhaps every copywriter should be chasing down… and I’m not talking about writing weekly emails to other copywriters. These are niche opportunities that can be very profitable for the copywriters willing to put in a little work. There’s a lot of good stuff in this episode so stick around. Before we get to my discussion with Jacob, this episode is brought to you by Research Mastery. Research Mastery is the one-stop program or course that will change your writing for the better. Instead of just organizing words, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to truly understand your customer so they relate to your offer and buy more often. Research Mastery digs into the 4 critical areas of research… if you miss one of them, your research just isn’t complete. And it includes the A.I. tools you need to do research faster, more effectively, and more profitably. You can learn more about this unqiue program at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now my interview with Jacob Suckow.

Planning for the unexpected is one of those skills that successful people have. But you can’t plan for everything. This episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast features my guest, Dani Paige, who has become an expert in figuring out how to move forward when you have to deal with the unexpected. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Dani’s website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Sometimes you can plan for change. Other times you can’t—and you have to adjust anyway. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. One of the strategies we teach in The Copywriter Accelerator and our other programs where we talk about getting things done is planning ahead for when things don’t go as planned. It’s pretty easy to set goals and expect the future to behave as expected. But the reality almost always turns out differently. So you might come up with a plan to spend next Friday creating a new product or service, strategizing who its for, the various things to include to make it valuable, and so on. But then Friday arrives and you’re not feeling well, or a friend from out of town calls and wants to see you, or a family emergency ends up taking up a significant chunk of your day. What happens then? Planning for the invevitable things that go wrong is a huge part of success. Thinking through the options before they happen can help keep you on top of things. But you can’t plan for everything. A lot of copywriters we’ve had on the podcast have shared that a career they planned on pursuing turned out to be less than they expected. And they make an unplanned switch to writing copy. But there are other ways that life throws you a curveball and you need to quickly adjust expectations and behaviors to make things work. My guest on the podcast today is Dani Paige. She started a corporate career that didn’t go as planned and found copywriting as a result. She’s changed the services she offers more than once. And she’s tried things she thought would work that failed. More recently, she made changes to her business to prepare for maternity leave. Everything was ready to support her new family situation but once again, things turned out differently than she had planned. So how do we as copywriters adjust on the fly when things don’t turn out the way we expect them to. That’s a big part of what we talked about on today’s episode. Dani and I also talked about her journey into copywriting and how she learned to write sales pages and launch copy… if you want to write those kinds of projects, you can learn a lot from Dani and her approach to learning these skills. And what Dani says about community and connection is a theme that has come up several times in the last few months here on the podcast. If you’re not building connections and participating in communities, you are not building a skill that is critical for your future success. There’s a lot of good stuff in this episode so stick around. Before we get to my discussion with Dani Paige, this episode is brought to you by Research Mastery. Research Mastery is the one-stop program or course that will change your writing for the better. Instead of just organizing words, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to truly understand your customer so they relate to your offer and buy more often. Research Mastery digs into the 4 critical areas of research… if you miss one of them, your research just isn’t complete. And it includes the A.I. tools you need to do research faster, more effectively, and more profitably. You can learn more about this unqiue program at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now my interview with Dani Paige.

Want to get more clicks? More sales? More clients? Then understanding why humans act the way they do will help. In his new book, Hacking the Human Mind, author Michael Aaron Flicker shares dozens of psychological “hacks” that copywriters should understand before they write copy. Michael Aaron is our guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Hacking the Human Mind by Michael Aaron Flicker The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Want more responses, sales, and customers? Let’s hack the human mind. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Several months ago, I was fortunate enough to get an advanced copy of a book called, Hacking the Human Mind. Now… if you have a book and want me to read it, giving it a title like Hacking the Human Mind and including ideas and insights from behavioral science, neuro marketing, and psychology is pretty much guaranteed to get my attention. But this book goes one step farther by looking at marketing in the real world then searching for the psychology that explains why something works. The approach basically flips the usual marketing tactic to-do list from: here are a bunch of psychological triggers… exclusivity, scarcity, risk removal, curiosity and so on… make sure you include them all into your sales process, and instead look for what works already and figuring out why it works. That’s a bit different from the usual approach. So I asked one of the authors, Michael-Aaron Flicker to talk with me about some of the concepts from the book. We talked about the Pratfall or Blemish effect and how to turn a product flaw into an asset. There are very few perfect products in the world, so understanding how to use this effect in your copy is incredibly useful. We also talked about how to address product changes in a way that doesn’t generate backlash. We’ve seen customers revolt against design and formulation changes over the last few years—Kraft Mac and Cheese did it the right way. And to hear that story, you’ll have to keep listening to this episode. Another idea we talked about is offer simplicity… we’re often tempted to stack feature on feature and then benefit upon benefit. We do this to pile on the good stuff and make our offers more valuable to our clients. But the actual effect may be the exact opposite. Again, to hear how that works you’ll want to keep on listening. One thing Michael Aaron points out that it takes more than knowing about a particular psychological effect or persuasion trigger, often you need to find new and innovative ways to use these triggers. Before we get to my discussion with Michael Aaron, this episode is brought to you by Research Mastery. Research Mastery is the one-stop program or course that will change your writing for the better. Instead of just organizing words, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to truly understand your customer so they relate to your offer and buy more often. Research Mastery digs into the 4 critical areas of research… if you miss one of them, your research just isn’t complete. And it includes the A.I. tools you need to do research faster, more effectively, and more profitably. You can learn more about this unqiue program at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now my interview with Michael Aaron Flicker. Transcript summary coming soon.

Writing for clients is just one way to build a copywriting business. Once you’ve done that for a while, you may decide it’s not right for you. So what does the alternative look like? I invited copywriter Krystle Church to join for for the 266th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast to talk about that and a lot more. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Krystle’s Email List The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   Partial Transcript: Rob Marsh: When your business stops working for you, what can you do to fix things? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. There are a lot of copywriters who build a successful business writing for clients. Or maybe they build an agency around their offers and niche. But then after a few years they don’t love the business they created for themselves. Sometime we just burn out and need to do something a bit different. Maybe they no longer want employees or contractors. Maybe they get tired of working directly with clients. Maybe they realize that instead of using their skills to attract customers to other peoples businesses, they decide to use their skills to sell products to their own clients. And then many of us are entrepreneurs at heart and have always wanted to build a business other than writing for a list of clients. Shifting a business from offering services to clients to something else can be a challenge. It’s a very different kind of work. Instead of creating assets for clients, you may spend your time creating assets for your own business, then spending even more time getting attention for your offers. For many copywriters, this is the dream—a copywriting business with customers instead of clients. But there’s a lot of work that goes into a business switch like this. Validating offers. Finding a client base for your offers—which is almost certainly a very different set of clients than you’ve been writing for. Building out marketing systems to sell your new products. Figuring out how to deliver value when you’re not actually delivering copy. I wanted to talk about this with someone who’s gone through the process recently. So I invited copywriter and coach Krystle Church to come back to the podcast and talk about the changes she’s made to her business over the past couple of years. The business Krystle has today is very different from the one she was running two years ago. She’s excited about the new direction and having more fun than when she was burning out with a calendar full of projects that required her attention from the time she woke up until she went to bed at night. If you’ve been thinking about re-imagining your business, this episode may give you a few ideas to try. You’ll get a few tips about validating a new offer. And you might even decide to dabble with an offer for your niche that at least gives you a taste of what a different kind of business would feel like. This kind of business isn’t for everyone. In fact, it’s probably not for most copywriters. But it’s worth thinking about how you might be able to add to or change your business so it fits your needs a bit better. Before we get to my discussion with Krystle, this episode is brought to you by Research Mastery. Research Mastery is the one-stop program or course that will change your writing for the better. Instead of just organizing words, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to truly understand your customer so they relate to your offer and buy more often. Research Mastery digs into the 4 critical areas of research… if you miss one of them, your research just isn’t complete. And it includes the A.I. tools you need to do research faster, more effectively, and more profitably. You can learn more about this unqiue program at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now my interview with Krystle Church.

Copywriters are teachers. We teach customers how the products and services we write about help them. In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with teacher turned copywriter Meredith Cooley about all the ways copywriters use their teaching skills. Even if you don’t think you’re a teacher, you’ll learn a lot from this episode—including a simple copywriting lesson from Bluey. Yes, that Bluey. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Turn the Page Newsletter The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   Transcript: Rob Marsh: Copywriters are teachers. So should more teachers be copywriters? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. A few years ago I had a conversation with one of my copywriting mentors. She mentioned that she had considered teaching as a possible career path. And I shared that I had the same thought when I started my career. Then we talked about the number of former teachers we knew who had left the classroom to write copy. And that’s when it dawned on me that copywriting isn’t just something that former teachers or potential teachers do. Copywriting is teaching. But instead of practicing that skill in a classroom, copywriters are teaching on the page or on the screen, helping potential customers learn about products and solutions, about processes and unique mechanisms, and how to solve the very real problems and pains they are experiencing in their lives. In the years since, I’ve interviewed close to a dozen former teachers on this podcast… people who are still teaching, just not in a formal classroom any more. Do you feel this as a copywriter? Do you see yourself as a teacher for your clients and their customers? My guest for today’s podcast is Meredith Cooley, a teacher turned copywriter who has helped dozens of other teachers leave the classroom and become copywriters for various businesses around the world. Teachers have so many skills that copywriters need, from project management to engaging with stakeholders at various levels of a business. And perhaps most importantly, good teachers have to be able to take dry, boring content and make it exciting for an often disinterested and bored audience. And if you listened to last week’s episode, you heard me talk about how I’ve started teaching marketing at a local college here in my home town. The crossover between teaching students and writing for customers is large. And that’s what this episode is all about. Even if you don’t see yourself as a teacher, this episode may change your mind about how you think about your relationship with the customers you write for. Before we get to our interview, this episode is brought to you by Research Mastery. Research Mastery is the one-stop program or course that will change your writing for the better. Instead of just organizing words, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to truly understand your customer so they relate to your offer and buy more often. Research Mastery digs into the 4 critical areas of research… if you miss one of them, your research just isn’t complete. And it includes the A.I. tools you need to do research faster, more effectively, and more profitably. You can learn more about this unqiue program at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now my interview with Meredith Cooley.    

This episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is another guest-less show. It’s just Rob sharing a few thoughts about the importance of creating customer journeys for the products you write for so you’re actually addressing your customer’s needs and not just your clients. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   What we talked about: Transcript is underway…

What’s the biggest opportunity for copywriters today? That’s just one of the ideas we talked about on this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. Tiana Asperjan is my guest and we talked about how she became a copywriter, her “secrets” for connecting with clients, showing up consistently even when things are uncomfortable, and the biggest opportunities for writers today. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Tiana’s YouTube Tiana’s Newsletter The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   Highlights from this episode: Rob Marsh: What is the biggest opportunity in copywriting today? We’re about to reveal the answer. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. When inviting guests to share their experiences on this podcast, I often look for writers who are doing something a little bit differently than their peers are doing. Someone who has a different approach, a unique viewpoint on something, or maybe they’re testing things that the rest of us just aren’t up to speed on yet. My guest on today’s podcast is Tiana Asperjan. Lately I’ve been seing Tiana everywhere… although that might just be a function of the algorithm showing me more stuff like the stuff I’ve seen recently. If you’re a copywriter, Tiana’s Youtube channel, social media feed, and newsletter are excellent. She’s teaching what works in ads and copy right now. But she doesn’t just say what’s working, she focuses on the strategy and psychology behind an ad so you know not just that it works, but why it works. She’s doing things a bit differently from a lot of other copywriters and most of us who are sharing ideas and insights about copywriting with other writers. So I asked her to join me on today’s episode and boy am I glad that I did. I like all of the interviews I share with you each week, but this one really stands out. Tiana’s story of how she got to where she is is a masterclass on the steps to success as a writer. It’s less about the destination, and more about accumulating the experiences and expertise you need to be great. I think as you listen in, you’ll learn a lot from Tiana’s experiences. As for the answer to that question I posed at the opening of this episode… what’s the biggest opportunity for copywriters working today who want to stay relevant for years to come? Well, you’ll just have to listen to this episode because Tiana reveals what it is and why this particular “niche” —and I’ve got niche in air quotes here—is where more copywriters ought to be focusing their efforts today. If you want a look at a industry or niche that is desperate for help from good copywriters, you’ll want to keep listening. Before we get to all that, this episode is brought to you by Research Mastery. Research Mastery is the one-stop program or course that will change your writing for the better. Instead of just organizing words, you’ll have the tools and strategies you need to truly understand your customer so they relate to your offer and buy more often. Research Mastery digs into the 4 critical areas of research… if you miss one of them, your research just isn’t complete. And it includes the A.I. tools you need to do research faster, more effectively, and more profitably. You can learn more about this unqiue program at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery

Newsletters are a big opportunity that many copywriters are ignoring to the detriment of their own businesses. For the 462nd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I invited newsletter strategist Ciler Demiralp to talk about the newsletter industry and how writers can take advantage of this emerging industry. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Newsletter Circle Ciler’s LinkedIn The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Here’s a summary of the episode:  

Want to do more than “write” copy? Then you need to get involved with your client’s projects before they decide what they’re going to do. And to explain how you do that, copywriter Jamie Thomson joins me on The Copywriter Club Podcast. We talked about his process for going from discovery call to paid workshop and then paid project on this episode. You don’t want to miss it. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Jamie’s website Jamie’s free Strategist Copywriter Course The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: If you’re a copywriter who wants more input into the work you do and more money for contributing your insights early, keep listening. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Far too many copywriters are content taking an assignment from a client and simply writing the words. In fact, there are thousands of copywriters and content writers who think that’s what copywriting is—choosing the right words to make a client sound good. They even call themselves wordsmiths as if all they’re doing is coming up with the words. Now obviously, writing the words is a big part of what we do. Often, it’s the only obvious part of a project that we can point to and say, that’s my work. But great copywriters don’t start with writing the words. They get involved in their client’s projects much earlier in the process. Before design direction is figured out. Before the brand voice is settled. Even before a client decides what exactly they need to solve the marketing problem they have. This is where copywriters should start on a project. That work is strategy… deep diving on the problem to be solved and exploring the various ways to find a solution, some of which might not even be copywriting-focused. Okay, so how do you do it. My guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is Jamie Thomson. Jamie takes his clients from discovery call to paid workshop to project in a process that immediately puts him in charge of driving the strategy for a project. It’s a process that makes him significantly more valuable and critical to the success of a project than simply taking a project from a client and writing the copy. What’s more, because Jamie plays such an important role in his projects, and his impact is obvious to his clients, they often come back for even more work which takes the pressure off client-finding and allows him to spend more time client serving. In the age of A.I., when the machines can write copy faster than you can… and yes I know, it’s not as good, but can your clients tell the difference? So in the age of A.I., this is one strategy that makes you more valuable as a copywriter who solves problems and gets paid to do it. If that sounds interesting to you, then stick around. And if that doesn’t sound interesting to you, maybe Jamie’s soothing Scottish accent will be enough to keep you engaged. It works for me. No matter what kind of copywriting business you want for yourself, The Copywriter Underground is packed with resources to show up as a business owner—not just a freelancer—to help you find clients, and solve big problems that clients are happy to pay big money to get off their plates. From copywriting and business templates to get you started (including a legal document and a proven onboarding process) to workshops to help you build your authority, attract clients, create products and services your clients want to buy, how to be more strategic and a lot more—The Underground is like a starter-kit for your writing business… It’s a complete business-in-a-box that you can plug into your own business and hit play. As questions come up, you have access to our private slack community, monthly group coaching, and regular feedback on your copy. I’ve been inside a lot of memberships and The Underground is the best value for content writers and copywriters I’ve ever seen. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu-2. And now, my interview with Jamie Thomson…         Thanks to Jamie Thomson for sharing his process for getting involved with strategy early on in a project where you can have a bigger impact and show how valuable your thinking is for solving real problems. Like I said at the beginning of the show, when A.I. can write copy that clients think is good enough, you need to contribute to your client’s marketing efforts in new ways, hopefully ways where you can add even more value. Jamie’s process is one of those ways. It’s not exactly a roadmapping session which is another way to play a strategic role with clients—with a workshop you take the lead in helping clients determine what needs to be created and getting buy in on direction which helps eliminate changes and rework later on. If you implement Jamie’s approach, email me to let me know how it goes. I’d love to hear how you make it work for your business. And of course, another p

What’s the best word to describe a hard-working freelance copywriter? How about feisty? On the 460th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, content strategist and author, Suzanne Bowness, shares the concepts from her new book appropriately called, The Feisty Freelancer. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: The Feisty Freelancer Website The Feisty Freelancer Book The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: What’s the best adjective to describe a hardworking, client-pleasing, financially successful copywriter? How about feisty? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. When it comes to freelancing, this is no one right way to do things. There are thousands of niches to serve. Millions of clients with millions of needs. There are hundreds of ways to find those clients and thousands more ways to solve their problems. But every writer who owns their own business has lots of things in common with others doing the same thing. And if you try to describe them… especially those freelancers who are actually finding clients, doing good work, and earning enough to make a living, well one word that comes to mind is feisty. The feisty freelancer brings energy to their work. They’re not afraid to stand up for themselves or the clients they’re writing for. And they even might be a little playful. The Feisty Freelancer is also the name of a new book written by content writer and former Think Tank member, Suzanne Bowness. Sue’s book is a primer for freelancers of all kinds—not just writers—who want to do more than struggle for scraps. The feisty freelancer has what it takes to succeed. This is Sue’s second appearance on the podcast. The first one happened almost three years ago. It’s episode #319 if you want to check it out. Given Sue’s expertise as a freelancer, it’s probably not a coincidence that some of the ideas we talked about then made it into the book. But it’s been a while since we had that discussion, so I took the opportunity to ask Sue about the topics she covers in her book. Things like pitching, working with corporate clients, marketing a writing business, strategies for being productive and getting things done. We even talked about whether freelancing is something people should be considering at all today. I think you’ll like what she had to share. Before we get to my interview with Sue, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. The Underground includes monthly coaching and expert workshops, an accountability group to keep you moving toward your goals, and more than 70 different workshops to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. Recently I asked a new member why she joined the Underground and she said she did it for the copy reviews. She wanted feedback on her work to help her improve her writing. And where many writing coaches charge as much as $1500 to look at a single sales page, you can get unlimited reviews in The Underground for less than $90 a month. Honestly this just might be the best value in the copywriting world. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu-2. And now, my interview with Sue Bowness…     Transcript is underway…

Clients need strategy. But they don’t always know that’s what they need. So how do you sell it to them? How do you ensure your work is strategic even if all your client wants is a few emails? My guest for the 459th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is copywriter Kristen Vanderhoek who specializes in strategy. She spills the secrets for selling strategy to your prospects on this episode. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: CursorAndInk.com The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Is strategy a big part of your copywriting business? If it isn’t now, it probably should be. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Every client needs a strategy. But they don’t always see it that way. They just want the emails or the web site or the launch plan. But it’s the strategy that ensures that the deliverables go to the right person, include the right message, have the right call to action—all at the right time. Clients want the deliverables and the benefits of the strategy, but they don’t always connect the two. So it becomes your job as the copywriter or content strategist to connect the dots for them, to show how strategy leads to better copy and content. On this episode of the podcast, my guest is Kristen Vanderhoek, a copywriter who focuses on brand strategy. We talked about how to approach strategy projects—Kristen shared exactly how she does it. And we talked about how you sell strategy to clients who usually just want to deliverable. We also talked about Kristen’s HOME framework, the step-by-step process she follows when working with clients to ensure they get well-thought out, strategic copy and design. Finally, one of Kristen’s differentiators is her white-glove service. She takes steps to make working with her feel like a high-end experience and makes sure her clients aren’t left wondering what’s going on, or feeling like they overpaid because the presentation at the end of the project isn’t just a file hand-off. If you’re a copywriter who is ready to level up the projects you work on and the way you deliver that work to your clients, you’ll want to listen to this interview. Before we get to my interview with Kristen, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. The Underground includes monthly coaching and expert workshops, an accountability group to keep you moving toward your goals, and more than 70 different workshops to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. Recently I asked a new member why she joined the Underground and she said she did it for the copy reviews. She wanted feedback on her work to help her improve her writing. And where many writing coaches charge as much as $1500 to look at a single sales page, you can get unlimited reviews in The Underground for less than $90 a month. Honestly this just might be the best value in the copywriting world. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu-2. And now, my interview with Kristen Vanderhoek… Transcript coming….

Want to write a book? Me too. But for some reason, I just can’t get it finished. Or started. I’m stuck. So I asked author and book marketing expert, Lacy Lieffers to join me for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast to share her thoughts on writing books, the mindset needed to power through the process, why books are powerful business tools and a lot more. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: BlackFoxMarketing Lacy’s Instagram The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Thinking about writing a book? Yeah me too. For a couple of years now. So let’s talk about how to actually get it done. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. If you’ve been listening to this podcast for more than a year or two, you’ve probably heard me talk about wanting to write another book. It’s been a goal of mine for a couple of years even though I haven’t made a lot of progress on it lately. And you’ve probably heard at least one guest talk about the book writing process… guest like Laura Gale, Jennie Nash, Stephanie Chandler, Mary Adkins, Ryan Guthrie and Allison Fallon have all shared their approaches, their secrets for finding time and organizing thoughts for a book, and their frameworks for putting together a best-seller or at least a book that appeals to their readers. It’s been a few months, but we’ve covered this ground before. So why talk about it again? Because if you’re anything like me, it’s less about learning the latest secret for writing a book and more about reminding yourself that this is still a goal, and now is as good a time as ever to get it done. So if you have a goal to write a book, or like me want to write another book—one that better reflects the work that you’re doing right now, or even a novel that will connect with readers today… this episode is for you. My guest today is author and book marketer, Lacy Lieffers. Lacy runs a community for authors and she helps writers at all stages of the book writing process from organizing ideas to creating a game plan to make your book a best seller. She knows her stuff, so I was more than a little interested to see if what she has to share will light that fire under my backside and get my book moving again. We talked about pen names, picking the right book topic for you, how to figure out if your book idea will work, book marketing, and a lot more. If you want to write a book, or you’re stuck in the middle of your book, or you don’t know where to start, this episode is for you. And for me. Before we get to my interview with Lacy, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. The Underground includes monthly coaching and expert workshops, an accountability group to keep you moving toward your goals, and more than 70 different workshops to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. Recently I asked a new member why she joined the Underground and she said she did it for the copy reviews. She wanted feedback on her work to help her improve her writing. And where many writing coaches charge as much as $1500 to look at a single sales page, you can get unlimited reviews in The Underground for less than $90 a month. Honestly this just might be the best value in the copywriting world. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu-2. And now, my interview with Lacy Lieffers…         Thanks to Lacy Lieffers for helping me reset my goal and efforts to finally get to writing my next book. I’ve written a book before, and I’ve got to admit that while I think it’s a good book, by the time I finished writing it, I was no longer in love with the topic or the book itself. And at least in the case of that book, it’s on a topic or niche that I don’t do a lot of work in any more. So it’s definitely time for a book that’s more relevant to my business today. If you want to connect with Lacy or use some of the tools she has created for authors to write and market their books, connect with her on Instagram where she’s got a long list of links to resources for authors. You can also find her at blackfoxmarketing.ca During our discussion we talked about the “speak your book” formula for writing a book. I want to be clear that I’m not saying that that process can’t work. But as Lacy points out, we tend to speak differently than we write. And we listen differently than we read. So you CAN speak your book, but you’ll want to put in a lot of work to make sure it actually reads like a book and not like a transcript which can be hard to follow. If this is the only way you’ll get your book out of your head and down on paper, go for it. And while having a book for it’s own sake may be worth the effort, a book opens all kinds of doors for you and your business that other marketing materials simply can’t. Even a podcast which can be a great way to get your voice and thoughts into the world, it doesn’t ha

What does it take to write in the health and wellness niche? I asked copywriter Kristen Driscoll about that on this 457th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. The wellness niche is booming and now is the time for good copywriters to jump in. Want to know why? Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Kristen’s LinkedIn The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Writing for the health and wellness industry takes a special set of skills. And that’s what we talking about today on The Copywriter Club Podcast. One of the questions I get asked the most as a copywriting coach is which niche pays the most. I’m on the record as a big proponent of niching… our own research which you’ll find published on our blog shows that copywriters who write in a single niche make almost two times more than copywriters without a niche. And copywriters who are focused on 2-3 niches make 30% more than writers without a niche. But not all niches are equal. Some niches pay more than others… the financial niche is one of those and we’ve published several episodes in the past talking about that niche… look for our interviews with Clayton Makepeace, Kyle Milligan, Jake Hoffberg and Ridge Abraham. Most of those episode are a few years old. Partly because of its reputation as a profitable niche, it’s hard to break into work with the high-paying financial publishers. Another niche that is generally thought of as high-paying is the health and wellness niche, especially writers who work with supplement makers, fat loss products and medtech. So what do you need to know to break into this lucrative niche? I asked Kristen Driscoll, a health copywriter, to talk a bit about how she broke in and the work that she does. It’s a roadmap for your own path to success with wellness clients if you choose to follow it. We talked about how Kristen found her first client in the niche, why she chose health as the industry she wanted to work in, and why wellness is a such a massive opportunity for writers today. I think you’ll like this discussion that Kristen and I had so stick around. Before we get to my interview with Kristen, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. The Underground includes monthly coaching and expert workshops, an accountability group to keep you moving toward your goals, and more than 70 different workshops to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. Recently I asked a new member why she joined the Underground and she said she did it for the copy reviews. She wanted feedback on her work to help her improve her writing. And where many writing coaches charge as much as $1500 to look at a single sales page, you can get unlimited reviews in The Underground for less than $90 a month. Honestly this just might be the best value in the copywriting world. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu-2. And now, my interview with Kristen Driscoll… Hey, Kristen, welcome to the podcast. I am really excited to talk to you about how you became marketing strategist and a direct response copywriter for health and wellness brands and all of the things. So tell us your story. Kristen Driscoll: Well, thank you so much for having me on. I think, like many direct cop direct response copywriters and marketing folks… so that was my first career, and then I was a full time yoga teacher for 14 years, and still teach yoga. And also a lot of kind of some similarities there that I could draw upon with copywriting and getting started. So from moving on from copywriting or moving on from full time yoga teaching, is when I discovered copywriting and went full off the deep end and kind of immersed myself in in learning the craft, because it really is a craft, you know, some getting those principles down, I think, is key for a longevity of a career. Rob Marsh: Let’s talk a little bit about what you did in the music industry. I know you got a couple of good stories, but, yeah, what were some of the bands that you helped promote? What were some of the things that you were doing to bring people in, you know, to the audiences, to the venues for all of these bands? Kristen Driscoll: Well, the very first, my very first job in the music industry was for an entertainment law firm, and that’s where I think I shared with you on one post. You know, there’s that question that goes around like, name one thing you’ve done that you’re sure that none of no other friends of yours has done. And one of the ones I example, I use in that a lot is that I am the witness on Deedee Ramone’s prenup. Rob Marsh: This is awesome. This is such like if, if I, if that was me, that would be like the headline on my website. I would just that would be, probably has nothing to do with anything that I do, but I just think that’s such a cool thing about you. I love that. Kristen Driscoll: Y

If you’ve been doing all the things, listening to the advice of the experts, and you’re still not seeing results, maybe the thing holding you back is your mindset. In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I’m speaking with former copywriter and current mindset coach, Brian McCarthy. We talked about burnout, imposter complex, confidence and much more. If you’re doing “all the things” and still not reaching your goals, this episode is for you. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Emily Reagan’s Interview Tanya Geisler’s Interview (Imposter Complex) Brian’s Website Imposter Complex eBook The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground The How to Write Emotional Copy Masterclass   Transcript: Rob Marsh: Maybe the thing keeping you from getting what you want and working with the clients you deserve is you. Want to know more? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Content writers, copywriters, social media writers, and marketers of all kinds face a bunch of challenges when it comes to building a successful business that supports the lifestyle that we all want. We talk about finding clients on the podcast a lot… maybe too much because there are other challenges… figuring out our niches, creating irresistable products and services that clients want to buy, pricing, positioning, marketing, and of course writing and so on. All of those business skills are important. If you can’t do them yourself or if you can’t hire someone else to do these for you, you’ll struggle as a business owner. But there is a whole other set of skills that we often overlook that also impact your ability to grow your business. We generally think of these hidden skills as mindset. And that’s what we’re talking about on today’s podcast. My guest is former copywriter and current mindset coach Brian McCarthy. Brian works with copywriters and others to help them work through mindset blocks and develop new skills to overcome them. Things like growing confidence, finding clarity and alignment, over coming imposter complex and a lot more. If you’ve been doing everything right but still struggle to get traction or feel like you’re making a difference in the world… or even just for your clients, maybe refocusing your efforts on mindset is what’s called for. So keep listening for our thoughts on these critical, but often ignored, mindset skills. Before we jump into our interview, a little while ago I recorded a masterclass to show copywriters, content writers and other marketers how to write “emotional” copy. Everyone says emotions sell, but how do you actually write emotional copy? I walk through more than a dozen examples in this masterclass and give you a proven process for figuring out the right emotions to focus on as you write… and how they change as you make your pitch. The masterclass includes several bonuses on storytelling, using A.I. to find dominant and transformational emotions, and much more. You can get this masterclass at thecopywriterclub.com/emotion And now, my interview with Brian McCarthy. Brian, welcome to the podcast. I’m thrilled to have you here, like we were saying, just as we were chatting before we started recording, we met briefly a bunch of years ago, you were doing something slightly different than what you did today. Yeah, tell me just how did you get here. You’re a mindset coach, but you also have a pretty big background in copywriting. So tell me about that? Brian McCarthy: Yeah, so I started copywriting, I don’t know 20, 2014 or so got into that world, and I was always copywriting for a lot of personal growth companies and coaches. I was just very into the personal growth world. And then eventually, like, found my I was doing launches, I was doing case studies, those became like my my main even wrote a book on how to do case studies like that kind of became my main focus. And then I was when the pandemic hit. One of my clients was this big life coach, Ronnie Britton, she’s amazing, and she has a coach. She has a program teaching people how to coach. And then I was like, that seems like a useful skill. I’ll do it. And then took the program, and as I started coaching people, I was like, Oh, this is the greatest thing in the world. And eventually moved from copywriting into coaching full time. And it was one of those, like, oh yeah, no. Like, I was always feeling that nudge to be in the personal growth world, like, yeah, no, wonder. And even during my copywriting career, it always felt like this is a stepping stone to something else. I just didn’t know what that something else was. Then once I found coaching, I was like, oh, it’s it’s that, yeah, it makes a lot of sense. So before we jump into all the stuff you’re doing as coaching, I’d love to dive into your copy career just a little bit, because six, six years as a copywriter is nothing to sniff at

This isn’t the first time we’ve talked about LinkedIn. But in this episode, we cover specific recommendations for the content you should create and post as well as a proven process for connecting with clients. My guest is content writer Divya Agrawal and what she shared could change your approach to LinkedIn for the better. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Divya’s LinkedIn Find Your Clients on LinkedIn (Divya’s Lead Magnet) The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground The How to Write Emotional Copy Masterclass   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: If you’ve got enough clients or you’re not willing to put yourself out there to find the clients you need, well, you can probably skip this episode. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Like last week, we’re revisiting a recurring topic on the show this week, but unlike last week, the recurring topics isn’t persuasion or psychology. This week we’re talking about the biggest challenge facing almost all copywriters and that’s finding clients. Even established copywriters will struggle with this from time to time. One of the trusims of business is that if you don’t have clients willing to pay you for the work you do, it doesn’t matter how good your website is, it doesn’t matter how good a writer you are, it doesn’t matter that you can solve your client’s problems better than anyone else… without the client, you don’t have a business. My guest this week is Divya Agrawal, a SaaS and Tech copywriter who has deep experience finding clients on LinkedIn. Divya started her career as a programmer but quickly figured out she was on the wrong job track, so she switched to writing. The lessons she shares from her experience launching this new business will help any copywriter or content writer who is looking for clients to work with. Specifically, Divya used LinkedIn to create connections with prospects. Her success posting content and making comments on other posts is a model for other writers who want to do the same… and LinkedIn is where a significant number of the people who hire copywriters hangout and connect. If your clients are there, you need to be there too. In this interview, Divya shares the questions she uses to vet her prospects before they become clients, and she outlines exactly how you can connect with clients on LinkedIn yourself. This is informaiton she charges her coaching clients for, but she’s sharing much of it today for free. Before we jump into our interview, a little while ago I recorded a masterclass to show copywriters, content writers and other marketers how to write “emotional” copy. Everyone says emotions sell, but how do you actually write emotional copy? I walk through more than a dozen examples in this masterclass and give you a proven process for figuring out the right emotions to focus on as you write… and how they change as you make your pitch. The masterclass includes several bonuses on storytelling, using A.I. to find dominant and transformational emotions, and much more. You can get this masterclass at thecopywriterclub.com/emotion And now, my interview with Divya Agrawal. Divya, welcome to the podcast. I’m excited to hear your story and to talk about how you’re finding clients, but tell us, how did you become a freelance copywriter for Tech. Divya Agrawal: Thank you so much for having me on the podcast, Rob, I highly appreciate this chance to talk to you. I have been a big fan of your podcast, so it’s really cool that I get to sit here and share what I know. Yeah, I became a freelance tech writer back in 2017 end of 2017 after a year long stint at a IT company as a software engineer, I was a Salesforce developer for a year, and that didn’t work out. I did not like the corporate environment. I did not like the work I was doing. So then I was like, I need to do something else. I had always been a writer. So I was one of those kids in school who is asked to write other kids speeches. So I was the introvert writing speeches for my more extroverted friends, who would get on stages and deliver those speeches. I was participating in essay competitions, all of those things. So I also had a lot of passion for technology. I was always learning about new technologies. I was good at development, if I do say so myself. So when I decided to shift gears, I was like, let me try and combine two of my passions, writing and technology, and that’s how I got into it. I had a little bit of an internship experience at a local IT company writing their social media content. So I when I decided to do this full time, I reached out to the HR. I was like, This is what I’m doing full time now. Do you have contacts for me? And he put me in touch with a bunch of companies, and that’s how I got my first client. Rob Marsh: So as you were reaching back to the school and they gave you these contacts, did he make warm introductions, o

In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, we’re talking about how con men, pick-up artists, magicians and yes, copywriters, use psychology and persuasion to get readers to pay attention and change their behavior. My guest is copywriter John Bejakovic who has just published a new book on the topic. If you want to be a better writer, click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: The 10 Commandments Book John’s first interview The Katelyn Bourgoin Interview The Sarah Levinger Interview The Richard Armstrong Interview The Parris Lampropouos Interview The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground The How to Write Emotional Copy Masterclass Transcript: Rob Marsh: Looking for non-obvious ways to be more persuasive? Today we’re talking about the ten commandments of con men, pick up artists, comedians and others. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Over the last couple of months, I’ve interviewed a couple of guests about psychology and persuasion… on episode 447 I talked with Katelyn Bourgoin and on episode 448, I spoke with Sarah Levinger. In both of those interviews we talked about using psychology and principles from behavioral economics and neuroscience. Today’s episode covers similar ground in a very different way. My guest is copywriter John Bejakovic. John runs one of the best daily email lists out there, sharing his throughts on marketing, sales, and persuasion. He recently published a book about these topics called, The 10 Commandments of Con Men, Pick Up Artists, Magicians, Door-to-Door Salesmen, Hypnotists, Copywriters, Professional Negotiators, Political Propagandists, Stand Up Comedians, and Oscar-Winning Screenwriters. It’s a long title for a short book that covers a lot of ground. I wanted to talk to John about the ideas in his book, but more than that, I wanted to discuss the ethics of using these kinds of tactics to get our readers and prospects to take action. If you want to be a better writer or a more effective communicator or simply want to help your children or customers or friends use information to make better decisions, I think you’ll like this episode. These topics really appeal to me. Not just as a writer or marketer so I can use these techniques myself, but also as a consumer. You can’t avoid the con men who use these tactics unless you understand the tactics and how they use them. Being smart is not enough to avoid responding positively to the ideas we talk about on this episode. Before we jump into our interview, a little while ago I recorded a masterclass to show copywriters, content writers and other marketers how to write “emotional” copy. Everyone says emotions sell, but how do you actually write emotional copy? I walk through more than a dozen examples in this masterclass and give you a proven process for figuring out the right emotions to focus on as you write… and how they change as you make your pitch. The masterclass includes several bonuses on storytelling, using A.I. to find dominant and transformational emotions, and much more. You can get this masterclass at thecopywriterclub.com/emotion And now, my interview with John Bejakovic. Rob Marsh: Hey, John, welcome back to the podcast. You were here, I think it was literally two years ago, Episode 365, where we talked about a lot of different stuff, and people maybe can go back and listen to that, but catch me up on what’s been going on in your business, and this new book you’ve got. John Bejakovic: Yeah, sure. So, yeah, I was thinking about that. It’s been about two years since I was on the podcast last and I think we talked about email and things like that, because that’s kind of my bread and butter. And then at the end of that podcast, you were kind of asking me, what I’m what am I working on? And I was working on this book at that time, and the plan was to have this book, which is a kind of an intersection of different disciplines and the commonalities between disciplines like sales and copywriting, but also things like con artists and pickup artists and stand up comedians and screenwriters. And at that time, I already had a pretty clear idea of what I wanted to write in the book, and I was very, very enthusiastic and thinking, I’m going to get the book out in the next few weeks, month or two. And it took me a long time to get the book out, and I finally managed to do it this spring, so, or maybe a little more than a month ago. So the book is out, and it’s exactly what I was planning on being in. You know, you helped me out with, actually, some of the final edits and so on. So that’s kind of the main thing. Otherwise, I’m still very much just focused on email and writing daily emails and writing about persuasion and marketing and copywriting, but the book is the one significant achievement advantage in the past couple of years. Rob Marsh: I love this book. I actually sent an email to my list, shari

Looking for clients? In this episode I’m sharing 21 different ideas for ways to connect with clients for your copywriting business. I guarantee you’ll find at least one idea—and probably more like four or five ideas—that will work for you. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: The Copywriter Club Youtube Channel The Finding Clients Ignition Kit The P7 Client Acquisition System The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: How do you find new or better clients? Here are 21 different ideas you might want to try. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. This episode of the podcast is going to be different from any episode I’ve done recently… in fact, in more than 450 different episodes, I can’t remember ever having an episode where not only did I not have a guest, but also didn’t have a co-host or someone else to chat with and bounce ideas around with. So in a sense, we’re making Copywriter Club history right now. But we’re not covering a new topic. In fact, we’ve talked about finding clients on almost every interview we’ve conducted with copywriters over the last eight years. And my guests have shared a ton of great ideas for finding clients. At some point in the future, I’d love to create a supercut of all the ideas we’ve shared over the years… but that would be dozens of hours long and it’s not at the top of my to-do list at the moment. However, on this episode, I’m going to share 21 different ideas, actually it will probably be more, 21 different ideas for ways to find clients. Not all of them will work for you. But I promise, if you stick around to the end of this episode, you’ll find at least one and probably five or six ideas that WILL work for you and that you can start using right now. I’m also going to share some advice… the dos and don’ts of reaching out to clients—some of the things you need to do first and what you absolutely can’t afford to do. If this topic appeals to you, I’ve got a couple of resources for you. The first is The Copywriter Club Youtube channel. I’ve posted several videos there about finding clients, pitching clients, the questions to ask to attract clients and more. Those videos are relatively short and will help you improve your outreach process so be sure to check them out. And I’ve put together a mini offer I’m calling the Client Finding Ignition Kit. It includes a 36 page report that covers what I’m talking about in this episode at more depth, and also includes three different workshops on finding clients. One focuses on Upwork and other online marketplaces, another is all about what’s working on LinkedIn, and the third is all about what to do if you need to find clients right now. And it also includes a one-time coaching call to talk about your approach and your pitch to make sure it will work. If you want that, go to thecopywriterclub.com/ignition Finally, I won’t go through all the stuff it includes, but there are a ton of resources in The Copywriter Underground to help you find, pitch, and land clients. If you want to find a full-time job, there’s a workshop all about that. If you want to improve your discovery calls, there’s a workshop and playbook all about that. If you want to go deep on what’s working on LinkedIn, Upwork, and several other places to find clients, there are resources for all of those too. And that’s on top of all the other workshops, coaching, community, lead sharing and more… that’s all available at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu-2. Before I jump into that first idea, though, I want to just talk about a couple of things that are really important to keep in mind before you start finding clients. The first idea is that you do not have a business without clients. This is the thing that we do. We write copy. But if we’re not writing copy for a client who’s paying us to do it, we don’t actually have a business. We’re just doing this thing. So whether you have one client you spend all of your time on, or you have 19 or 20 clients, you’re writing small things for over the course of the month, someone has to pay the bill. Someone has to pay you for this skill that you have, and if you don’t have clients, that’s the very first thing that you need to do. So don’t spend any time getting ready in your business. And by that, I mean don’t spend any time building a website. Don’t think about even building a portfolio. You don’t have to worry about having a social media presence. You don’t even need a LinkedIn page or anything like that. What you need is a client. And so I want you to go out there and land that first client. Now there’s some things that you’re going to have to do in order to do that. We’ll talk about these in a minute, but I want you to land that first client, and then once you’ve had that client, you’ve done. The assignment. You’ve cr

What do you do when the worst happens in business? Are you prepared? In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with copywriter Topaz Hooper about the steps you should be taking now to prepare for an economic downturn. The ideas we talk about here are good business practices even if the economy booms. But they become more important when things are uncertain. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: American Copywriter Co. Topaz’s new Instagram The first interview with Topaz The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Are you prepared for the worst in your business… economic downturns, recessions, the loss of clients and ongoing projects? If not, this episode is for you. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. In today’s episode I’m catching up with Topaz Hooper who was a guest on the show several years ago. Topaz’s business has followed the trend that so many copywriters and other freelancers followed through the pandemic and afterwards. Most of us saw a nice bump in clients and revenues but then things started to change and she’s had to reinvent her business to adjust to the changes. We’ll get into that in the interview. Topaz also happens to be the second American expat who is living and working in The Netherlands that I’ve had on the podcast over the past couple of weeks. That wasn’t intentional, but maybe this was a hint that more of us could be living overseas and working with clients here in the states. I don’t know. The big topic we covered in this podcast is how to survive in a recession. We are not in a recession—at least as far as the general business cycle goes—at the moment, but there have been some difficult economic events that have scared a few people and caused them to predict that a recession is somewhere out there on the horizon. We are not predicting a recession, but we are talking about how to be prepared for it if it happens to come… maybe this year, maybe next, but certainly at some point in the future. But beyond the general economic environment, there have been micro effects in the copywriting world… things like A.I. taking on a lot of work, especially at the lower end of the spectrum. And some industries, finance and tech come to mind, have suffered their own downturns with layoffs and clients cancelling projects. So while these haven’t shown up in the overall macro-environment, what you see happening in your niche may be close to a what an actual recession might feel like. If you’ve felt that, you’ll want to listen to this whole episode. One more thing I want to mention, I talked about this topic—preparing for a recession—at The Copywriter Club In Real Life in 2020… that was right before the last mini-recession happened. Topaz and I talk about some of those ideas on this episode, but you can go even deeper with them in an article written by Anna Hetzel. I’ll link to that article in the show notes if you want to check it out. It’s worth reading. Before we jump into our interview, this is probably the last time I’ll mention this for a while but I want to share with you all of my research secrets… especially my 4:20+ research method that helps copywriters like you uncover the ideas and insights you need to write great sales copy. It’s part of Research Mastery which also includes more than twenty different techniques for capturing ideas, all of the questions I use to learn more about my client, their product, their customers and their competitors as well as the documents you need to capture your research and several tutorials on how to use A.I. to speed up your processes and even help with your research itself. There’s a bonus on using Airtable to collect and sort your data and more… You can learn more about this unique resource at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery… research mastery is all one word. Check it out now at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery. And now, my interview with Topaz Hooper. Topaz, welcome back to the podcast. It’s great to have you here, excited for this discussion, talk, chat, whatever we’re gonna whatever we’re gonna call it, but you were here a few years ago episode number 305, catch me up. What has changed in your life since we talked about cruelty free copywriting and sales and all of those things. Topaz Hooper: So the first time we chatted, thanks for having me back, Rob. It’s so good to be here. Yeah, life has changed quite a bit. Cruelty Free copywriter was my baby in 2021 I think I jumped on the pod, like you said in the 300th episode somewhere. And at that time, vegan food, plant based fashion, clean beauty were all rising and they were really heavily funded, and they needed copywriters everywhere. And I couldn’t be everywhere, but I had a very good, successful business. And since then, you know, people are feeling a bit of a financial pinch these days, and those industries are not

As the owner of a copywriting business, you have a lot to think about—your products, your clients, your research process, writing great copy, finding new clients and more. So it’s no wonder we tend to push legal questions to the bottom of the to-do list until there’s a problem. Don’t do that. Andrea Sager is my guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. And she’s got a lot of great legal advice on using A.I., contracts, business entities, and protecting your business and assets. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: AndreaSager.com Legalprenuer.com The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery Course Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Do you have questions about contracts, trademarks, business entities, and your legal risk and liabilities? Today, I have answers. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. About a year before I took on my first freelance writing project—I’m going back a long time here—I took the LSAT, that’s the test for admittance into law school. I had thought I would become a lawyer from about the time I was in eighth grade. And I did well enough on the test to get into most of the schools I was planning on applying to. My plan at the time was to practice law in the non-profit sector. And to help with that goal, I decided to enroll into a Masters program in public administration. But once I started that program, I was so bored by the curriculum, I couldn’t envision myself finishing. At the same time I met someone who asked me to write an article promoting a product for a company she was working for. When I realized I could make money as a writer, I turned my back on my dream of being an attorney and started writing copy. So when it comes to legal advice, I can’t really help, but my friend Andrea Sager can. Andrea has helped hundreds of small businesses with legal advice and services. I tried to ask her all of the legal questions copywriters tend to have about things like using A.I., contracts and agreements, trademarks, and how we limit our exposure to legal liability that could cost you your business, your home and more. This stuff matters. And I hope you enjoy this interview. Before we get to the interview, the last couple of weeks I’ve mentioned that I put everything I know about conducting research and using A.I. as part of my research process into a short course called Research Mastery. It includes a lot, but it’s not an overly long, impossible to watch course. Instead it’s the kind of course you can watch in an afternoon or weekend and walk away with a research process that helps you uncover the insights you need to write great sales copy. ..more than twenty different techniques for capturing ideas, … all of the questions I use to get find big ideas about my client, their product, their customers and their competitors as well as the documents you need to capture your research and several tutorials on how to use A.I. to speed up your processes and even help with your research itself. But unlike other research courses that take hours to watch and implement, this one will teach you everything you need to know in a single afternoon. You can learn more about this unique resource at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery… research mastery is all one word. I’ll link to that in the show notes so you can easily find the link if you can’t type the URL into your browser right now… thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now, my interview with Andrea Sager. Hey, Andrea, welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. I am thrilled to have you here. It’s been quite a while since we talked to an attorney about all of the stuff that we need to be thinking about in our businesses. So I’m excited to have you here, but before we get started, maybe you could tell us your story. Just how did you become an attorney, an author, founder of the legal preneur.com and if I’m reading your website correctly, last year, you were ranked in the number 22 trademark lawyer in America. How does that all happen? Andrea Sager: Thank you so much for having me. I so I way back when I started my journey in big law I got the big, fancy, quote, unquote dream job right out of law school, which was the plan. I thought I was going to be married to my job work my way up to partner. And the first week there, I it hit me all of a sudden, and I remember thinking there is absolutely no way I can sit here for the next 40 years of my life, so immediately I’m trying to plan my exit. But it was a little harder because my husband, at the time we he was staying home with our son, and I was the only breadwinner. I was the only one making any income. But about seven months into my journey in big law. I always tell people I manifest getting fired, but ultimately I just wanted to work with small businesses. I had a previous small business where I had connections with other small business owners, and they kept comin

Copywriters have been using LinkedIn to connect with and land clients for years. So why is it still so difficult to grow an audience on that platform? I asked copywriter and LinkedIn Strategist, matt Barker, to chat with me about this for the 450th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. We talked about the best content to post, the biggest mistakes people make on LinkedIn, and how to get the right followers to pay attention to you. If you want clients to find you, click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: Matt’s LinkedIn Matt’s Website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery Course   Transcript: Rob Marsh: Looking for ideas for finding and connecting with potential clients on LinkedIn? You’re in the right place. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. There are a lot of ways to find and land clients. There’s cold emailing which allows you to choose the clients you want to work with—and if your pitch warms up your prospect and offers to solve the right problem for them, it can be very effective. Incidentally, if you want to learn how to cold pitch effectively, check out thecopywriterclub.com/lovenote. Beyond cold pitching, another popular method for attracting clients to you is posting content on social media. And for copywriters, Instagram or LinkedIn seem to be the two go-to platforms. And yes, there are copywriters using other platforms like TikTok or Threads and seeing success there, most of the action seems to be on these other, older platforms. We’ve talked about finding clients on LinkedIn several times on the podcast. And in fact, we’ll talk about it again in the near future. But because so many copywriters are using thise platform to build an audience, it bears repeating some of that advice from time to time. But it’s not just repeating the same stuff… we’re looking for new ideas that work now. The algorythm is always changing, so keeping an eye on what’s working now is important. So with that as our preamble, I invited copywriter turned LinkedIn Audience Building Strategist, Matt Barker, to share with me—and you as my listener—what is working on LinkedIn right now. Matt has built an audience of more than 170,000 followers on LinkedIn. His posts get 100s of comments and when he shares his programs or other products, the sales follow. Matt will be the first to say that getting attention on LinkedIn is harder today than it was two or three years ago. But that doesn’t mean it’s hard to stand out. In this interview, Matt and I talked about what works, what he’s posting more of lately, and how sharing content to inspire and motivate can bring in more clients than posts pitching your services. I think you’re going to like this interview… Before we get to the interview, just in case you missed this last week when I mentioned it, I put everything I know about conducting research and using A.I. as part of my research process into a short course called Research Mastery. It includes the 4:20+ research method that helps copywriters like you uncover the insights you need to write great sales copy. ..more than twenty different techniques for capturing ideas, … all of the questions I use to get find big ideas about my client, their product, their customers and their competitors as well as the documents you need to capture your research and several tutorials on how to use A.I. to speed up your processes and even help with your research itself. But unlike other resource courses that take hours to watch and implement, this one will teach you everything you need to know in a single afternoon. You can learn more about this unique resource at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery… research mastery is all one word. I’ll link to that in the show notes so you can easily find the link if you can’t type the URL into your browser right now… thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now, my interview with Matt Barker. Matt Barker: Yeah, thanks for having me on. By the way, I used to listen to this podcast a little bit when I was getting to learn copywriting and that sort of stuff three years ago. So thanks for what you do with your episodes, it’s helping people maybe more than you know, appreciate that, yeah, but yeah, with my LinkedIn profile, it was I started writing on there in January 2022, the main purpose for that was to get copywriting clients. I just left my job about three or four months prior, I worked in marketing. I was in marketing for about eight years, B to B and B to C, so I kind of understood marketing pretty well, and copywriting was a small part of that, but I wasn’t really sure how to be a really good copywriter. So. Yeah. Fast forward to when I started link running on LinkedIn, January 2022, I was using it primarily to try and get clients for my new copywriting business. I’d started, and it was pretty difficult at the start, because I just didn’t I had this thing that a lot of people e

I covered a lot of ideas in this episode with copywriter Grace Baldwin. We talked about product marketing, building an agency, conducting research (including one research technique you’ve never heard before) and the importance of community in growing your copywriting business. This is a good one. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Grace’s Newsletter The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Research Mastery   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Hidden inside this podcast are a couple of ideas that will take your research game to another level… and I promise at least one of these you’ve never heard before. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. I’ve interviewed close to 350 different copywriters and close to another hundred or so other experts on this podcast over the past eight years. And you would think that by now, I’ve heard just about everything there is to learn or know about copywriting, research, persuasion, finding clients and the many other topics we talk about every week. Often the topics we cover are good reminders of things I already know but maybe don’t apply to my business the way I should. Other times I hear ideas that I have implemented and what we talk about is a confirmation that what I’m doing in my business is helpful to my clients. And yet, I am constantly surprised by new ideas, new ways to do old things, and new insights that guests share that have never occurred to me before. That happened as I was recording this episode. My guest today is my friend Grace Baldwin. Grace is a copywriter with a background in strategy and product development. She’s in the process of building her own design agency. Grace has constantly leveled up as she’s built her business, working with bigger clients, taking on bigger projects and helping to create more impact for the brands she works on. While we were talking, she shared one way she does brand voice research—something I have never heard other copywriters doing and something that has never occurred to me before… and yet it’s the kind of idea that may help you as you conduct research for your clients, especially if they are in early stages and don’t yet have a lot of customers to intervew or survey. After hearing that, I shared my favorite research technique for getting a founder to share the features, benefits and other details about a product in a way that helps me capture these for my sales copy. If you want to hear either or both of these ideas, you’re going to have to listen to the rest of the podcast. Before we do that though, since one of the topics we touch on in this podcast is research, I want to share with you all of my research secrets… the 4:20+ research method that helps copywriters like you uncover the ideas and insights you need to write great sales copy. I’ve shared them all… more than twenty different techniques for capturing ideas, plus all of the questions I use to learn more about my client, their product, their customers and their competitors as well as the documents you need to capture your research and several tutorials on how to use A.I. to speed up your processes and even help with your research itself. You can learn more about this unique resource at thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery … research mastery is all one word. Check out thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery. I’ll link to that in the show notes so you can easily find the link if you can’t type the URL into your browser right now… thecopywriterclub.com/researchmastery And now, my interview with Grace Baldwin. Hey, Grace, Grace Baldwin: Hi Rob. Rob Marsh: I am so excited to have you here, so let’s let’s start with your stories. You were in the think tank. We hung out so much together a few years ago, but it’s been a little while. So catch me up and catch up our listeners. How did you get to be marketing consultant, copywriter for B to B, Tech brands, branding specialists, like all these things that you’re doing, and now you’re building an agency. Grace Baldwin: Yeah. So okay, the story starts kind of while I was still in school, so I kind of became a copywriter on accident, like everybody or like, I think most of the people that are on the show, right, never really imagined that this is kind of what life would look like. But when I was in high school, I would always really had fun writing like flyers, and, you know, I threw parties in my basement, and I loved writing the invitations. And then around my senior year of college, I kind of realized, Okay, wait, people will pay me to do this, which was amazing. And then after school, I moved to Amsterdam and fell into the world of B to B technology. I started working in ed tech. Then I went to e-commerce tech, and then finally ended up in, like, in a space tech company, which was really interesting. And that’s kind of when I came into Think Tank. I was working at a space tech company. I knew I always w

If you want to write more persuasive copy, you need better insights from your research. But how do you get them? Sarah Levinger is my guest for the 448th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast and we talked about research insights, trend spotting, how A.I. can distort your research analysis, and how to make your copy more persuasive. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Sarah’s Twitter Sarah’s Community Tether Insights The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Can psychology help you capture and hold the attention of your readers… then sell more of your products to your customers? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. On last week’s episode of the podcast, we talked about buyer psychology and how to use it to sell your products and services. It’s a great interview and I recommend you don’t miss it. This week’s episode is a kind of part 2 to that interview. In addition to specific persuasion techniques, today we’re going to go deep on research and discovering insights that a good copywriter can build a sales argument. If you want to use the techniques we talked about last week, what we talk about in this interview will give you the baseline insights to make them so much more effective. My guest today is Sarah Levinger, founder of Tether, a research insights platform that helps uncover emotional, behavioral, and identity-driven insights so marketers can connect on a deeper, more human level with their customers. And she uses A.I. to augment the process. Sarah walks through the process and framework she created for finding the kinds of insights that resonates with customers. She categorizes comments and research data by emotion, which leads to a better set of avatars and marketing ideas based on emotion rather than taglines or words that get a little tired as prospects see them over and over in your ads and other marketing. Then Sarah goes even deeper than feelings to uncover beliefs—she talks about why in this interview. I think you’re going to like what she has to share about that. Sarah also mentioned something about A.I. that I hadn’t considered before that kind of shifted the way I’m thinking about using tools like Claude and ChatGPT to analyze data. If you don’t understand this change, if you use A.I. in your research or analysis process, your copy will probably not connect as well you expect. Before we get to my interview with Sarah, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. If you haven’t jumped in to see what the Underground includes, now is the time. It’s guaranteed, which means you can join and if you don’t find the resources you need to grow your business, just let us know and we’ll refund your money. The Underground includes more than 70 different workshops—and accompanying playbooks to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. This week we’re adding another expert workshop all about how to create the perfect for you copywriter website. If your website doesn’t stand out or doesn’t help you land clients, you’ll definitely want to join us. The Playbooks make it easy to find quick solutions to the challenges you face in your business everything from finding clients, conducting sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn or YouTube or Pinterest, and dozens of other workshops. You also get dozens of templates including a legal agreement you can use with your clients, monthly coaching, regular copy and funnel critiques, and more. You can learn more and join today by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Sarah Levinger… Sarah, welcome to the podcast. Before we hit record, I told you I’ve been wanting to have you on for quite a while. I’ve been following your stuff online. The way you talk about persuasion psychology, it just rings my bell. So I’m so glad to have you here. But before we get into all of this stuff, how did you get to where you are, where you’re basically, you know, this marketing consultant to DDC companies using psychology to help, you know, increase responses, all of that kind of stuff. How did you get here? Sarah Levinger: Oh, gosh, that’s that I don’t even know that the journey that I’ve taken to get there has been a really interesting one, and I really do think I landed here on purpose at this particular time. So I started in marketing when I was 21, really, really young. I went to school to be an equine scientist. I wanted to be a vet for horses. I thought I wanted to be an equine scientist and go be like an equine vet. And then I found out very quickly, I don’t like blood, but I don’t like needles. This is not for me. So during that first, like, college year, I took a course in InDesign. Does anybody remember what InDesign was? I miss that platform so much. Oh my gosh. I really, really enjoyed designing in there. So that w

When it comes to getting customers to buy more, it helps to have psychology working for you. So I invited buyer psychologist, Katelyn Bourgoin, to chat with me about the marketing tactics that truly make a difference when it comes to getting customer to open their wallets. This is a great discussion that covers insights like Jobs to Be Done, Trigger Events, and the deep psychology that engages customers and keeps them coming back for more. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Katelyn’s Newsletter Wallet Opening Words <— Get this! The Milkshake Video Clayton Christensen’s How Will You Measure Your Life? The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Transcript: Rob Marsh: Why do people buy the products and services we write about? If you don’t know the answer to that question, you need this episode. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Before you can sell the products and services you write about, you need to understand why your customers buy in the first place. This includes marketing concepts like market/message match, jobs to be done, market sophistication, clarifying an offer, finding pain points, and finding under-served markets. My guest today is buyer psychologist Katelyn Bourgoin. She writes the Why People Buy newsletter and focuses on using science and psychology to sell more of whatever it is that you are writing about. Personally, these are the topics I could talk about for hours. If you want to sell more of the products and services you write about, you’ll definitely want to listen to this entire episode. What Katelyn shares about “trigger moments” is in my opinion one of the most important concepts in marketing that doesn’t get the attention it deserves. Katelyn and I also talked about making difficult decisions like shutting down a business that isn’t working, or choosing between taking a real job and doing something on your own, and the mindset shifts required to make these decisions. And I grilled Katelyn on the methods she used to grow her newsletter. If you write a newsletter (or want to write a newsletter), her ideas will help you attract new readers faster. Before we get to my interview with Katelyn, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. If you haven’t jumped in to see what the Underground includes, now is the time. It’s guaranteed, which means you can join and if you don’t find the resources you need to grow your business, just let us know and we’ll refund your money. The Underground includes more than 70 different workshops—and accompanying playbooks to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. This week we’re adding another expert workshop all about how to create the perfect for you copywriter website. If your website doesn’t stand out or doesn’t help you land clients, you’ll definitely want to join us. The Playbooks make it easy to find quick solutions to the challenges you face in your business everything from finding clients, conducting sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn or YouTube or Pinterest, and dozens of other workshops. You also get dozens of templates including a legal agreement you can use with your clients, monthly coaching, regular copy and funnel critiques, and more. You can learn more and join today by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Katelyn Bourgoin… So Katelyn, welcome to the copywriter club podcast. I’m thrilled to have you here. I’ve been wanting to have you on the show, literally, for like, a year. I’m not sure why it took so long to make the right connections, but thanks to Jordan for helping to make it happen. But since you’re here, tell us your story. I know you’ve got a great story of, you know, some business success and failure, but you have created an amazingly successful newsletter. I love it. It’s one of those that I wait for it to come into my email box, and probably because the topic is the topic that just rings my bell, which is persuasion. So anyway, tell me your story. How did you get here? Katelyn Bourgoin: That’s a long question. Rob Marsh: It was a terrible question. Katelyn Bourgoin: No, it’s a great question. I just feel like I’m, you know, I’m always kind of thinking about the best way to share this story, because it’s long and winding as most entrepreneurs are, and like, to your point, things look great today, but there have been a lot of ups and downs to get to this point. And so maybe I’ll share a little bit of the journey before launching the newsletter, which is why we buy so prior to launching the newsletter, if we go all the way back to like 2014 so we’re talking like 11 years ago, I was running a branding agency. I’d actually just sold the sister company, which was a restaurant consulting agency, and I was having this kind of crisis of identity, like I think a lot

Can copywriters who run a service business attract good clients using Facebook ads? The short answer is “yes”. Facebook Ads Strategist, Tara Zirker, is my guest for this episode The Copywriter Club Podcast, and she explained that not only can they use FB ads to attract clients, they may be able to do it for as little as $10/a day… and that could attract dozens of leads—more than you would need to hit six figures. Want to know how to do it? Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Your Ad Kit (Tara’s Newsletter) The Successful Ads Club The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Do you think of Facebook ads as a tool for growing your copywriting business? If not, it might be time to update your thinking. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. This is not the first time we’ve talked about Facebook ads on this podcast. I think I keep coming back to this topic because I see so much potential here—both for our own businesses and for our clients’ products and services. This is the kind of strategic skill that helps set some copywriters apart from most others. When you understand the ins and outs of driving paid traffic to your offers, you become imenselly valuable as a writer. And if you use these skills for your own products and services, you could create an almost endless pipeline of customers ready to pay for your help. But, for some reason, Facebook ads feels difficult. You’ve probably heard the same stories that I have of a creator who turns on ads and steps away for the weekend, only to wake up Monday morning to bill for thousands of dollars and no leads to show for the ad spend. This is something you probably can’t set it and forget it, at least as you’re gettinng started. I wanted to understand more about using ads and the analytics we need to pay attention to when we start using them to maximize our experience. So I invited Facebook ad strategist and founder of the Successful Ads Club, Tara Zirker, to walk me through all of this. We talked about how to scale a business with ads on a tiny budget… like $10 a day… what metrics you need to watch, what to test and what you can not bother with and a lot more. I’ve been on Tara’s list for quite a while and really appreciate her approach for running ads to your business… and yes, this works for service businesses like copywriters and content writers. Tara is about to tell us all how to do that in this interview. Before we get to my interview with Tara, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. If you haven’t jumped in to see what the Underground includes, now is the time. It’s guaranteed, which means you can join and if you don’t find the resources you need to grow your business, just let us know and we’ll refund your money. But I doubt that will be your experience because The Underground includes more than 70 different workshops—and accompanying playbooks to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. The Playbooks make it easy to find quick solutions to the challenges you face in your business everything from finding clients, conducting sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn or YouTube or Pinterest, and dozens of other workshops. You also get dozens of templates including a legal agreement you can use with your clients, monthly coaching, regular copy and funnel critiques, and more. You can learn more and join today by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Tara Zirker… Tara, welcome to the podcast. I’m thrilled to have you here, as I was telling you, right before we hit record. But before we get into all of this stuff around Facebook, Facebook ads and your expertise, just tell me how you got to where you are. How did you become the expert in Facebook ads? Tara Zirker: Thanks so much, Rob. I’m so happy to be here and talk to your community. And basically, a very long story short is I actually got my start in journalism. So come from the copy world. I actually ended started in editorial, and pretty quickly they must have recognized something, because they asked if I want to take on a couple of advertorial assignments, and that just became my place. I was like, loving it. It was so fun. And I just love seeing the results that you had from writing copy and having your clients get conversions. And so that started to expand pretty quickly, until, you know, I eventually went freelance. Had a full book of business in varying freelance services, everything from blogging, social media to SEO and, you know, just the whole kit and caboodle. Developed a small agency, and then I had one client who kind of did a bait and switch. They hired us for social media, and when, you know, day one, they’re like, actually, we need you to run ads. I was like, whoa, whoa. And this was way, way, way back when. I mean, I think Meta had had ads running for ju

In a world where A.I. can write all of the words for free, what is a copywriter to do? What tools should they adopt and how should they approach artificial intelligence? I invited Petter Magnusson, the creator of PurposeWrite, to join me on The Copywriter Club Podcast to discuss these questions and talk through how copywriters can use tools like his to serve our clients better. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Petter on LinkedIn PurposeWrite (sign up for a free trial) The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: It’s been three years since ChatGPT launched and changed the world. So what does A.I. mean for copywriting today? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. When OpenA.I. released the first version of ChatGPT to the public, what had been a quiet conversation about artificial intelligence happening mostly behind the scenes suddenly burst into our collective consciousness. Writers and creators in particular were suddenly aware that at least at some level, these large language models could do some of the work we were being hired to do. Many of us dove into these tools to see what they could do. We launched a short-lived podcast that talked about how A.I. was impacting so many different ways of working, certainly within marketing, but also in many other industries. You can find the 20+ episodes of that podcast on The Copywriter Club website. Since that time, the dust has settled a bit. The A.I. tools have gotten a bit better. Image creation tools are significantly better. Writing tools have also improved, but it remains true today that the best copywriters seem to be able to use them to get the best outputs… if you want good copy, copy that captures attention and converts readers into buyers, it helps a lot to have a copywriter guide the inputs and rework the outputs you get from the A.I. model of your choice. Another thing we’ve seen in over the past couple of years is that while tools like ChatGPT and Claude get most of the headlines, lots of other tools have added components of artificial intelligence to improve their products, speed up useage, and make applications more sticky. At the same time we’ve seen the launch of job-specific A.I. tools that do one thing… like writing emails, or writing articles at speeds humans simply can’t match. So when it comes to A.I., where are we headed next? What tools will we be using to get better results? And how helpful is it to have a user or prompt engineer or copywriter who really knows what they’re doing versus just playing around to see what they can get a model to do? I asked Petter Magnusson, the developer of PurposeWrite to talk a bit about A.I., the tool he’s built, and also the broader environment of artificial intelligence and where he sees us going from here. And because whatever happens with A.I. will have a big impact on copywriters, this is a topic I may come back to in the coming weeks. This whole industry is fascinating. The speed of change is a bit scary. During our conversation, I had a realization. In the past copywriters charged for the things we delivered… the words. Officially we sold blog posts or sales pages or emails or some other copy, but it was the words that clients expected to get. But now that ChatGPT can produce the words pretty much for free, we need to move up the value chain and sell the process, the strategy, the analysis, and the ideas. And bringing that to the A.I. model you use will make the outputs there so much better. Any way… I think this is a discussion you’ll enjoy. Before we get to my interview with Petter, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. Unless you are hitting the 30 second skip button when you get to this point of the show, you are no doubt familiar with The Copywriter Underground. I talk about it every week. The Underground includes more than 70 different workshops—and accompanying playbooks to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. The Playbooks make it easy to find quick solutions to the challenges you face in your business everything from finding clients, conducting sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn or YouTube or Pinterest, and dozens of other workshops. You also get dozens of templates including a legal agreement you can use with your clients, monthly coaching, regular copy and funnel critiques, and more. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Petter Magnusson… Petter, welcome to the podcast. I am really interested in your journey. How did you go from, i think, photographer, content creator, and now you founded an AI company all about writing How did you get here? Petter Magnusson: First of all, thanks for having me. I’ve been like, to be honest, I have discovered your pod fairly recently, but I have listened in and I really like what you do. So I’m going to be stuck in he

Building a simple business should be, well, simple. But it’s not. So I invited business consultant Justin Wise to join me for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast to talk about all the complex ideas that go into building a simple business that supports you (and not the other way around). We covered a lot of ground from content creation to positioning to offers and more. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Justin’s Newsletter Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Transcript: Rob Marsh: What does it take to create and run a truly simple copywriting business? We’re going to talk about that today on The Copywriter Club Podcast. One of the many reasons that business owners fail at running their businesses is complexity—and by the way, this includes copywriters and content writers who own and run their own businesses too. We can serve so many kinds of clients and do so many kinds of work and even serve a bunch of different niches. And with all those options, we sometimes create a business that has lots of offers, and lots of messages to appeal to lots of different prospects. There are people who make that work, but this kind of complexity burns most of us out. So I invited business consultant and founder of Simple Business, Justin Wise, to talk about what we need to do to build a truly simple business that doesn’t require 60 hours of work a week to keep running. We cover a lot of ideas or levers in this episode… dailish emails, simple offers, customer journeys, pricing, content creation, sharing content…it all comes down to how you talk about what you do and who you do it for… differently. Differentiation is one of those things that a lot of copywriters tend to struggle with. We do so many of the same things that seeing what makes you different is really hard, especially when we’re sitting inside our own businesses. Someone once said, you can’t read the label from inside the bottle. That’s so true when applied to your copywriting business. Figuring out the thing that makes you different from all of the other writers out there is critical. And if you can do it, you’ll probably not struggle to connect with your ideal clients and land bigger, higher paying projects. Justin and I also talked about the pressure to be producing all the content, talking about all the things on all the platforms and how none of that leads to a simple business. I think you’ll like this discussion that Justin and I had so stick around. Before we get to my interview with Justin, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. Unless you are hitting the 30 second skip button when you get to this point of the show, you are no doubt familiar with The Copywriter Underground. I talk about it every week. The Underground includes more than 70 different workshops—and accompanying playbooks to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. The Playbooks make it easy to find quick solutions to the challenges you face in your business everything from finding clients, conducting sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn or YouTube or Pinterest, and dozens of other workshops. You also get dozens of templates including a legal agreement you can use with your clients, monthly coaching, regular copy and funnel critiques, and more. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Justin Wise… Justin, welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. I would love to start just by hearing your story and how you became basically an advisor to literally hundreds of companies that are trying to differentiate and simplify and find an audience and make money. So how did you get here? Justin Wise: Well, it’s the standard career path that everybody takes, unemployed house painter to pastor to business owner. Rob Marsh: There you go, you and everyone else. Justin Wise: It’s pretty typical, but yeah, long story short, I graduated college in 2003 and I had every intent of being in the radio and film industry, radio, TV and film, and went out to Los Angeles, moved there for a summer, and then promptly moved back immediately to Iowa, entertainment industry. That’s where I’m from, Iowa, but the entertainment industry, very quickly it became clear that this was not… this is not a long term career choice that I was interested in and not that it’s bad or wrong, but it just wasn’t for me. And so I kind of went into this identity crisis when I got back, like a lot of college kids do, where you realize, like, oh, the work that I thought I was going to do with my degree is not going to materialize. It’s not going to work. And, you know, I grown up going to church, and this isn’t really a church thing, but had kind of fallen out of that. And then my parents were like, Hey, uh, you know, it may be a good idea to go

Want your copy to stand out and get notice? Communication Specialist Sam Horn is my guest for the 443rd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. Sam talks about how to take “regular” ideas and make them “pop”. If you want to get noticed by potential clients, or want to help your clients get noticed by their customers, this episode is for you. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: Sam’s LinkedIn Pop!: Create the Perfect Pitch, Title and Tagline for Anything by Sam Horn Tongue Fu by Sam Horn The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Want your copy to get noticed and remembered? There are a couple of simple tricks that will help you do that. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. The ability to help your clients get noticed and remembered is one of the main things they pay you for. And to find clients in the first place, you need to be able to get prospects to notice and remember you. If you can’t do this one thing… you really can’t help them with anything else because they never engage with you. There are lots of psychological techniques that help people notice you… or help people remember you… or make people want to engage with you. So what are they? I asked communication specialist Sam Horn to walk through some of these techniques. Sam is the author of the book Pop: Create the Perfect Pitch, Title, and Tagline for Anything. She walked me through a bunch of the tricks she uses to coin new phrases so her readers raise their eyebrows. One of the things you’ll notice as you listen is that Sam uses these techniques as she talks with me… you’ll hear rhymes, juxtapositions, cliches, and patterns that demonstrate exactly what she is sharing as we talk. The ideas and insights we discuss go well beyond typical persuasion techniques like urgency and scarcity to create a more fun, human, and interesting connection between the ideas you write about and your audience. This is a different sort of interview… because Sam actually workshops an idea for a presentation I am planning on offering to listeners of this podcast. As she goes through the ideas I share with her, you’ll notice she starts throwing out ideas and insights I might use when I’m ready to share my presentation. It demonstrates the insights she shares—especially her advice to show the shift as we communicate what we sell. Near the end of the interview, Sam walked me through the questions she asks as she starts writing a book—and she’s written a bunch of them. If you’re thinking of writing a book yourself, some of these questions may be useful for you. I think you’ll like what Sam has to share. Before we get to my interview with Sam, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. Unless you are hitting the 30 second skip button when you get to this point of the show, you are no doubt familiar with The Copywriter Underground. I talk about it every week. The Underground includes more than 70 different workshops—and accompanying playbooks to help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. The Playbooks make it easy to find quick solutions to the challenges you face in your business everything from finding clients, conducting sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn YouTube or Pinterest, and dozens of other workshops. You also get dozens of templates, including a legal agreement you can use with your clients, monthly coaching, regular copy and funnel critiques, and more. You can learn more by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Sam Horn… Sam, welcome to the copywriter club podcast. I would, I mean, I’m thrilled to have you here. You know, author of nine books, everything about language and communication. But before we get into all of that stuff. I would like to know how you got here. How did you become an author, speaker coach, I guess, an intrigue expert, and all of the other things that people have called you. Sam Horn: Okay, so how about I’ll go two places with that. Sound good? We’ll, we’ll start with the original origin story. Okay? Because I think our originality is in our origin story. So I grew up in a small town, more horses than people, and I was, like, elected as valedictorian of my class. A small town, big deal, right? So I put together my little graduation speech, and I shared it with my dad, who ran Future Farmers of America for the state of California. And you may know they understood speaking was very important. So I asked for his feedback, and he said, it’s an okay talk. He said, You just didn’t say anything I hadn’t heard before. It was the little bird leaving the nest homily, you know? And I said, But dad, there’s nothing original under the sun. And he says, of course there is. He said, You know what the definition of original is, if we haven’t heard it before. And you know, Rob, I at a very

What’s the best way to learn copywriting? Could it be hand-writing sales pages and other great copy from expert copywriters like Mel Martin and Gary Bencivenga? My guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is Derek Johanson, the writer who created CopyHour, a program designed to help you learn to write by hand-copying great copy. We also talked about getting affiliates, mentoring, and a lot more. If you want to improve your copywriting skills, be sure to listen to this episode (and click here to learn about the CopyHour program). Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: The CopyHour Course Gary Bencivenga’s Olive Oil Sales Page The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: What’s the best way to learn copywriting? Would it surprise you that handwriting great copy is possibly the most successful technique? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. There must be something like a thousand different courses for copywriters to learn how to write copy. And probably another thousand more that talk about content—as if it’s a separate skill set. And there are probably an additional thousand more free videos in places like YouTube that promise to teach you the skills you need to succeed as a copywriter. With that many choices out there, you would think the world would be crammed full of phenomenally skilled copywriters, but it’s not. This should tell us that not all courses or workshops that promise to teach writers how to write copy and content actually work. So what does work? Is there a course out there that many copywriters talk about or recommend when it comes to writing engaging sales or conversion copy? And it turns out there is. One course recommended by people like Dan Ferrari, Chris Orzechowski, Elise Savaki, and hundreds of others is called CopyHour. Unlike many other courses, CopyHour focuses on handwriting great copy. Does that really work? I asked Derek Johanson, the writer who created CopyHour to be my guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast to answer questions like… why does hand-writing teach copy structure and pacing where other methods don’t appear to have the same level of success? We talked about the genesis and evolution of the CopyHour program and what it includes… things like writing great offers, writing headlines and bullets, and how Derek has improved the course over time. Now I want to be upfront about something… I came to this interview as a bit of a skeptic when it comes to hand-writing copy. I’m all in on studying good examples of emails, sales pages, and other good copy. In fact, I have a swipe file with more than 500 different sales pages that I’ve saved to study… those swipes are part of The Copywriter Underground… But handwriting? I wasn’t so sure… I think Derek may have changed my mind. And if you’re a skeptic on this topic, you may want to hear what he says about the science of handwriting and learning. If you’re convinced by the end of this episode that you want to know more, you can go to thecopywriterclub.com/copyhour to find out more about Derek’s course. It’s open for new members the week this episode goes live, so check it out today… thecopywriterclub.com/copyhour Before we get to my interview with Derek, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. You’ve heard me talk about how we’ve recently rebuilt The Underground dashboard to make finding the ideas and insights you need easier. But as I started recreating this new dashboard, it occurred to me that no one has time to watch more than 70 different workshops—even for those workshops that help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. So I’ve taken more than 30 of those workshops on finding clients, having sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn, and dozens of others… and I’ve created playbooks that break down the ideas in the workshops into easy-to-follow steps. Each playbook is 3-5 pages long. You can read through one and implement the ideas in minutes. And then if you want more detail, you can watch the accompanying workshop. Each playbook even includes a checklist so you don’t miss any steps and can ensure you get things done. I’m working on completing playbooks for all of the workshops and training inside The Underground. They should all be ready by the end of April. You can get the first 30 or so right now by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Derek Johanson… Derek, welcome to the podcast. I’m thrilled to have you here. Before we hit record, I was mentioning you know, you’re you’re talked about by everyone. Your program is relatively well known. But before we get into all of that, I’m curious: how did you get from the beginning of your career to where you are now, where you are literally on the lips of so many copywriters around the world? Derek Johanson: Wow. Do you want the long version

Yes, you write. But when it comes to marketing, you can do a lot more than that. Today, clients are looking for help from specialists like copywriters who bring more to the table. In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with Emily Reagan about how writers can offer additional services and expertise to their clients. Emily helps virtual assistants step up into a more helpful role as Marketing Assistants, and it’s something we think more copywriters need to consider. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff we mentioned: Atomic Habits Emily’s Podcast Emily’s Instagram The Authority Framework The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: You’re a copywriter, but you can do other marketing stuff like design or email systems. Is there a need for that? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. As a copywriter, you probably have a hand in all kinds of marketing activities—everything from the overall marketing strategy to brainstorming lead magnets, to creating and posting content, or writing and managing ads, to figuring out which email systems will help increase engagement and purchases… you probably already do a lot of this stuff. What’s more, a lot of clients want smaller, more nimble teams these days, and that means working with people who can do more of the tasks they used to depend on an entire team to get done. Some people taking on these expanded roles call themselves marketing assistants. Whether that title works for you or not isn’t important. What really matters is that there is a growing need for writers of all kinds to take on this larger, more inclusive role and contribute more, often using A.I. to bring it all together. My guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is Emily Reagan. Emily started out offering marketing support especially related to Facebook ads, but she expanded beyond that to include copywriting and other marketing services. And she’s spent the past couple of years helping others do the same thing. We talked about the importance of adding additional marketing services to your copywriting business to make yourself more valuable—maybe even indispensable—for your clients. It’s yet another way to stand out from all the other writers out there who don’t offer clients anything extra. While we talked, Emily also shared a lot of details about her business—she works with clients and helps other writers grow their marketing skills. As she tells it, her business grew serendipitously… going from one thing to the next as it made sense. It’s not exactly a path that others can follow, but it is a strategy for finding your own path to the work you love doing. I think you’re going to like this discussion. As usual, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. You’ve heard me talk about how we’ve recently rebuilt The Underground dashboard to make it easier to find the ideas and insights you need. But as I started recreating this new dashboard, it occurred to me that no one has time to watch more than 70 different workshops—even for those workshops that help you gain the skills and strategies you need to build your business. So I’ve taken more than 30 of those workshops on finding clients, having sales calls, using A.I., building authority on LinkedIn, and dozens of others… and I’ve created playbooks that break down the ideas in the workshops into easy-to-follow steps. Each playbook is 3-5 pages long. You can read through one and implement the ideas in minutes. And then if you want more detail, you can watch the accompanying workshop. Each playbook even includes a checklist so you don’t miss any steps and can make sure you get things done. I’m working on completing playbooks for all of the workshops and training inside The Underground. They should all be ready by the end of April. You can get the first 30 or so right now by visiting thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Emily Reagan… Hey Emily, welcome to the podcast. And let’s, let’s just start out by saying this is a long time coming. The last time we saw each other, it’s like five years ago. And I don’t know why we haven’t had you on sooner than the now, but I’m glad you’re here now that you’re here. Yeah, tell us. Tell us your story. How did you become a copywriter? Emily Reagan: Yeah, it’s been five years in the making. The last time you and I were together was right when the pandemic was happening in 2020, so it’s a completely different time. And my business has changed a lot since I showed up to your conference in real life. But you know how business owners, especially the online ones, are running around like crazy, trying to wear all the hats, do all the things, and keep all the marketing and all the gardens happy? I am the person who started training the marketing assistant to help within that marketing department. It started because I

When most writers think about ghostwriting, they think books. But there’s a huge opportunity to ghost for business leaders who need content… articles, blog posts, speeches and more. In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, Rob is talking with Allison Evelyn (Ally) about how she pivoted from Day Rates and standard copy projects to ghost writing for clients—and how she’s leveraging that work to ghostwrite books in the future. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Allison’s Website Allison’s Podcast: Holy F Allison’s Instagram Get her freebie: Ghostwriter Gold The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Transcript: Rob Marsh: When you think of ghostwriting, do you think of books? If so, you’re thinking small. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. We’ve talked with several copywriters, from time to time, over the past eight years, who have talked about ghostwriting. Most of those episodes focused on large projects like ghostwriting books—the in-depth process for writing a book and connecting with the kinds of clients who need help from someone who can write their book. But ghostwriting is more than that. Ghostwriting includes any project where a writer steps into the shoes of their client to write something in their name. It can be blog posts, articles published online, emails, webinar scripts, and more. When you look beyond the book world, the opportunity for ghostwriters is huge. Landing these clients isn’t dramatically different from the way that you find, pitch, and close regular clients… though there are differences. Usually, as a ghostwriter, you’re not writing for lower-level employees. Rather, you’re writing for founders, CEOs, and other high-level thinkers, so your work needs to be able to reflect that. In fact, your pitches may need to include ideas and insights that a client can use to show up as a thought leader in their business and niche. Landing work with ghost-writing clients means you need to show up and be recognized at this higher level. My guest for this week is Allison Evelyn, that’s her professional name— she mostly goes by Ally. Ally’s been on the podcast before when we talked about an earlier version of her business. Over the past four or five years, the kind of work she does and the kinds of clients she works with have changed quite a bit. When we recorded that earlier episode, Ally was a member of The Copywriter Think Tank. She also taught several workshops about day rates and the kind of work copywriters can get done on those kinds of projects (one of those workshops is in The Copywriter Underground today). With all the changes she’s seen in her business and her personal life, I was excited to catch up with Ally and learn more about her role as a ghostwriter for some prominent online voices. I wish we could talk about a few of them by name, but as a ghostwriter, you usually need to stay behind the scenes so your clients can shine. Even if you’re not interested in ghostwriting for clients, a lot of what Ally shares in this interview about working with clients applies to the normal back and forth with all clients, and if you put her suggestions to work in your business, I promise, you’ll be more successful. Make sure you take notes as you listen to this one. As usual, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. No matter what kind of copywriting business you want for yourself, The Underground is packed with resources to show up as a business owner—not just a freelancer, find clients, and solve big problems that clients are happy to pay big money to get off their plates. From copywriting and business templates to get you started (including a legal document and a proven onboarding process) to workshops to help you build your authority, attract clients, create products and services your clients want to buy, and more—The Underground is like a starter-kit for your business… or a complete business-in-a-box that you can plug into your own business and hit play. As questions come up, you have access to our private Slack community, monthly group coaching, and regular feedback on your copy. I’ve been inside a lot of memberships, and The Underground is the best value for content writers and copywriters I’ve ever seen. You can learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu And now, my interview with Allison Evelyn… Rob Marsh: Ally, welcome back to the podcast. You were here Well, see, it’s been a long time—episode 172, and we were talking about launching, I think you were launching your first program, but a lot has happened since, not just like work-wise, personally, years have passed. Catch us up. What’s going on in your copywriting life? Allison Evelyn: Yes, so dearest listener, we were just talking about how before, when we talked, and then I was a panelist at The Copywriter Club In Real Life, which was wild because it was early 2020. At the time. I wa

A lot of copywriters want to expand their businesses beyond client work. But what does it take to do that? How do you come up with a new offer? And how do you test whether your audience actually wants it? Ross O’Lochlainn is my guest for the 439th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. He shares what it takes to come up with and validate a new offer. We also talked about how he found his first clients (and idea that works today) and how A.I. is affecting marketing and a lot more. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: Ross’ Website The Client Studio How to Write Like a MoFo 10 Energizing Hook Frames The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: How do you go from copywriter or content writer to problem solver and irresistible offer maker for your clients? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. A lot of copywriters jump into client work with both feet, they find some success and create a business that makes money, but also find that it takes a lot of time they may have been hoping to use for non-work activities. Spending time with family. Having lunch with a friend. Or taking in a movie in the middle of the day. Serving clients is time-intensive whether you’re doing research, writing copy, managing the client relationship, or looking for and pitching your next client. And of course, there’s the bookkeeping and marketing and the other basic office stuff that takes up time. It’s pretty common that copywriters tell me they want to change up their business a bit so they have more time for the personal things they want to fit into their days. But the constant stream of client work makes it hard to fit in the other options like products for your niche or templatized services ready to buy off the shelf and easy to fulfill on. And once you have an offer you want to make… how do you test whether it will work with your audience? How do you find the problems you can solve or the gains your potential clients want to get? On this episode you’re going to hear about a process that can help with that validation and how you identify not just the problem, but the kind of client you want to work with on these non-copy products. My guest for this week is Ross O’Lochlainn. I met Ross a few years ago when he came to our Copywriter Club in Real Life Event in Brooklyn. Since then, Ross has built a pretty unique business where he works a few hours a day helping his clients solve big problems. Then he spends his free time training in Brazilian Ju Jitsu and spending time with his wife. Ross is a copywriter but he does far more than just write copy. He’s become an expert in client attraction, moving customers into high-paid coaching opportunities and like I said a moment ago, solving big marketing problems. From the outside, it appears to be a great business model, so I wanted to see how Ross built that business and what we can learn from his approach. As we talked Ross also shared the idea that having a product is not enough. Having a lead magnet is not enough. There’s some alchemy to making the elements work together to generate a “lead with intent”. The intent here makes a ton of difference. Finding “perfect fit” prospects to join your email isn’t easy. And Ross shares how he does it. Oh, and we talk about A.I. in this one too. You’ll want to listen to this episode right up to the closing credits. It’s a good one. As usual, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. This episode is all about creating a business that works for you and provides you with the time you need for the life you want to live. And The Underground is packed with resources to help you gain confidence and help your clients solve big problems like Ross does. From templates to get you started (including a legal document and a proven onboarding process) to workshops to help you build your authority, attract clients, create products and services your clients want to buy and more—The Underground is like a starter-kit for your business… or a complete business-in-a-box that you can almost plug and play. As questions come up, you also have access to monthly group coaching and regular feedback on your copy. I’ve been inside a lot of memberships, and The Underground is the best value for content writers and copywriters I’ve ever seen. You can learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu Ross, welcome to the podcast. It’s been a while since we talked in person. It was 2019, one of our live events. Catch me up on what’s going on and and how did you become—you’re so many things. I mean, copywriter, coach, mentor for so many. How did you get here? Ross O’Lochlainn: Yeah, it has been a while. We were just chatting about that before we hit record. um There was obviously a whole global disruption in between the live events that I haven’t really gone back to live events and since. Part of that is the last while here has been kind of building

Using social media to find clients can be exhausting. Writers tend to focus on the “media” and use it as a broadcast platform that requires post after post and what at least one marketing guru has called “Content Shock”. What if you focused on the “social” part of social media and used it to foster real relationships with prospects and clients? That’s what’s been working for Esai Arasi, our guest for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Esai’s LinkedIn Esai’s Instagram The Business of Expertise The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Looking for an approach to social media that doesn’t require you to post three times a day or more? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. The old approach to social media was to post content—photos and video with clever captions that invite comments and likes—is hard to keep up with. If you don’t have a team of content creators and algorythm watchers to keep up with the latest thing, you burn out or lose interest or eventually realize that the effort you are putting in is not being rewarded by the leads and clients you are looking for. Most of us are on social media to get leads. But how’s that working out for you? Most content writers or copywriters posting on Instagram or X/Twitter or LinkedIn are spending a lot of time for very little payoff. And that’s because social media is great at helping foster connections and relationships, but not all that great at selling organically. I’m not saying it can’t be done or that no one’s doing it. Some are. But it’s not easy. My guest for this week’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is Esai Arasi. And she argues you don’t need to post every day or every week or even every month. Tools like ManyChat help move followers who are interested in what you do from posts to DMs. Using social media to foster relationships you have with previous clients and referal partners is also useful. Those things don’t disappear into the feed after a few minutes. They endure. And switching up your approach to focus on these kinds of behaviors may bring you better results than you’ve been seeing lately. Stick around as we talk about how to do this. As usual, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. We’re talking about social media and getting clients to work with you today and it just happens that there are additional resources in The Copywriter Underground designed to help you do both of those things. Workshops on using tools like Pinterest and YouTube to grow your audience and attract clients. Still other workshops on engaging prospects on LinkedIn and other social media platforms so you can build relationships that result in high-paying client work. Not to mention resources to help you land a “real” job if that’s more up your alley. And that’s just the beginning… there are dozens of templates—including a legal document worth hundreds of dollars—ready for you to borrow and use in your own business, three entire courses on selling, writing proposals clients can’t say no to, and building your authority so clients seek you out, not the other way around. Plus dozens of other workshops, monthly coaching, regular copy critiques and more. You can see what it includes at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu And now, my interview with Esai Arasi… Esai, welcome back to the podcast. It’s been a little while since we talked on the podcast. You and I have talked offline a few times since then, but catch us up on what’s been going on in your business. I think on the podcast, last time we talked was like 2020. So it’s been a little while. Esai Arasi: It’s been a while. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me again, Rob. And I’m really excited to catch up on what my growth has been like because when I was last on your podcast, I was still working with you inside the think tank. I was still learning. I was still building all of the systems as we were discussing. And it was I was going through a huge period of change. And I’m really excited today to share the systems I’ve built, the marketing strategies that I’ve tried, what’s working for me, what’s working for my clients, what’s working in social and in marketing right now. And most importantly, as you and I discussed, I’m going to talk about all of this within the framework of Traffic Nurture Conversion. And figuring out where you need to focus, or you can guess the best results where I focus personally. And just and if anybody is interested in, after they listen to the podcast, they want to know where they should focus on. A simple way that they can do that is sending me a DM called audit and take my quiz right in their DMS, which will tell them what is their easy win easy money book in your focus right there. Rob Marsh: Perfect, o

Finding a “real” job isn’t easy. But more copywriters and content writers are interested in trying. In this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with Copy Chief Matt Snyder who has hired lots of copywriters over the past couple of years. He shared the mistakes copywriters are making and what it takes to get the attention of a hiring manager. Even if you don’t want a “real” job, what Matt shares in this episode will help you connect with high-paying clients and land more work. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Matt’s newsletter Matt’s LinkedIn The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Want to land a real job as a copywriter or content writer? It’s not easy. But help is on the way. This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. Most of the listeners to this podcast are freelancers or contract writers. If you’re like them, you generally work on projects or retainers for a variety of clients. And you’re good at it. But some writers crave the stability that comes with a regular job—either part-time or full-time—with an actual employer paying wages and maybe even providing benefits. A handful of freelancers I’ve worked with over the years have dipped their toes into the corporate world to work primarily for a single client, or for those who are looking for part-time jobs, have landed work that provides some security and regular income to go along with the unpredictabilty of freelancing. But finding those jobs isn’t easy. They’re out there for sure, but within hours of a copywriting or content writing job posting on LinkedIn or any other job board, the hiring managers receive hundreds of applications. Getting found in that slush pile isn’t easy—even for the very best writers. Recently in The Copywriter Underground, I invited a friend of mine who worked for decades as a job placement specialist for creatives, to share her best advice for copywriters looking for “real” jobs. That training is inside The Underground now. When I announced we would be hosting that training, another copywriter, Matt Snyder, reached out to offer his advice. Matt is the Head Copywriter at a digital agency and works with a team of five or six writers. He hires a lot. And he sees a ton of applications, resumés and other creative attempts to get his attention. So when he offered, I suggested we record our discussion and share it here on the podcast. That’s what this episode is. Now, I know I said this is about getting hired to real job with a company. But everything Matt shares is applicable to getting hired by freelance clients as well. I think every copywriter, every content writer, and every freelancer writer who listens to this episode will get a lot from what Matt has to say. So stay tuned. As usual, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. We’re talking about getting work today, so I should probably mention the resources available in The Underground that will help you do that. Starting with the workshop with my friend, Jessica, the placement specialist. Her advice will make a difference if you’re applying for what we tend to refer to as “real” jobs. We also have workshops from experts like Laura Belgray who shares how you can stop waiting in line and “duck under” the velvet ropes holding you back. And Parris Lampropoulos who shared the exact pitch he used to get his first five clients, then how he went on to double his income every year for the next five years—do the math, that’s a lot. There’s also our in-house training about ways to find clients and an entire course on sales. Plus dozens of other workshops, templates, copy critiques, monthly coaching, and more. Learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Matt Snyder… Matt, Welcome to the podcast. I was checking our back episodes because I swear we’ve had you on the podcast before and turns out we haven’t. So we should have probably had you before, but I’m glad that we’ve waited because what we’re going to talk about today kind of came out of a lot of things that have happened since the last time you and I were even on a call together. So this should be pretty good. But let’s start with your story. How did you even become a copywriter? Matt Snyder: Um, great question. Uh, I feel like I’ve lived many lives, so it’s kind of hard to turn it down. But, um, I, I always like to say my love affair with writing online or publishing anything online started with a Zynga account, like way back. Rob Marsh: That’s a long time ago. Matt Snyder: Yeah. Way back in like 2003. So, Um, like right when I got into college, I was like, I’m real. I, I kind of was dabbling into journaling and I thought that this online medium was going to be kind of cool. Um, so that was like, I think blog spot was maybe starting. And so I just started publishin

Writing Video Sales Letters is an art. It’s not enough to simply record someone reading a regular sales page. They depend more on stories and keeping listeners engaged because you can’t afford to lose your viewer’s attention. In the 436th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with Svet Dimitrov about this challenge and he shared why you need to take a different approach when writing VSLs. We covered a lot more than that, so click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Svet’s LinkedIn Svet’s Facebook The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: If you applied for 200 different projects or jobs, each time sending a new cover letter with your pitch, I imagine you would learn a thing or two about what works and what doesn’t work in the application process. That’s what Svet Dimitrov, my guest on this episode of the podcast, did. But that’s not even the reason I asked Svet to join me on the podcast. I heard another copywriter talking about how Svet is one of the best VSL copywriters in the world today—VSLs are video sales letters and they’re different from regular sales letters because you can’t afford to lose your viewer’s attention ever. We talk about that in this episode and what you can do to improve your own VSL writing skills. If you want to write VSLs, don’t skip this episode. We also talked about Svet’s contrarian advice that copywriters—especially copywriters who are just starting out—should not have a website. Obviously, that’s not the way most of us think. Websites are there to build credibility and help clients see the various ways we can help them. But Svet argues, and I think I agree, that there is a better approach that connects personally with your prospects. You may want to stick around to here what Svet does. As you might expect, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. I’ve completely rebuilt the content vault to make it more useable and useful and in the process I’ve added more than 70 differnt workshops to it. And there are even more coming. Workshops taught by expert copywriters like Parris Lampropoulos, Joanna Weibe, Stefan Georgi, Jack Forde, Chanti Zak, Laura Belgray and dozens of others. And it’s not just copywriters, we’ve got marketing experts teaching how to build funnels, how to market using tools like Linkedin and Pinterest, how to put yourself in the right mindset to succeed and so much more. And that’s just the workshops. There are dozens of templates, a community of like-minded writers holding each other accountable, and monthly coaching with me. It’s time you joined us inside. Learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu And now, my interview with Svet Dimitrov… Svet, I’m thrilled to be able to chat with you. I’d love to start just by hearing how you got where you are. How did you become a copywriter? Before we started recording, I mentioned that I’ve heard your name because people have said you are one of the best VSL copywriters in the world right now. So how’d you get there? Svet Dimitrov: Thank you first for inviting me, Rob. It’s a pleasure to be here. And yeah, my story goes back, I would say, probably Probably by the time I was doing my master’s degree actually, I was really struggling. That was 2009-2010 to finish my master’s thesis. And I did read, so this was in the era when you couldn’t find a lot of stuff on Google. So I had to sift through a ton of pages, I think I went to like the 10th page of Google, which probably nobody goes there these days, just to find, just to do research. But I think that’s when I really started to understand that research is really important. I appreciate it, love the game, although I was struggling to find a good way to express my thoughts in my master thesis. And I think I sift through like maybe 10 physical books. Then I mentioned research on Google. I think I probably went through more than 100 PDFs that I found online and all that stuff. And it was kind of a crazy couple of months just doing research and research and not getting anywhere, which was frustrating. But then there was this mindset shift that I said, hey, if I’m going to say, hey, I can’t do it, I won’t be able to do it, right? But when I said, hey, I need to do it and I will do it, things started to get better. Um, so after I finished my master’s degree, I started applying. It was actually in European policies and politics. So I started applying for different positions in the European Union related to politics, management and all that stuff. And I couldn’t land any, and I probably sent like more than a hundred different applications. Most of those applications were not only consisting of a CV, but also a cover letter. So I wrote a ton of cover letters. And later, like years later, I realized that has helped me a lot to master my skills

It’s pretty common to hear copywriters recommend that you study old sales pages and even sales emails, but what about old magazine ads? The kind that are printed on paper in actual periodicals? Today, where so much advertising happens online or in your social media feed, Ad writing is a bit of a lost art form. But that doesn’t mean we can’t learn from it. In the 435th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I interviewed Lewis Folkard who breaks down old ads for his newsletter readers. And he shared what copywriters have to learn from his approach. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Lewis’ Website The Olive Ad Breakdown The Silk Cut ad The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Copywriters seem to revere old books by Eugene Schwartz and Vic Schwab. But what about old ads? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. If you’ve been a copywriter for more than a few weeks, you’ve probably heard other more experienced copywriters mention books like Breakthrough Advertising by Eugene Schwartz, How to Write an Advertisement by Victor Schwab or Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples. They make up a large part of the official cannon of copywriting. In fact, David Ogilvy once said no one should be allowed to write a single word of copy until they had finished reading Caple’s book seven times. Of course there are new books that ought to be added… books by Joe Sugarman, Ann Handley and Matthew Dix. In addition to books, there are a lot of copywriters who like to study old sales pages. They create swipe files full of them. I do this. My swipe file has more than 1,000 differnent sales pages I’ve collected over the last decade. Some copywriters even suggest you hand write sales pages as part of your learning. I don’t go that far, but I think you can learn a lot by studying the persuasion techniques that copywriters have used in their work. But what about ads? One page with an image, headline, and a few lines of copy? Are they worth studying? And what can we learn from them? My guest on this episode is Lewis Folkard. Lewis has made a bit of a name for himself by picking old print ads from advertising award books, analyzing them, and writing about why they are effective or not. Lewis’ breakdowns are more than interesting reading, they’re mini-lessons on copywriting, attention-getting and persuasion. He told me why he does it and how it’s impacted his business in this interview. Stick around to hear what he had to say. As you might expect, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. I’ve mentioned that I’ve been rebuilding the content vault and adding a ton of additional workshops to it. Workshops taught be expert copywriters like Parris Lampropoulos, Joanna Weibe, Stefan Georgi, Jack Forde, Chanti Zak, Laura Belgray and dozens of others. And it’s not just copywriters, we’ve got marketing experts teaching how to build funnels, how to market using tools like Linkedin and Pinterest, how to put yourself in the right mindset to succeed and so much more. And that’s just the workshops. There are dozens of templates, a community of like-minded writers holding each other accountable, and monthly coaching with me. It’s time you joined us inside. Learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu And now, my interview with Lewis Folkard… Lewis, welcome to the podcast. I would love to hear your story and how you became a copywriter. Lewis Folkard: Okay, well, I mean, I guess a lot of copywriters say very similar things in the sense that I feel like I’ve always had an interest in people and communications. I mean, some of the earlier nonfiction books that I read were kind of about human psychology and communications. I think there was a How to Win Friends and Influence People and another one by Brian Tracy, I believe. But I was young and just always enjoyed learning about how the human mind works and how we can kind of translate that or how not to say how we can, but how that translates into behavior. But yeah, a career into marketing to copywriting and marketing started. Uh, I guess alongside uni, uh, I graduated with a degree in materials engineering and had every intention of following that path. Um, and. I don’t know, really, I don’t know how or what the, the kind of compelling idea was to, to leave and to start marketing, but it kind of happened. And of course, when it had a small business online selling vintage jewelry and yeah, I sort of helped him out as best I could. and end up discovering copywriting and haven’t really looked back since, to be fair. It’s sort of scratched itches that I didn’t realize I had. I’ve kind of always been more sort of mathsy, so to speak. Numbers, binary answers, right or wrong, you know, this either works or it doesn’t. And heading into copywriting in this kind of world was like, well, actually two opposing ideas c

Everyone starts from scratch. But what if you had to earn six figures a year from the very first day you were in business? That’s the challenge Jon Morrow had. He’s my guest for the 434th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. I asked him about how he did it. We also talked about how he is using A.I. in his business (his approach is pretty good, which is what you’d expect given he’s been using it for more than ten years). We also talked about what he would do if he had to start over… he suggested a strategy I’d never heard before. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: SmartBlogger The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Would you be willing to work for free—for two full years—in exchange for a simple favor? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. You already know this but succeeding as a content writer or a copywriter is not easy. And building a reputation when you’re just starting out is a huge challenge. But what if you knew that you needed to earn six figures a year, beginning on the day you launch your business. No time to ramp up. No time to figure out client acquisition. No time to create and test the products and services you offer. You have no choice but to succeed at a high-level from day one. What would you do? That’s the challenge Content Strategist and founder of SmartBlogger, Jon Morrow, faced. But he did it. He succeeded in creating a six-figure business from day one. Jon shares how he did it and why it was necessary in the first few minutes of our interview. And once you hear what he says, you may find yourself without an excuse for accomplishing big things in your business. Because if Jon can do it with the limitations he faced, you can almost certainly do it even if the world is conspiring against you. I didn’t expect this when we set up the interview, but what Jon shares about how he uses A.I. in his business, to write sales letters, create courses, and run his businesses will either frighten you or inspire you to step up your writing game. His approach is impressive. As you listen to this episode, ask yourself these questions: What are you willing to give up in order to get what you really want? How are you diversifying and changing your business in the face of A.I.? What can you do differently to make sure your approach to email actually makes money for your business or your clients? And what can you do to create more connection and community with the people you want to work with? But before we get to all that, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. we’ve been rebuilding our content vault and adding a ton of additional workshops to it. These new workshops are jammed full of practical ideas for building your writing business, creating new products like VIP days, lead magnets and more, getting attention and building your authority, showing up on social media with the right content to attract your ideal clients and lots more. The more templates and training we add to The Underground, the more I realize there is a crazy amount of valuable resources, in addition to monthly coaching and regular copy critiques ready for you to use. And you can get immediate access for less than you spend on a dinner out with your family. Learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Jon Morrow… Jon, welcome to the podcast. As I mentioned just before we started recording, you’ve been on my list for a long time to have as a guest. I think I’ve followed you or known of you for close to 15, maybe even more years than that. We’d like to start with your story. So I’m guessing that there might be one or two people in our audience who don’t know who you are. So tell us how you got to where you are. Jon Morrow: So yeah, my story has many chapters. So the thing about me that’s unusual is that I have muscular dystrophy and I can’t really move any part of my body except my face. I use Dragon, naturally speaking to type. I have people that take care of me around the clock. Despite that, I mean, I’ve built several successful businesses. I’ve written tons and tons of copies. And it hasn’t really held me back at all. So that’s the first piece that if you’re listening to the audio, you wouldn’t be able to hear me being nervous probably, except for my voice is a little scratchy. That’s one of the symptoms. But yeah, that’s a big part of my life. And then my career really got started when I went to work with a blog called CopyBlogger. That used to be huge. When I left Copyblogger, it was 35 million pages a month. A lot of the best writers in the world worked there. And I started out as a writer, eventually worked as an editor. and then started also learning and mastering copy while I was there. My first mentor was Brian Clark. My mentor after that was Neil Patel for

One of the biggest challenges writers face today—and it’s a repeated theme on the podcast—is getting noticed by clients and prospects. In the 433rd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with Content Strategist Erica Schneider about how you can cut the fluff and get noticed by the people you want to work with. This is a good one, you won’t want to miss. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Erica’s Website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Transcript: Rob Marsh: What to get noticed? Want to stand out? Want clients to find you instead of the other way around? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. A lot of the conversations on this podcast focus on the problem of getting noticed… standing out from the crowd of a million other writers—many of whom are willing to work for a lot less than you, some of whom, though hopefully not many, are simply better writers than you. There are lots of ways to do it… posting content on social media platforms, showing up at events, creating podcasts and video channels on still more platforms, building an email list… the many ways of getting noticed goes on and on. And yet… many of us, maybe most of us, still struggle to break though. There’s some unfairness in the idea that the most successful copywriters aren’t necessarily the very best writers or persuaders… they’re often the best at getting and keeping the attention of the clients they want to work with. So how do you become the writer who gets the attention and the clients. Often it comes down to creating content that is positioned to attract your clients on the platforms where they spend their time. And to share the best ideas for creating that content, my guest on today’s episode is Erica Schneider. We talked about a lot of ideas and insights to try in your own business—everthing from the mindset shift you need to make related to your personal brand and how to think differently about content in the age of growing competition and A.I. to Erica’s favorite hook frameworks and how to use them and why you absolutely need an email list even if you don’t plan to ever send an email. This is all good stuff so I hope you’ll stick around to hear it… But before we get to all that, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. I’ve spent the few weeks rebuilding our content vault and adding a lot of additional training to it. New workshops include how to add a VIP day to your services, how to create a new offer, how to get more done, how to do research, how to develop your own frameworks, how to conduct discovery calls, how to get more referrals, how to build an email list, how to create a launch sequence and dozens more. The more we add the more I think we really need to raise the price because there is a crazy amount of helpful templates, workshops, and even monthly coaching in The Underground. But for now you can still get in for less than you spend on a dinner out with your family. Learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Erica Schneider… I’d love to get started just by hearing your story and how you got to where you are now as a coach, content maestro in some ways. You are an authority builder for so many people. You’re doing a lot of things. So how did you get here? Erica Schneider: I am doing a lot of things. So I was the head of content at a B2B marketing agency. for four and a half years. I started there as a contract editor, then managing editor, then head of content. And I have loved writing my entire life, but I never knew how to make money from it until 2018, which is when I kind of stumbled into the content marketing world. And so I am a self-taught marketer. never went to school for marketing, never studied like copywriting, content writing, any of that stuff. I learned everything on the job. Um, but I also sort of always wanted to be a teacher. So growing up, I wanted to either teach or write or one of those two things, but I just didn’t know how to do it. Um, and so while I was head of content, which I was loving, uh, I realized as, uh, through the effort of building a personal brand that I was sort of teaching at scale. just by sharing content every day. And my audience was asking me, hey, you know, could you help me with this thing or that thing? Got my wheels turning, like maybe there’s a way that I could actually go out and teach people and make money for it and write and teach other people how to write. And so that was a couple of years ago that I had that aha moment. The creator economy luckily is booming and I hopped on board. So that’s sort of the short version of it. Rob Marsh: Before we jump into all the things that you’re doing now, there are a lot of people who would love that career track, you know, getting into content to head of content. And I think it’s not as easy today as perhaps it was, say, 10 years a

Do you write webinars? Sell with webinars? Work for clients who use webinars? If so, this interview is for you. Jason Fladlien is the copywriter behind the highest selling webinars in history. I asked him about whether webinars are still working today and the answer is part of this 432nd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. We also talked about how to be a better copywriter, how to create information products and a lot more. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Jason’s Info Product Webinar One to Many (Jason’s book) Jason’s website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: A few years ago I attended several mastermind events hosted by one of my mentors, Brian Kurtz. The were fantastic events. Each of these events featured several speakers sharing the strategies they use to succeed in whatever they were doing. One guest might share direct mail packages they used to sellout their services while another speaker might share copywriting techniques and yet another would walk through how to set up a research survey then share how they determine which answers are worth paying attention to and which answers could be ignored. I always walked away from these events buzzing with ideas to try. At one of these events, Brian invited Jason Fladlien to speak. Jason is pretty well known in the online world as the expert who created the highest-ever selling webinar… he sold something like 60 million dollars worth of services on a single webinar. He has personally written hundreds of webinars that have sold millions of dollars in courses, services, products and more. I used what Jason taught at that event to write our best-ever selling webinar. So it makes sense that Jason has been on my list of future potential guests for a long time. And we were finally able to get an interview with Jason. We definitely talked about webinars and what it takes to make them work—especially today when we’re hearing that webinars don’t work as well as they used to. Jason does a pretty good job of busting that myth. But that’s not all. Jason shares how he created his very first information product. It’s not as easy to do today as it was when Jason first started, but if you want to sell courses and other products, what Jason shares in this episode will definitely help you get started. I don’t think its an exageration to call this episode a masterclass in creating and selling your own products. There are a lot of copywriting insights here as well. But before we get to all that, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. I’ve spent the last week rebuilding our content vault and adding a lot of additional training to it. New workshops include how to add a VIP day to your services, how to create a new offer, how to get more done, how to do research, how to develop your own frameworks, how to conduct discovery calls, how to get more referrals, how to build an email list, how to create a launch sequence and dozens more. The more we add the more I think we really need to raise the price because there is a crazy amount of helpful templates, workshops, and even monthly coaching in The Underground. You can learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Jason Fladlien… Unfortunately, as we started recording this interview, we had some technical difficulties and we lost the first five, six minutes of the interview where Jason introduces himself and talks a little bit about how he got started as a copywriter and how he created an information product from scratch and started selling it for, I think, $7. He was originally creating content for just a couple of dollars per article when he started out and needed to learn copywriting in order to sell his services. So we’re going to join the interview as I ask Jason how he became a copywriter, how he got good at the process of writing and where that took his business. Jason Fladlien: Yeah, I mean, because back then all the copywriters that tell you how to write copy, they would give you this very long convoluted process that involved a tremendous amount of research, which I get. If you’re going to write for Agora back then when they were printing stuff and putting it in the mail, and there was lots of money on the line, you should do that. But we are at this cross section of the new internet where I found very quickly, and this is what changed my life, is I didn’t have to have to write world-class copy. I had to have an interesting offer that I could just write very quick, formulaic copy around, and that’s what I did. I create a lot of info products because that’s where I created that first one and it sold well, Rob. It was like, let me just repeat the process. Let me create these cheap little ebooks, $7, $17, $27, make them very simple, solve problems because I could publish them fast. All of them needed a sales lett

What does it mean to show up courageously in your life? Who exactly are you showing up for? Why is it important to keep showing up. In the 431st episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, Rob sat down with author and story teller, Jude Charles, to answer those questions and more. This episode is a bit different from the typical discussions we have on the podcast, but we think you’re going to like it. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Jude’s Book (audio) Get The Questions The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: A couple of months ago, I scheduled a catch-up call with my friend Jude Charles. Jude has been a guest on the podcast and a speaker at several of our TCCIRL live events. But we hadn’t talked in several months so we hopped on Zoom to catch up on what we were both doing. During our catch-up, our discussion got personal and a bit vulnerable and we shared some of the things we were working on and working through. And we both realized we probably should have been recording the call because there are probably a few people who could benefit from the insights we were sharing. Some of the questions that came up included… What lights you up in your day-to-day life? Or in your work? Who are you showing up for? Who are you making a difference for with your work? And what do you do each day that requires courage? It was too late to hit record on that discussion, but we scheduled a time to revisit some of these ideas and this time we did hit record. That’s what you’ll hear if you continue to listen in on this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. This discussion is a bit different from the typical interview we usually share, but I think you’re going to like the change in topic and tone—at least for this episode so keep listening. But first, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. You’ve heard me talk about the monthly trainings—the next one happens this week and is all about how to land a “real job” for a client where you are their PT or FT copywriter. That’s happening tomorrow on the day this episode goes live. And of course it will be recorded and shared in The Underground training vault along with dozens of other trainings on building your authority and audience, on launch strategy, on building an email list, on research, on creating new products and services and so much more. To get your hands on all that training for less than you’ll spend on a single night out with your spouse or partner, visit thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, let’s go to our discussion with Jude Charles. Welcome back to the podcast. You’ve been here before. You know the drill. You were on episode number 217, where you talked about the demonstration of proof. And then you came back for an ensemble episode, if I remember right, 279, where you were chatting a little bit about burnout with a couple of other people and just kind of talking about how copywriters can deal with that. You and I reconnected a couple of months ago and we were just chatting and I think it was, we were chatting. I can’t remember which one of us said this, but we were like, we should be recording this. Cause it was a really, really good discussion. And so I’m thrilled to have you back. So we normally start out with your story, but since we’ve done that before, just kind of catch us up. What’s been going on this last year or two? Jude Charles: Yeah. So I, Ironically, I think I’ve been going through a process of reinvention, maybe for the last, it feels like the last five years, it’s probably been less than that. It started at TCC IRL, where we’ve talked about it. I don’t know if we’ve ever talked about it online, but offline, we’ve talked about how you challenged me to get on stage and to share my expertise and what I had to offer. I was scared out of my mind the first time I did it. It was back in 2019. I remember I had been to TCC IRL the first year, which was only about 50 people. And then I came back the next year and it was much bigger than I was expecting. But yeah, I remember just almost like walking away from that and saying, you know what, I can’t do this. Because I went to tech check the rehearsal. And I remember looking at the room and I’m just like, I can’t speak in front of all these people. Like, this is crazy. But I pushed past my comfort zone and did it. And that’s what started this journey that’s what I feel like has been a process of reinvention for the last five years, where I have been on over 150 podcasts as a guest. speaking and sharing and sharing my purpose, which I believe is to lead and empower entrepreneurs to have relentless courage, but also sharing just my own journey vulnerably about my experiences going beyond business. And so in the last two years, I have been contemplating this transition that I

How do you stand out in a sea of copy and content sameness? A USP (unique selling proposition) isn’t enough. Neither is being different. My guest for the 230th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is marketing strategist Louis Grenier, author of the new book, Stand the F*** Out. We talked about what it takes to position your business, find your people, and build a durable brand. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Louis’ book and bonuses Louis’ book on Amazon The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: The biggest question facing most people who own their own businesses is how do I stand out? How do I position my busines in a way that makes it easy for customers to find me—and more importantly, to know they want to work with me? What can I do to make them care? Those important questions are answered in the new book, Stand the F*** Out by Louis Grenier. And Louis is my guest for today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. The topics we cover in our discussion are the kinds of things that help copywriters go from helping clients get the words right to helping clients sell more products, grow their businesses and as the title says: stand out of the crowd. This stuff isn’t easy. It can take years to learn. But if you stick around, the insights Louis shares will shortcut your learning curve Before we jump into this interview, I want to mention the guest trainings we have lined up in The Copywriter Underground this month one more time… the first one is focused on building connections with prospects and clients on social media without burning out. If you’re like me and struggle to show up on social media consistently, this one will change your approach entirely—and help you find a client. And by the way, a single new client could pay for your Underground membership, for the entire year, two or three times over. And the second workshop is all about landing a “real” in-house job—either part time or full time. A lot of copywriters want something a bit more stable than the string of clients they get as a freelancer. If that sounds like you, you need to hear the ideas this workshop will include. The presenter for this workshop was a talent placement expert for creatives. She’s helped hundreds of copywriters find so-called real jobs. What she’ll share is critical to know if you’re thinking about applying for these kinds of jobs and want to stand out from the crowd. Both of these workshops are exclusively available for members of The Copywriter Underground. If you want access to them plus more than 30 templates, 70+ other workshops and trainings, and monthly coaching and copy critiques from me… you can learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. If you’ve been thinking about trying out The Underground, now is the time to do it. The first workshop is tomorrow. Go to thecopywriterclub.com/tcu for more information. And now, let’s go to our interview with Louis Grenier. I like to start by hearing your story, how you got to where you are. You’re a marketing strategist, author of a fantastic book, Stand the F Out. I don’t usually use that word. I do. But it stands out for sure. So tell us how you got here. Louis Grenier: Bonjour, bonjour. Thank you for having me on. And it feels like I’m part of podcasting royalty. So it’s good to be invited on this podcast, listen to it a few times over the years. And it’s funny how the copywriting discipline is is still thriving despite the fact that they were supposed to be dead a couple of years ago. So it’s good to see that you’re still fighting the good fight. So yeah, to answer your question, it started from a trip in Paris when I was 17. So that was 18 years ago. to visit one of my older brothers. And I saw this book on his shelf that was basically the French version of Influence by Cialdini. But it wasn’t a translation of it. It was like a psychology slash marketing slash behavioral psychology book in French about key facts about human behavior. And I remember reading it. I was a lost mechanical engineering student at the time. And I just loved it so much. And things started to develop from there. I started to connect all the little puzzle pieces that I had misplaced, like the fact that I love being on the internet from a very young age and love hacking stuff on the computer. I loved all things psychology, understanding people. I felt I had the knack for it in some way. It came naturally to me. And all of that came together while I was doing mechanical engineering, realizing that that wasn’t my thing, that marketing, digital marketing at the time was the thing I wanted to do. So that was the start at least. Rob Marsh: Yeah. I think a lot of marketers have a transition where they want to do something else or maybe not want to, but they’ve been sort of programmed by school or whatever to do. I was ready t

What makes a good newsletter? How about “unfiltered stories and what we learn from them?” For this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I interviewed business strategist Kristin Kenzy, the writer and strategist behind the Drunk Business Advice newsletter. Kristin’s formula for figuring out what makes a good story for sharing in email or newsletters is gold. As is her “accordion pitch” process. Don’t miss this one. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Kristin’s Newsletter The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Okay before we get into our interview… long time listeners are probably wondering, what’s up with the new music? For the past five-ish years, we’ve been using a bit of music composed for us by Addison Rice. But after so many years, it just felt like it was time for a change. So the music is different for the new year and we’ll see if we can’t go another five years or so with this new mix. On top of that, you’ve probably noticed that I’ve been hosting the podcast for the past six months without my one-time co-host Kira Hug. Enough people have asked what’s up with that, that it’s probably time to let you all know what’s up. I mentioned this briefly on one of our throwback episodes, but to make sure you don’t miss it… I wish there was a juicy story here, or a controversy, a messy falling out worthy of the pages of People magazine, but there’s not. Last year Kira told me that after seven years working on The Copywriter Club, that this project just didn’t light her up like it used to, and she was ready for a different kind of challenge. So we worked to slowly move her out of her daily role at The Copywriter Club. Kira’s still officiallly—legally—a partner behind the scenes, but is no longer working on Copywriter Club projects. We’re still friends. There was no drama… just time for a change. At the time I considered ending the podcast, but whenever I mentioned ending the podcast to someone I trusted, they all said, “no, you can’t do that… this podcast is too important for writers who want a look into how other people are running their businesses.” And on top of that I really enjoy talking with copywriters and other marketing experts about this thing we all do. It’s still lighting me up and I’ve got some great guests coming in the next few weeks, so hopefully you’ll all stay tuned to see what’s coming next. I’m still committed to our original promise of sharing strategies and ideas you can steal and use in your own business. Speaking of great guests… my guest today is business strategist and story teller Kristin Kenzy. Kristin writes one of my favorite newsletters, Drunk Business Advice. In it, she combines interesting marketing take-aways with fantastic storytelling that makes me (and thousands of other readers) look forward to it each week. I wanted to talk with Kristin about her approach to finding and writing the stories she shares. The formula she uses to figure out if a story is worth telling is excellent and she walked me through during our interview. We also talked about why writers need to stop journaling and a better way to pitch prospects in person… something Kristin calls “accordian pitching”. It’s good stuff, so stay tuned to hear what she had to share. Before we jump into this interview, we’ve got some really great guest trainings lined up in The Copywriter Underground this month… one on building connections with prospects and clients without burning out on social media. If you’re like me and struggle to show up on social media consistently, this one will change your approach entirely. And a second training on landing a “real” in-house job—either part time or full time—if you are looking for something a little more stable than freelancing is. Ironicallly, copywriters are bad at telling our own career stories and this workshop will show you what to do if you want to land one of these so-called “real” jobs. Both of these workshops are exclusively available for members of The Copywriter Underground. If you want access to them plus more than 30 templates, 70 other workshops and trainings, and monthly coaching from me, you can learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. If you’ve been thinking about trying out The Underground, this month is the month to do it. Go to thecopywriterclub.com/tcu for more information. And now, let’s go to our interview with Kristin Kenzy. Rob Marsh: Welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. We always start with your story, but I’ve got to say, I’m hesitating to ask that because you’ve had so many experiences that I’ve read about in your newsletter. We could talk about your story for the entire podcast. So your version of how you got to where you are today, running your own newsletter and the businesses that you’ve been starting. Kristin Kenzy: Of course. Well, thank you, Rob, for having me. It’s r

In another throwback episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, we’re taking a deeper look at goal setting and a proven process to help you get more done in 2025. Dave Ruel, the author of Done by Noon, walks through his framework for setting goals (or intentions) and making sure they happen—before noon. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Done by Noon by Dave Ruel 4000 Weeks by Oliver Burkeman Get Dave’s workshop in The Copywriter Underground The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: If you’re listening to this episode as it goes live, today is the final day of 2024. Many of us are looking forward to the new year and new opportunities to grow and get things done. I’m not a big fan of resolutions. They tend to be good for a few weeks, but after 4 weeks are often forgotten. It’s even a cliche now to mention how full gyms are on February 1 compared to January 1st. The drop off shows how ineffective resolutions can be for most of us. So what does work? Well, the past year or two I’ve focused more on behaviors rather than goals or resolutions. That is, making time to exercise every morning without a goal to lose weight or compete in a marathon or bench press a certain weight. Making time to do something every day is something I can do. This applies to other goals as well, like time spent reading rather than having a goal to read 24 books a year. By scheduling time to read every day, I can reach the 24 books read without setting a goal. So that begs the question, how do you make sure you spend your time on the activities and behaviors that will get you closer to the person you want to be? A few years ago, we asked something similar of Dave Ruel, the author of Done by Noon. That book is one of my favorites when it comes to getting stuff done. My other favorite takes an almost completely opposite view of time management and getting stuff done and that’s Oliver Burkeman’s 4000 Weeks. I’ll link to both in the shownotes in case you want to check them out. For today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I went back into the archives to resurrect this mostly forgotten interview with Dave Ruel. And while he does talk about goals, he shares a framework for making sure your schedule includes plenty of time for the behaviors you want to implement into your life. If you’re looking to get more done in 2025, some of his ideas will help. Before I share what Dave told us, after this interview we realized that we wanted to go deeper with Dave and his system. So we recorded a workshop where he walks through everything what he shares during this interview… at an even deeper level. That workshop is one of the dozens of business focused trainings available right now in The Copywriter Underground. Coming up in January of 2025, we’ll be adding several more, including a workshop for copywriters who want to work either part time or full time with a client. My friend Jessica, who spent 2 decades as a recruiter for a creative talent agency will share why copywriters are so bad at resumes and cover letters and what they need to do differently if they want to land a so-called “real” job. And Esai Arasi will be sharing how to build relationships with prospects at scale, without burning out on social media. Both of these workshops are happening in January and are completely free for Copywriter Underground members. If you want them… along with the time management workshop from Dave Ruel, go to thecopywriterlcub.com/tcu now to join. And like last week, you’ll hear Kira Hug asking questions on this episode as it is a throwback to 2020 when she and I were co-hosting this podcast. Okay, with that let’s jump in with Dave Ruel as he tells us how he became an entrepreneur focused on sharing better time management strategies… ———— Dave Ruel: I’m going to go back to my days as a fitness athlete. This is pretty much when it all started. So, in the early 2000s, I was an amateur competitive bodybuilder. So, I was very obsessed with everything fitness, bodybuilding, muscle building, you name it. In 2007, I met a guy named Lee Hayward. We were fellow competitors on the regional circuit. So, we’ve known of each other within the local circuit, but I’ve never met Lee in person. I was traveling to his hometown to compete that weekend. So, Lee actually offered me to stay at his house that weekend. We only knew each other little bit, but I never knew what he was doing for a living. The first morning, he was having coffee. He’s like, “Well, I’m going to do some work. I’m going to answer a couple emails and then I should be done by noon. And then we can go work out.” I was like, “Yeah, it’s nice to be on vacation and have that schedule.” He’s like, “Well, it’s pretty much like the way we operate here.” I was like, “Really? What is it that you do?” He’s like, “Well, I have a bodybuilding website. I make a full living out of it and making six figures a year

Becoming a great copywriter is not easy. But there are things you can do that 99% of other writers will not invest the time to accomplish. In the 427th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, we talked with copywriter Jason Rutkowski about the process of mastering copy, how to find a mentor, and all the effort that goes into the process of becoming great. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Parris’ Book List The Single Best Way to Get Clients On Writing Well by William Zinsser The Brilliance Breakthrough by Eugene Schwartz The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: It’s the holidays and if this year is like most of our past years, that means fewer of our regular listeners are tuning in for the next week or two. So instead of bringing on a new guest you won’t have the opportunity to listen to and learn from, I’ve gone into the archive to uncover an excellent old episode that you probably missed. And if you did hear it back when it aired a few years ago, you might have forgotten it. But honestly, this is one of our best interviews about mastery and the process of becoming an in-demand copywriter. The guest for this episode is Jason Rutkowski. At the time we interviewed him, Jason was writing for some of the top financial and health clients. So he’s got a lot of great, timeless advice. You’ll also hear Kira in this episode. Long time listeners will know Kira is a co-founder of The Copywriter Club and until the middle of this year, my co-host for The Copywriter Club Podcast. Some of you have been asking, where she went? Earlier this year, Kira shared that after seven years of building The Copywriter Club, she was interested in pursuing some other challenges. So while she’s still offically a partner behind the scenes, she hasn’t been actively involved in the podcast and our programs for the past six months. Everything’s fine. There was no messy break-up… and who knows, if the right opportunity presents itself, we may work on something together again. We’ll see. So, while you’ll hear Kira’s voice, she is still working on other stuff for now. One more thing before we get to the interview, you’ve heard me talking about The Copywriter Accelerator Fast Track and that in the coming weeks it will be retired forever. This is the proven business building program used by hundreds of copywriters to start and grow their businesses. Many used it to create six figure businesses. A few have earned seven figures since completing the program. And I know it will work for you too. But time is running out to get the strategies, insights and ideas we share in this business-building program. So go to thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack now to learn more—and if its a fit for you, join so you can build a successful copywriting business for yourself. And now, enjoy this throwback interview with Jason Rutkowski. Hey Jason. Kira Hug: Welcome Jason. Jason Rutkowski: Hey Kira, hey Rob. Kira Hug: How’s it going? Glad you’re here. Jason Rutkowski: Oh no, I’m excited. I haven’t done one of these in a while, so I was excited to do it with you. Rob Marsh: Definitely took a little time to get our schedules aligned. We’ve been trying to make this happen for a little while, because we know a little bit about you and where you write and we think it’ll be a great conversation, so we’re glad to have you here. Jason Rutkowski: Yeah, definitely. Kira Hug: All right, so let’s kick this off. Jason, how did you end up as a copywriter? Jason Rutkowski: Okay, I’ll give you the quick story about this. I was 19. I just finished my freshman year of college. I got an internship at a normal 9-to-5 job. And I realized I hated it. I was like, oh man. I saw all these people who worked in an office, you know, 30, 40 years; I’m like, is this really going to be my life? And also at the same exact time, I was on the internet one day and I found an internet marketing forum. And I was like, what’s an internet marketing forum? I don’t know. So I go on it and I see all these guys, like ‘Yeah I just made 200 grand this year, 500 grand this year. I work from home; I’m sitting at my desk all day.’ I’m like what? How is that even possible? So I started getting really into it. And then I learned about traffic drivers and marketing and product creation and all these things. And I was really confused. And I was like 19, 20 years old. So I heard about copywriting, but I didn’t decide to be a freelance copywriter right away. I was like, you know what I’m going to do, I’m going to create my own products; I’m going to do Google Adwords; and I’m going to drive traffic. I’m going to do the whole thing, like from start to finish. And I horribly failed. You know, I was going to school full-time, and then I was doing this part-time, and I was just failing and failing. And then after a couple of years of that, I decided, okay this isn’t working. I’m just going to do copywriting because I thi

The world is drowning in content—most of it bad. So when a creator is doing something different, something that really stands out and challenges the rest of us to up our game, we pay attention. That’s why Content Strategist Heather Parady is our guest for the 426th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. Heather shared her unique approach to content creation and lays out a roadmap for anyone else who wants to up their content game. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff we mentioned to check out: The Copywriter Accelerator Fast Track Save the Cat by Blake Snyder Heather’s Website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Content is everywhere. Almost every business knows that content is one avenue that helps prospects discover and connect with them. I’m not telling you anything new here, most copywriters work with clients who need this kind of content whether it’s on social media, regular emails, videos, workshop and webinar content. We even use it ourselves. So when I discover someone who is making cotent that stands out or is even a little bit different, I pay attention. And today’s guest on The Copywriter Club Podcast fits that description. Hi I’m Rob Marsh and today I’m speaking with Content Strategist, Heather Parady. I’ve been watching Heather’s content for a while now and I am impressed. She connects ideas from interviews and books and all kinds of other sources to create short video content that grabs attention and teaches with a story, almost always gives me something to think about. This is one of my favorite interviews this year and I think you’re not only going to enjoy it, but you’ll have a bunch of takeaways to apply to your own business and content creation. Before we jump in, as we wrap up the year I need to let you know that The Copywriter Accelerator as it is today is going away forever. This is the proven business building program used by hundreds of copywriters to start and grow their businesses. And I guarantee it will work for you too. But to get the eight modules, eight blueprints, the bonuses and the coaching calls that go along with it… you need to opt in now. And if you decide to join the Accelerator now, you’ll get absolutely free, the program I am working on behind the scenes that will replace it. I don’t even have a name for the new thing, just know that it will be worth it. And if you don’t agree, you’ll get your money back. Go to thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack for details now. And with that, let’s go to our interview with Heather Parady. Heather, welcome to the podcast. I, I’m thrilled to be here. You know, as we were just talking before we started recording, I’m a big fan of yours. I would love to start with your story and how you got to where you are building this list, this following that you have, you know, video producer, all of the things. Yeah. How did you get there? Heather Parady: Well, first of all, thanks for having me on. I was listening to your show and I’m just really impressed with the quality of guests and the topics and how thorough you guys are and professional. It’s just really, really valuable, valuable show that I look forward to continually listening to now. I was a therapist, you know, I went to school to sit in rooms with people and hear their problems and sort it out. psychology of trying to figure out why we are the way that we are. And I’ve always been kind of like a helper. You know, I think through and through, that’s really who I am. So it’s funny because a lot of people are kind of coming to me for like the media side of stuff. They’re like, video editing and all this stuff. And I’m like, that’s something that I’m learning how to do. It’s not something that I’ve been doing all along. What I’ve been doing all along is sitting with people and reading books on Adler and Carl Jung and stuff like that. So I’m Kind of a mental health therapist turned media person. Short story is, at some point, I really just fell into the world of personal development and the online space. Probably about 10 years ago, and I was just really drawn to this idea that you could create something from nothing and reinvent your life and all the possibilities there. And I really loved the freedom, the idea, which is funny because I work now so hard and so long, so I’m laughing at the whole freedom thing. This idea that you can make your own path especially i was pregnant at the time of my first daughter and really torn with going into the workforce and wanting to be with her and so forth so i’m very reluctantly very reluctantly i. Turn down a whole bunch of therapy jobs and we moved perfect jobs. and cried and talked to hours and hours to my husband, bless his heart, and said, I think I want to build something online and figure out my voice here. It has been so messy, Rob. I st

Wondering how copywriters could be using Facebook and Instagram ads to grow their business? Our guest for the 425th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast is Kwadwo Sampany-Kessie. Kwadwo had to reinvent his business during the pandemic. And today he helps businesses grow with ads on Meta. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: The Accelerator FastTrack The Art of Online Business Podcast The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Facebook ads. Copywriters write them. Some copywriters run them. All of us see and click on them. And yet, most of us don’t have a deep understanding of how to use them for our clients or our own businesses. It’s not a skill you can easily pick up by listening to a podcast, but we can get a deeper understanding of them with the help of an expert. Hi I’m Rob Marsh and on today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, my guest is Facebook Ads Manager Kwadwo Sampany-Kessie. Kwadwo’s business collapsed during the pandemic and he had to create an entirely new means for supporting his family. So he began a business helping others use Facebook to promote their products. That’s not all we talked about. Kwadwo talked about the value of learning a new language and how that can change your perspective on the world. And the challenges of starting over. I think you’re going to like this episode. Before we get to that… I’ve been telling you about The Copywriter Accelerator FastTrack— that’s our business foundations program used by more than 350 copywriters to start, build and scale their own writing business. Graduates include six-figure writers like Justin Blackman, Kirsty Fanton, Michal Eisik, Dani Paige, Krystal Church and hundreds of others. The only way to get the business changing strategies and proven ideas we share in The Accelerator is with the Fast Track edition. And it will be going away sometime in the new year. So if you’ve been thinking of joining the accelerator, this is just about your last chance to get that game-changing program. I’m working on a new program that will replace it… something that will be more concise and immediately applicable. It’s too soon to reveal the details but if you join The Accelerator FastTrack before we launch this new program, you’ll get The Accelerator and free access to the new program when it launches. That includes all of the content, the 8 modules and blueprints and several bonuses that will help you find and land the high-paying clients you want. If you get started with the FastTrack now, when the new year is here you’ll be ready with a steady flow of clients and a signature service you’re proud to offer them. Visit thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack to learn more today. And now, let’s go to our interview with Kwadwo… Kwadwo welcome to the podcast. I’m excited. First of all, as I said, as we were starting to chat just to meet you, but also to have you on to tell us your story, how you became a Facebook ads manager, a strategy partner, host of a very popular podcast. How did you get here? Kwadwo: Let’s go back to when I was sitting in Beijing, China, the capital of China, with my wife at a Mediterranean restaurant. And we were enjoying our hummus and naan and we’re sitting and we’re overlooking like a popular shopping strip. And so we’re chatting and just relating about China life because I’ve lived there for 12 years. And the next thing that happened was It’s very typical for me, but my wife had never experienced before. And so a couple of tables down, there’s two Russian girls. They had spotted me, and they had started giggling like they saw somebody famous. And the thing is, I was famous, and I’ll go into that in a moment. they made their way over to the table and, you know, say, excuse me, introduce themselves and wanted to take a selfie with me. So I introduced them to my wife and then did the selfie thing and they went away. And my wife was like, wow, you weren’t joking. Like this happens. People recognize you as the elementary Chinese guy. And elementary Chinese was my prior business that got decimated by the pandemic where I taught Mandarin Chinese. I’m going to go into the story a little bit, but I taught Mandarin Chinese to expats, expatriates, people who are not Chinese, but living and working professionally in China. And that was going quite well. I have this desire now as a Facebook ad manager, and I’m skipping forward, but we’ll get back to that previous business and what happened and why I’m not doing that anymore. But I have the desire to help people run their ads profitably and not make the mistakes that I made back then that got me famous for that previous business, but did not fill up my courses with a bunch of students who were the right fit for me to serve. And so here’s what happened. I was basically on the Hollywood B-lister

A lot of copywriters need a way to attract prospects… but more than that, they need to do it in a way that immediately communicates that they’re the expert—an advisor clients can trust. In the 424th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I spoke with copywriter Meg Kendall about creating an industry report that does this perfectly. If you want to stand out from all the other copywriters who depend on lead magnets and social posts to get clients, you need to listen to this episode. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Meg’s Website The Copywriter Accelerator Fast Track The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: One of the biggest challenges copywriters face… actually it’s not just copywriters, it’s freelancers of every kind… one of the big challenges we all face is getting noticed. But more than that, getting noticed in a way that builds trust with the clients you want to work with. Just about everyone has a lead magnet… or an email list… or content on social media… all with the intent of making a connection to prospects and potential clients. If you don’t have those you should. They’re table stakes for creating a successful business. But because everyone has them, you have to do more than these to stand out. One way to stand out is to write an eye-opening industry report that immediately sets you up as the expert in the field. It’s more than a download, it’s a shortcut to interviewing potential clients, establishing relationships with them, and demonstrating your ability. Hi I’m Rob Marsh and on today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, my guest is copywriter Meg Kendall. Meg followed this exact path to connect with several potential clients in her niche. She’ll be sharing exactly how she did it in this interview. Before we get to that… you’ve heard of The Copywriter Accelerator program. That’s our business foundations program used by more than 350 copywriters to start, build and scale their own writing business. Graduates include six-figure writers like Justin Blackman, Kirsty Fanton, Michal Eisik, Dani Paige, Krystal Church, and today’s podcast guest, Meg Kendall. We no longer run that program live… the only way to get the business changing strategies and proven ideas we share in The Accelerator is with the Fast Track edition. And as I mentioned on this show last week, even that will be going away sometime in the new year. So if you’ve been thinking of joining the accelerator, time is running out. What will replace it? It’s too soon to reveal the details but if you join the accelerator fast track before we launch this new program, you’ll get early access to both the accelerator and the new program. Until then, you get all of the content, the 8 modules and blueprints and several bonuses that are included in The Accelerator Fast Track. And when we launch the new program sometime next year, you’ll get that updated program too. Don’t wait to work on your business so when the new year is here you have a steady flow of clients and a signature service you’re proud to offer them. Visit thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack to learn more today. And now, let’s go to our interview with Meg Kendall. Hey Meg, welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. Let’s start with your story. I’ve been watching you build your business now for a couple of years. I think it’s a good one. Meg Kendall: All right. Yeah. I feel like my story is kind of similar to a lot of other copywriters and that it’s very winding and maybe a lot of the backstory is fairly irrelevant to what I do now. So I had a fairly long career in hospitality. I worked as a server and a bartender for about 10 years, and it was pretty hard to leave. At some points, I wasn’t sure I would ever leave. And then I finally broke out, and that was via going back to school for the millionth time, it feels like. Really, it was the fourth time that I finally got my undergraduate degree, and that was in botany. And I lean on that a lot today because most of my clients are… So I work in climate tech, so they’re all very focused on the science behind climate change. just like very technical topics, et cetera, stuff like that. So they love that I have a botany degree. From there, I moved to New York city for a job, completely irrelevant to botany. I moved there as the technical term is an orientation and mobility specialist, but nobody knows what that is. So I’ll tell you, I was a travel instructor for visually impaired students in the Bronx and New York city. So that was a really interesting time period of my life. And I’m only telling it because it’s relevant to switching my way to copywriting. Yeah, so I was in New York City. So many big changes in such a short amount of time. I moved to New York City with my husband, left that 10-year-long hospitality career, became pregnant with my now two-and-a-half-yea

For the 423rd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, we’re checking in on the progress A.I. has made over the past year with Jon Gillham, founder of Originality.AI. We talked about how originality helps protect writers from false accusations of plagiarism and checks facts (unlike ChatGPT and Gemini), plus some of the risks that A.I. poses to the world of content creation. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: Get the AI Bullet Writing Prompt Originality.AI The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Almost two years ago, we realized that A.I. was not just a new idea that copywriters and content writers needed to pay attention to, rather it was a game-changing technology that would impact almost everything writers do. The number of new tools and features that include use A.I. to deliver their benefits is in the thousands. That’s a big part of why we launched the A.I. for Creative Entrepreneurs Podcast last year. You can find more than 20 conversations about A.I. on that podcast. But as A.I. has become almost commonplace, we stepped away from doing so many interviews about artificial intelligence and just how it is changing our industry. But I’m thinking it’s about time we checked in on how the tech has changed over the past few months and what copywriters should be using it for… if they aren’t already doing it. Hi I’m Rob Marsh and on today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, my guest is Jon Gillham, the founder of Originality.AI. This tool is the most accurate A.I. detector available today. What’s more in addition to checking for content created by A.I., it’s a fact checker—something tools like Gemini and ChatGPT have struggled with, it checks for plagiarism, and will help protect you against clients and others who might claim your writing isn’t original. We talked about how they do it and the risks A.I. continues to pose for writers on this episode, so stay tuned. Before we get to that… last summer we ran the last ever live cohort of The Copywriter Accelerator program. Since then, the only way to get the business building insights and strategies that we shared with more than 350 copywriters over the past seven years was to join the Fast Track version of the accelerator at thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack. But I’ve been working on an updated version of that program and it too will go away soon. So if you’ve been thinking of joining the accelerator, time is running out. What’s coming next? It’s too soon to reveal what I’ve been working on, but if you join the accelerator fast track before we launch it, you’ll get early access to the new program, absolutely free. Until then, you get all of the content, the 8 modules and blueprints and several bonuses that are included in The Accelerator Fast Track. And when we launch the new program sometime next year, you’ll get that updated program too. Don’t wait to work on your business so when the new year is here you have a steady flow of clients and a signature service you’re proud to offer them. Visit thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack to learn more today. And now, let’s go to our interview with Jon Gillham. Hey, John, welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. We’d like to start with your story. So how did you become the founder of Originality AI, and I guess also the co-founder of AdBank and Motion Invest and Content Refined? You’ve done a lot of this company starting thing. Jon Gillham: Yeah, it’s been a journey. Yeah, so my background was as a mechanical engineer, did that in school, and then I always knew that I wanted to get back to my hometown and started some sort of online projects. A lot of those projects all had sort of a central theme around creating content that would rank in Google, get traffic, and monetize that, whether that was an e-commerce site, a software business. And then at one point, we built up some extra capacity within the team that I had of writers that we were working with, and then started selling at extra capacity. So built up a content marketing agency, sold it, and then had seen the wave of generative AI coming. look to build a solution to try and help provide transparency between writers and agencies and, and clients. And that’s where originality came from. Rob Marsh: So as far as most people’s experience with AI, it really started about two years ago when, you know, ChatGPT went live and suddenly everybody was like, oh my gosh, this is not what we were expecting, or it’s come along a lot faster. But you’ve been doing this a lot longer than that. Tell us, you know, basically, how did you get interested in AI and get started with creating these kinds of tools? Jon Gillham: Yeah, so I totally agree. I think a lot of people sort of assume everything on the internet that predated Chat GPT was human generated. But the reality is that there was other tools that predated Chat GPT. Specifically,

Starting and growing a copywriting business isn’t easy. So when we find a writer who seems to have figured it out, it’s worth taking a closer look to see what’s going on. So for the 422nd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I asked Megan Smyth to share more about her business and podcast and how she’s gotten so many things right as she’s grown. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: The Copywriter Accelerator Fast Track Megan’s website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: One of the things I love most about what I do at The Copywriter Club is the opportunity I have to see copywriters grow in so many different ways. They get better at writing. They build and develop amazing businesses that support the lifestyle they want—sometimes that’s something as dramatic as a full-time, six-figure business and other times it’s a part-time gig that helps pay some of the bills. And for copywriters who already have a business, it’s fun to watch them change and update the way they market themselves, create products, and find their ideal clients. Honestly, it’s a big part of why I do what I do. Hi I’m Rob Marsh and on today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I talked with copywriter and launch consultant, Megan Smyth. As you’ll hear during this interview, Megan is one of those copywriters who has made big changes to her business over the past couple of years. Megan’s a pre-med student turned copywriter and the business she’s created will inspire anyone who is just starting out or is ready to make a change—heck, I’m inspired by the progress she’s made. So stick around and listen to what Megan has to share about how she did it. Just a quick note… on this episode, we’ll mention The Copywriter Accelerator program that helped jump start Megan’s business and brand creation. That program is no longer available—at least in the format that Megan participated. However, we’ve taken all of the content, the 8 modules and blueprints and several bonuses and repurposed them into what we’ve called The Accelerator Fast Track. This version is designed to help you get results even faster. If, as you listen to us discuss that program, you are interested in how it might help you and your business, simply visit thecopywriterclub.com/fasttrack to learn more. And now, let’s go to our interview with Megan Smyth. Megan, welcome to the podcast. Tell us how you got started. How’d you become a copywriter, a course creator, now doing some coaching as well? You’ve come a long way. Megan Smyth: Yeah, doing all the things. Well, first of all, thank you for having me. I’m very excited to be here. It’s an honor to be on this show. It’s one of the very first podcasts I started listening to on this journey. So, you know, if we’re talking about how I got started, very first copywriting and business podcast I ever listened to was yours. And I’ve learned so much from you and Kira. But yeah, so to kick it back, I did not grow up dreaming of being a copywriter. I’ve yet to meet anyone that even knows what that was at a young age. My plan was to be a doctor. So I studied pre-med in university, and I realized about halfway through that something was just not right. I was enjoying it, but not as much as my friends around me in the program. And I was sort of on this fast track to success. It seemed like I had it all figured out. I was in this great program. I was applying for early admission to med school and all these things. And there was just this voice in the back of my head that was like, this is not it. Something’s not right. And so when all of my friends in the program were writing the MCAT over the summer, I took the summer off and I booked a one-way ticket to Thailand. And that was sort of my escape plan. Rather than tell everyone that I was having these doubts, I just left the country for three months. Just ran away from my problems, which is what you do at 19 years old. And I was just not sure what I wanted to do. I thought med school might not be it, but I wasn’t sure what the other options were. And so I thought I would use this time to do some soul searching. I went to Bali. I did the whole thing. And I realized on that trip, what I really wanted to do was travel. That was a big motivator for me. I wanted the freedom to be able to work wherever I wanted to see the world and meet new people and have new experiences. And so I started looking for a career that would allow me to do that and stumbled into copywriting because I’ve always loved writing. And I just really fell in love with it from the beginning. I loved the sales aspect of it and the psychology aspect of understanding how people think and why they make decisions. And I started copywriting while I was still in university. And then I, you know, had a couple of clients on the s

What does it take to create a course that delivers on its promise and ensures that students get through all of the material? On the 421st episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, copywriter and course corrector, Maya Stojkovich, shares her COURSE framework for creating and fixing the programs experts sell in order to get results. There’s a ton of crossover with copywriting sales messages, so grab your headphones and let’s get to it. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: The Course Corrector The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob Marsh: Why are so many course creators failing when it comes to selling their courses? Or worse, they do sell their courses or memberships or workshops, but the people who buy them don’t finish them. I’ve certainly bought my share of courses with the full intention that I was going to complete the training and the assignments, and they’re still waiting there months… sometimes years later. What’s up with that? Hi I’m Rob Marsh and on today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I talked with copywriter and course corrector, Maya Stojkovich. Maya is one half of the partership behind the Course Corrector—a program designed to help course creators fix the things that keep course buyers from finishing the work and getting the result they want. The other half of this partnership is Linda Perry who has been on the podcast several times before. On this episode, Maya shared the formula for making sure a course will deliver the promised result and keep students engaged. And smart copywriters will notice some big similarities between what she shared and what we often put into a winning sales message. So stay tuned. Just a quick plug… this episode is sponsored by The Copywriter Underground… the only membership for copywriters focused on helping you build your business skills—the skills that help you attract clients, create services they want to buy, price them effectively, and run a business that’s fully booked and profitable. Does it reallly make a difference? Yes it does. Members tell us its the best investment they’ve ever made in themselves. The training resources, templates, critiques and community are game changers. And you can find out more… even try it risk free for thirty days at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu And now, let’s go to our interview with Maya Stojkovich. Hey, Maya, welcome to The Copywriter Club Podcast. Let’s start with how you got to where you are. How did you become a copywriter, a teacher, and now a course corrector? Maya Stojkovich: Yeah, absolutely. And thank you so much for having me on. I’m so excited. That is a wonderful question. How I got here, I’d say, is a pretty non-traditional route. Everything about it seemed traditional at first. I went to college. I got an English degree. I actually started off working in politics and that’s what I really thought I wanted to do. And then I ultimately recognized that it wasn’t the life for me. And so I actually ended up coming home and I was trying to reassess and, you know, I got the chance to actually join the Accelerator, and that was the first course I ever took. And I sat there and was like, this is really something. But there was a piece that was missing. I wasn’t fully engaged, but I also like to blame that on being 20 and 21 and not really knowing who I am at that age. And I continued to learn. I took so many courses. That full year, I was just taking course after course. I actually ended up becoming a certified mindset coach. And that really helped shape the rest of my career path. I actually settled down into marketing for a while, and then I up and moved, and I ended up being a paralegal, a teacher, an education programs coordinator. And it seems all over the place, but now sitting where I am as one half of the course corrector, I recognized that my entire path was just setting me up to become this course strategist, to actually dive into the courses that I had taken prior and say, you know, what can I take from this and actually apply it to courses everywhere? Rob Marsh: Yeah, I love that. And obviously, all of the things that you’ve done have, you know, created, gotten you where you are. That’s the way paths work, right? Maya Stojkovich: Right. Rob Marsh: All of us. But of all of those positions, did you have a favorite and some big takeaways from being a teacher, mindset coach, paralegal? I don’t know. Maya Stojkovich: Yeah, I know, right? So many. I would say that the most impactful was actually the education programs coordinator. I got to learn what it took to craft this beautiful narrative. I taught environmental sciences to third and fifth graders. So it’s a tough audience, but I got to craft this beautiful narrative with these programs about salt marshes, about like forests, about, you know, fiddler crabs. And I had to make it excit

Marketing consultant, Leticia Collins is our guest for the 420th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. She’s an expert in community-based email list growth, so it’s no wonder she added 4300 people to her list in less than a week. Want to know how she did it? Then this episode is for you. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   Stuff to check out: Leticia’s website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: The money is in the list, or that’s what we’re told. And before you can work on getting some of that money out of the list and into your business, you need a list. If your list is small, you need a bigger list. If your list is full of the wrong people, you need to find the right people. As a business owner, one of your big challenges is your list. And knowing that, would you like to hear how you can add hundreds, maybe even thousands of qualified names to your email list in as little as a week? Hi I’m Rob Marsh and on today’s episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, I talked with marketing strategist Leticia Collins. Tish is a successful marketer who has worked hard to grow her list. And in this interview, she shared how she added 4,300 subscribers to her email list in one week. And triped her revenue in the process. If you want to grow an email list full of potential clients for your business, this episode is for you. Before we get to that though… you hear me tell you about several resources that we’ve put together to help you build and grow a writing business. I’m going to quickly list a few of them here so you can get the help you need… we have a free facebook group called The Copywriter Club. You can find us on Facebook and request that we add you to the group where you’ll find seven years of threads about all kinds of copywriting and business questions. Obviously you know about this podcast. You’re listening to it right now and there are more than 400 interviews with successful copywriters and other experts in our backlist. Once you’ve listened to this episode, scroll through to find interviews with people like Seth Godin, Jay Abraham, Jereshia Hawk, Joanna Wiebe, Todd Brown, Kennedy and so many others. Honestly, it’s the best free library of copy, content and business ideas that you’ll find anywhere. And it’s at your fingertips. Take a minute now to subscribe on your favorite podcast player so you don’t miss another episode. And right now you can get our free, 36 page mini-book called How to Find Clients when you go to thecopywriterclub.com/findaclient . I guarantee you’ll find at least one and probably 5-10 ideas you can use to find a client for your business. We’re here to help you build a business, so be sure to take advantage of all the free resources we’ve provided for you. And now, let’s go to our interview with Tish Collins. Welcome to the podcast, Tish. I want to start with the question we always start with, which is how did you become a content creator, a digital marketing strategist, business mentor, all of the things? Leticia Collins: Hi, well firstly thank you so much for having me on, it’s so lovely to be here. And I got started in business, I started my business back in 2019 and I never really saw myself becoming a business owner at all, I kind of fell into it. It started when I went to university, I studied journalism and creative writing and one of our assignments, one of the very first assignments was for us to start a blog. I had always wanted to do that. So I was really excited about it. I started my blog and it was going to be like a portfolio for when I became a journalist. Obviously that didn’t happen. Um, but what did happen is I began to grow my blog. I grew my Instagram. I started working with brands and I kind of started my first business that way. And then after a few years I began to get some questions about how I was getting paid to work with brands and growing my Instagram so fast. And so I thought, you know what, there is a bit of a market here. There’s people who want to learn how to do this kind of thing. So I started my first proper business as an influencer coach. And I did that for a little while. And then I kind of started to realize that actually working with brands is great, but it’s not a sustainable form of income. And so I started teaching these people how to actually create their own products and services and how to monetize that way. And it just kind of snowballed into what I am now, which is a marketing strategist for online business owners. Rob Marsh: I love that. I want to know a little bit more about the whole influencer coach thing, because obviously there are a lot of people out there who would like to be influencers. There are a lot of copywriters, marketers, freelancers who maybe they don’t want to be influencers, but they want to be able to do the things that a lot of influencers do, that is grow their audience and share their exp