by Dina Giolitto

Suppose you paid thousands to have a professionally branded website designed from scratch. What’s the one element that can make or break your sales? The words! Yes, you’ve heard it before - your message to the customer means everything.

Oh, you already know that? Well, that’s terrific. And now let me tell you something you probably didn’t know. Remember the part where your designer asked you if you wanted “search engine optimization” - and you said no thanks, because your bank account had just been drained?

THAT is where you went astray, and lost out on myriad opportunities to get your brand and message in front of all those clamoring, salivating prospects. And that’s what’s REALLY keeping you and the people who want to buy your stuff from ever crossing paths.

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Popularity: 33% [?]

If you’re making the transition from corporate to freelance, how comfortable are you in the new role?

Is it like a new pair of shoes; you’ve stepped in with both feet, but they’re giving you blisters — and you really just want to go back to those old, broken-in, full-time loafers?

I was interviewing a client the other day, for a new business website I’m helping her launch. She was telling me about the vast and varied experiences that led her to desire this new incarnation of her professional self.

She kept saying things like, “So then I had to change jobs again. We relocated to Missouri and I had to start teaching, because we had a family to support!”

My client sounded almost apologetic. Every time she mentioned a new skill that she had acquired along the way, she had to justify the experience as though it was a “bad thing.” Like she shouldn’t have changed jobs, or she shouldn’t have bothered to learn new things.

After hearing her repeatedly downplay her credentials and experience, it occurred to me why this client needed my copywriting support and marketing direction.

It was because *she still didn’t think of herself as a consultant!*

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Popularity: 54% [?]

Facebook, Ryze, LinkedIn, Myspace… what’s the point?

Can social networking REALLY work to get you clients? Or is this just a way for wily webmasters to bring hits and attention to THEIR websites, so they can pull in more ad and membership revenues?

Last week, a fairly new copywriting client asked me the above question. Then he said to me, “I emailed you to work on my project because I remembered you from Ryze.”

I was active on Ryze… oh, three years ago? And yet this person remembered me after three years, sought me out, and here we are doing a website project together.

This is not the first time I’ve gained a new client due to having “put in my time” on the social networks.

In my humble opinion and experience, I would say that the more of a standout social networking experience you create, and the more you put into making your profiles professional… the more thought you give to creating posts that add value and meaning to others’ professional lives… the more you’ll get out of social networking.

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Popularity: 84% [?]

If you’re a user of Google AdWords then pay close attention. Google has announced that they will now begin adding landing page load time to your AdWord rank score.

According to Google, people who have web sites with slow-loading pages will be charged more for their Google AdWords advertisements.

There are several ways to reduce the loading times of your pages.

• Cut down the graphics. Graphic files take up a lot of bandwidth even with today’s high-speed connections. If your site depends on graphic intensity, then make sure you optimize your images to minimize load times.
• Take a written approach. While graphics slow down load times, text seems to have little effect, so making pages that are heavy on the copy are to your advantage. They load fast and, if properly optimized, will help your page ranking.
• Avoid Flash animations. Flash animations are definitely cool, but also eat up bandwidth faster than Iron Man eats up WD-40.
• Avoid embedded objects. YouTube videos, photo slide shows and other items that you embed into your pages increase the amount of information that has to be sent, which causes your pages to load more slowly.

Studies show that if a page doesn’t load within 8 seconds, people go somewhere else. So optimizing your web pages for better load times will not only help your Google AdWord bottom line, but will provide a better experience for your readers.

Read the full story here.

Michael Sieber is professional web content writer. Visit his site at prowebwriting.com.

Popularity: 24% [?]

Dogs and bees, and freelancers, can smell fear. As someone who writes copy and produces marketing materials on a freelance basis, I can tell within five minutes of talking to a potential customer whether their fear of being overcharged will set the tone for our work together. I can also assure you that there are ways to retain quality and get good turnaround time on projects without being run through the wringer.

Some facts and suggestions on how to get the most bang for your outsourced buck:

Know that the freelancer is just as interested in being quick and efficient as you are.

People who are new to outsourcing might view me (the copywriting consultant) as someone who would try to milk them out of their last dime while dragging the project on forever. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Established freelancers typically juggle multiple projects at once. It makes much better business sense for us to complete two projects for two happy clients in two days, then deliver one project for one client in two days and have that client feel uneasy about the amount of time we spent on their work.

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Popularity: 88% [?]

I’m currently in the middle of trying to figure out why my client’s email newsletter looks strange when viewed in some versions of Outlook and in Gmail. So I Googled “sending html emails in gmail” (but I didn’t put it in quotes).

Up came this phenomenal article from MailChimp.com with information so specific they should be charging money to let people read it.

I’m going to paste the beginning here and then let you click to read the rest.

(By the way, their use of “How” and “How to” in the title and subtitle is enough to send this copywriter into convulsive fits… but I’ll let it pass because the rest of the information is just so superb.)

How To Code And Send HTML Email Campaigns and Newsletters
How HTML email works, basic concepts, best practices, tips and tricks

Want to learn how to code your own HTML email campaigns? You’ve probably Googled all kinds of web pages that give you countless “what works, what doesn’t” charts. They tell you which CSS definitions break, how Lotus Notes never renders HTML properly, and how Outlook can’t send email campaigns right.

But instead of focusing on specific tactics, let’s go over some fundamental principles…
Prerequisites

One thing I have to stress is that in order to code your own HTML email, you really, really, really need to know how to code HTML. You should be able to code web pages “from scratch” without the help of any WYSIWYGs (like Front Page, or even DreamWeaver). If you’re that good, then you really don’t need to worry about a million little rules (like what CSS definitions work in this email program, but not in that email program). Just being able to understand “the fundamentals” will save you a lot of time and frustration.

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This tip courtesy of Dina at Wordfeeder.com Copywriting and Marketing

Popularity: 22% [?]

A good copywriter should be well practiced in the art of perspective jumping - not just in your marketing communication, but with your client relationships as well. While I was always pretty good at hopping into the minds of my own clients… I was never so tuned in to them as when I began outsourcing aspects of my own marketing.

Here is my take on what small business clients not only want, but desperately need from the people who we outsource our jobs to.

“The Small Business Client Wishlist” from Dina at Wordfeeder.com.

Small business clients wish that service providers would take the initiative.

I know that many freelance professionals wait there passively, thinking “Well, if my clients needed my services, they’d call or send an email.” The truth is that sometimes business owners can’t catch their breath long enough to say what it is that they want, let alone map it out in steps.

I guarantee that the next freelancer of mine who appears in my email inbox and asks for work WILL get it, even though right now I have no idea of what that assignment will be. Believe it; small business owners are THAT busy. If you’re looking for work, just say so. Clients do not spend time wondering how much work you do for other clients. We just like to know that you’re available for US.

Small business clients wish for marketing without ego.

Being on the flip side has allowed me to experience the unspoken friction that happens when clients make copy changes that copywriters don’t appreciate or agree with. There are two occasions where the copywriter has the right of way in this situation. One, is if the copy changes that the client implements might affect sales. (Let’s say the client deletes the call to action or deletes their own URL - yes it happens.) And two, if the client accidentally says something in the copy that blatantly makes them look unintelligent.

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Popularity: 40% [?]