Transcript
Welcome to the Bloggy Friends show!
What's up Bloggy Friends? Famous Ashley Grant here and I'm so excited to bring you
Lauren and she and I, we have battle scars together girl
and I'm so excited to talk about the big thing
that no one talks about but they should be and that's boundaries in ghostblogging.
So Lauren tell me a little bit about what you do and how your business works.
Well I've been doing writing professionally for other people for 12 years
and we met... I didn't know it was that long. Yes, it's that long.
And we met very early in that time span when I was just sort of figuring out
that I needed boundaries actually.
Yeah I started out in travel journalism and that was when everything, the economy tanked
and there were no jobs and journalism was going under and you couldn't get any gigs at newspapers
or magazines, nobody was hiring. So that turned a lot of writers to marketing
and then I sort of fell into ghostblogging. That is exactly what that is.
It is ghostwriting for people's blogs, pretending you were them, writing their blog posts for them
so they don't have to because they're busy entrepreneurs.
And that's where I got my start and then that slid into software as a service, ghostblogging.
Thought leadership, that's a good little catchphrase.
Thought leadership articles on customer success and I did that for a long time
and then I got really, really done, really done with software as a service
and switched my entire business to just doing copywriting, which is different,
that is very different from blogging. Blogging is content,
copywriting is the words that make people buy stuff now.
So that's what I do and I do it for coaches so I'm completely out of the tech sphere.
I work with the woo woo folks who have crystals and essential oils and all that good stuff
and they heal and they read tarot cards. They're super fun folks.
And I'm loving life right now but yeah, back in the day, my bread and butter, ghostblogging.
I can definitely relate to that because in 2007, that's when I began my journey into writing.
And 2009, that's when I started blogging.
2011, that's when I went pro so to speak.
And then about 2013 is when I don't know what happened but everything dried up.
That's when all of the gigs that I was doing under my own name, they disappeared.
And January 2014, when I say to you that ghostblogging literally dropped in my lap,
that's not an exaggeration. I had never heard of ghostblogging.
I never knew that was even a thing. And lo and behold, the woman that we shall not mention...
She who shall not be named.
Exactly. She who shall not be named.
She called me and she had my business card from a Channel 10 event that I had done for Metro Mix.
Channel 10 was a... It was in Tampa and Metro Mix was, I guess you'd call it an affiliate of Channel 10.
Gannett was the owner, like the big company that owned everything and Metro Mix was like this big new hip thing they were trying to create.
And so I was covering a lot of events under that umbrella.
And I was giving out my card everywhere I went. I was like, you know, if you ever need anything, call me, blah, blah, blah.
And as things started to widen down in 2013, lo and behold, 2014 starts and this particular person calls me and they're like,
hey, I need a blog writer because I want to promote my business and I literally do not have time to do it.
And I was like, oh, yes. And I was like, well, you know, work is drying up.
I've never done anything as a ghost, but, you know, hey, if the bills are being paid, I'm in.
And that never bothered me. Like not taking the credit just never, ever bothered me at all.
I kind of loved using other people's experiences, using their stories, using their knowledge and just making that into beautiful words on their website.
No problem.
Real talk. I can't say that at all.
I used to joke that I didn't get the credit, but I'll take their cash.
Yes. Yeah. So I'm the girl that was dubbed famous Ashley Grant, quote unquote, whenever I was working for Channel 10.
And so the idea of not being able to tell anyone what I was writing hurt me in my soul.
But at the same time, it was like, I'm able to get these people's voices out there.
I'm able to help them promote their message. And so that's what drove me.
That's what encouraged me to keep going.
So, but but one particular person that you and I both know with.
She started both of our careers, really. She really did.
And yes. And that's actually how if I'm not mistaken, that's how we met, isn't it?
Yes. Yes.
And for anybody who's listening to this, I know we're being a little bit vague, but it's because we will not name names.
We're we're trying to protect the guilty.
But the reality is the person that we're both referring to, she she was very much a.
I will say this. She's brilliant at marketing.
I've never met anyone in my life who's more confident than this person.
She self promotes. Oh, my God.
Her ability to tell people you need to buy from me.
She was the queen of marketing.
However, her. For lack of a better phrase, her demeanor was a frightening at best.
Yeah, she did have a bit of a scary side for sure.
Gosh, when I think of how much anxiety I would have every time she would call, it was just through the roof.
Yes. And one particular one particular moment that told me I needed to stop working for this person.
I don't remember exactly what day it was, but I ended up in the E.R.
I don't know if you know this story. No, I had what can what doctors called was an anxiety attack.
But at the time, I literally believed I was having a heart attack in that moment.
I knew I could not keep working for this person.
However, I was so.
Hurting for cash, I kept powering forward.
Until my anniversary of that year, on my wedding anniversary of that year,
I found out that this particular person was selling my work.
At four times the cost to other people.
She demanded that I write these posts for much less than I wanted.
At a ridiculous discount because she was going to save my career.
Yes, yes. Positioning herself as as the savior of yes.
That is very scary on brand. Yes.
And so that day, I wrote every single post I owed her.
I had a whole bunch of posts in my queue and I wrote every single one of them.
And the next week, I sent her a message that said I had taken a job full time.
And I couldn't write for her anymore. Yes.
Yeah, that sounds very familiar.
So so we're I love that we're coming together now after all this time and sharing how to because
the golden thing that I got from working with her and I had similar experiences is
it taught me how to spot red flags a mile away.
I have superpowers now for avoiding that kind of client.
Well, speaking of that, tell me, what are your red flags when you're talking to a client?
Oh, gosh. OK, so the first.
Red flag for me is if I get the sense they are coming to me for my price points,
if they are what what we call a price conscious consumer,
and they are coming because they see that I am less expensive than the other copywriters out there.
I mean, copywriting now, but it was content
that immediately signaled that they were making this decision based on money,
not based on whether we were a good fit.
And what correlates with that.
So this is how you spot red flags.
There's a little there's a little trigger of, oh,
this behavior tends to correlate with these other behaviors.
And the price conscious person correlates with being a cash square.
Yes. Giant pain in the ass, because it's not enough for them to get a deal.
They want to torture you also.
And this it's always, always like this.
People who ask for discounts, same, it's the same mentality.
They'll ask for a discount for some reason.
And because you're a nice, sweet person and probably a newer writer, you're like,
oh, sure, I can give you a discount because I need money right now.
Really, really bad. Right.
And then they torture you. Yes.
So anything around questioning the price point, asking for a discount, saying,
oh, I saw that you are less expensive than this other option.
Run for the hills.
Do not need their money.
They will make you pay for it 10 times over.
Absolutely. And the other thing I'll add to that is if they come at you
and they're like, I can make your career.
Oh, my gosh. Yes.
I can bring you more work than you can handle.
Or if they ever say to you, you will not make it without me. Run.
Oh, yeah. I mean, this is this is classic narcissistic relationship behavior.
And it also applies to professional relationships.
Absolutely. And law and order criminal intent.
I love it. Yes.
They referred to it as malignant narcissism. Yes.
Yeah. And and and that's honestly what it felt like when when we were working
for this individual, it was it was like a cancer.
But yet at the same time, we were scared to get chemo because
we really believed as we were working for this person, we were helping her
and we were building our careers. Right.
Well, and she would she would do this this thing where she would recommend me
to her friends, but she would share the very low rate she had asked for.
So, again, that that correlation.
And she was like, hey, this writer is amazing.
I was so young. This writer is amazing.
And she'll work for this tiny amount of money.
You should totally hire her.
So she was helping build my client base,
but she was helping build the client base with other cheapskates.
So I was never making any money.
Yes. And and the worst part for me is she didn't tell them what my rate was.
She told them, contact this person for their rate.
And then she would send me an email that said, please tell them,
this is your rate and I expect a 20 percent commission.
That is the that is what she tried to pull with me.
And that was I gave her a super hard no.
And she did not like, oh, my gosh, you can not tell some people, no.
But unfortunately, I was the dumbass that gave her the 20 percent.
I was the dumbass that or I like to call it the dumbass because Ashley. Hello.
I was the dumbass who gave her the 20 percent.
So every bill that I submitted to her had a 20 percent discount based on the people
that she brought me, who, as it turns out, I found out later she was charging
an obscene amount of money to promote them, quote unquote.
And the reality was these are people who were working full time jobs
and hoping to make their businesses realities, making hoping to make their
their businesses their full time gigs, but they're paying her all this coaching money.
And how can you ever.
Turn your dreams into realities whenever you have
what can only be described as a snake oil salesman telling you that you can make it.
Yeah, yeah, I wonder. I wonder about that.
Yeah, yeah. So let's see more more red flags.
That's that's probably my biggest.
Oh, another one that this comes up in copy more than it did in content.
But maybe there's a content corollary.
But somebody who comes in and says, I know this copywriting framework.
I get a lot of the hero's journey, folks. OK.
And I want this, you know, this basically I want you to do
the thing this other copywriter is doing over here.
And that tells me that they do not want they're not interested in my style,
my philosophy, my differentiators, like basically the special sauce that makes
my copywriting my kind of magic.
They want somebody else's kind of magic.
So that's another one where it's just, you know, now I have the wisdom to just say no.
And that's my specialty.
I think you would be a better fit with somebody else.
Yes. And for anyone listening to this, I have to tell you, Lauren knows her shit.
She is, I mean, I'm not I'm not exaggerating when I say she is by far one of the best
copywriters I've ever met in my life.
She will take your voice and turn it into the message your ideal client needs to hear.
So if you're listening to this and you're looking for a copywriter
and you don't have all the red flags we're talking about, right.
Please message her because she's amazing.
And I, you know, I know that your listeners are probably a lot of writers as well.
If you're curious about getting into copy, shoot me an email, you know,
book a little tea date, comes in my craft and copy hour, we'll talk shop.
I love doing that. Like no charge.
Writers got to help other writers out.
Oh, girl, I will drop that in the show notes.
For anybody who's listening to this, I think we're going to have this as
well as your friends dot com backslash happy hour.
Yes, I haven't used that that
you are with anybody, but I think that's the most appropriate for this one,
because because as you're thinking about all the red flags you're going through,
because I know there are some some ghost bloggers and some real bloggers
who use their own names who are going to be listening to this going,
I need a shot of tequila.
You know, content is so yes, actually, that is my
it used to be. I haven't done it in a while, but that used to be my method
for getting through content revisions is I would have a shot of tequila.
And for every stupid revision request by somebody who's like English
isn't even their first language and they are correcting my grammar.
I have a little shot like I don't have the whole shot.
I sit down slowly, but still girl, I take the whole shot.
Oh, my gosh. I know. Is there a red flag?
Is there a warning for this situation that I found myself in so much,
especially in software as a service, because you're working for
should I should I pause this?
Oh, no, no, we got this. OK.
So software as a service or any company that has more than one cook in the kitchen.
So you're not working with one person who's judging your work.
You're working with a team.
And that means multiple people are finding really dumb reasons
not to like your coffee.
Some of them are good reasons.
I keep those clients.
If you have a client who's criticizing your work and they're actually helping
you make it better, keep them put up with it.
Don't drink too much. Keep them.
They'll make you better.
But there is this other kind that just comes up with the most bonkers
revision requests that make the copy that make the content worse.
And it is usually a function of too many cooks in the kitchen.
The old saying too many cooks in the kitchen spoil the sauce,
the broth, the soup, something like that, whatever you're cooking, they mess it up.
Yes. And and I actually had this happen, say it was.
I think it was twenty nineteen.
It was a woman that her company.
When I say she made multiple seven figures, that's not an exaggeration.
She made a ridiculous amount of money.
And so she believed that the words we said had to be a Stanford
or a Harvard education level. Oh, no.
Even though the people that were reading her website,
I mean, they probably only had a high school education.
If we're really being honest, if we're really looking at who was going to her website.
But she was so convinced that it had to be Stanford or Harvard level,
that some of the feedback that she would give would be horrible.
It would be like it would be like, OK, so I didn't realize that we were speaking
to freshman high schoolers.
So can you please just take this to the SAT level that I'm expecting?
Ouch. Yes. And it was like, as I'm reading her feedback,
all I could think was, do you not realize that your actual ideal customer
who's reading your website, they don't understand.
SAT level, they're asking for the layman's terms.
And she ended up firing our company that I was working for at the time,
because she was so pissed off that we couldn't give her what she wanted.
But it's because she wasn't thinking about who was reading what she wanted.
Yes. Yeah. And that's one of the things that breaks my heart,
because people that come to people like you and I,
people who come to ghostwriters, they don't have time to write their blogs.
And yet they come to us hoping that we have the golden ticket,
we have the lottery numbers that will give them all the business that they're
hoping for, but they quit thinking about their ideal customer.
And they. Yeah. That's actually a good.
A good sort of secondary way to start talking about boundaries,
because it's not just, you know, watch out for these people and avoid them.
It's OK. Now you've got this other person.
How do you set up boundaries that help them succeed and you succeed?
Yes, this is a really good one.
And it comes up so much where the business owner is making assumptions
about their clients without actually having done the work to verify their assumptions.
So that's when I like to. And this is a boundary.
This is a soft boundary.
I like to suggest, let's test this.
Let me interview two of your very favorite customers.
Oh, that's good. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm leaning in.
I'm leaning in. What you do, you make that suggestion and you sell it to them.
You know, this is going to make your content better.
This is going to make it more tailored.
It's going to bring in more of your ideal clients because we are focusing in on these two people
you already love working with and you get them to set up the interview.
And whatever your style, I type really fast.
So I take almost word for word notes and I can give that client language back to the client.
Like, look at this. This is exactly what your people said.
This is exactly how they said it.
This is the level of language we need to write towards.
And if you're not that fast with the keyboard, some people are faster, slower.
You can record it and you can show them that way.
And you can have a transcript made. It's relatively inexpensive.
You can find websites that do that and not drive yourself crazy over it.
Otter.ai. I'm just going to throw that out there.
Otter.ai.
So you show them proof that this is the language the clients are using to talk about their
problems, to talk about their hopes, to talk about their goals and what they enjoy about
working with the person.
You have your list of questions.
And when you have that wealth of customer data, you can turn that into amazing content.
You can turn that into amazing copy by literally copy and pasting those phrases.
Yeah, the business owner can't argue.
That's the years of customer success. Ghostblogging.
So that's the beautiful thing about ghostblogging is you actually learn so much doing it.
Yes. Yes.
And so it's like, what is your customer trying to do?
And the sad thing is so many people who want to do blogging, they have the wrong idea about
what it is their customer is trying to do.
They think, oh, well, they're just trying to pay me to do X, Y or Z.
And the reality is it may be one, two, three or ABC.
Let's do some Michael Jackson and Jackson Platt.
Yeah.
So, yeah, I really loved everything you just said.
I really like using that with all of my clients.
In fact, one of the things I have them do, and this is a copy thing, but I have them
take the draft and show it to their five favorite clients and just have the clients do a gut
check on it.
And a gut check is like, this resonates.
Oh, my gosh, where is the camera hiding in my house?
Clearly, you're watching me like you understand my problem so well.
So what resonates?
What leaves them completely cold?
Like no, that's not me at all.
I don't get it.
And what confuses them?
And again, it's that customer feedback just at that gut level of yes, no, confused.
And that can make a huge difference.
Absolutely.
Okay.
And the big thing is, you know, I'm sure you feel this too.
We want our clients to succeed.
Yes.
And it breaks our heart when we see them failing because the whole point of bringing someone
on board who can write the words that they want to say, but they can't quite articulate
is they need someone who can put their message out there.
And if they don't have that, it's like a, it's a dagger to the heart.
Yeah.
Well, and so often they're so good at what they do.
Like in business, if they weren't so good at what they do, if they weren't providing
so much value, and it's communicating that value that falls to us.
So, you know, no pressure.
We are kind of integral to their ability to succeed because you can't succeed without
words that convey the value you bring.
Yeah.
I like to say that we give the voice to the voiceless because they're so, they're so in
their business that they don't see how they can improve their business.
Before we started this, you were telling me about how you craft the perfect filter.
Tell me a little bit about that.
Yes.
So this, this is a copywriting technique, but if you are a ghost blogger, you have your
own website, you can do this on your own website.
And when I'm talking about crafting a perfect filter, it is attracting the clients that
you love and deeply want to work with and actively repelling the people you don't like.
So it's a two-parter.
And if you do it right, you get a wrong fit clients, maybe 10% of the time, 90% people
who are contacting you are amazing and you just have the best time together and it's
super great.
So the way you do this and it will work better the more experience you have, because you
have to really dial into your track record of success.
So make a list of all the clients that you've worked with that you've loved and start analyzing,
okay, what, what things did they have in common?
What did our interactions have in common?
And you start forming this picture of exactly who your ideal client actually is.
So you write exactly for that person.
And this is standard copy.
This is always what we want to do.
So the filtering part is actually happening with putting boundaries in your copy.
So that can be a process page where you say, this is how I work.
This is how much I charge.
And that alone will get rid of people who want to create special deals.
And you always have that to fall back on.
It's like, oh no, I'm sorry.
I don't offer a discount for this service.
This is the price.
It's on my website.
And that's all you have to say.
And then they go away.
And as you work with more clients, you gather more data, you gather more information about
who worked really well and why.
Then you gather data about who didn't work and why.
So one of the things that I recently instituted, I caught a client in my net who was a wrong
fit, but he didn't seem like it.
But what happened was he was, I'm sorry, we didn't have this conversation.
I am surmising what I suspect was the case, but I've seen it happen a lot.
You'll get a client who gives you endless revisions because they want to make it perfect
and there is no such thing.
And what's really happening there is the client is terrified to actually start their business.
So they prolong the copy parts for as long as seemingly possible.
They torture the copywriter.
They torture their website designer with endless revisions because they're afraid to actually
start.
So that's what was happening with this guy.
And it's one of those things where I was like, I quit copywriting.
I'm just going to be like a housewife, a milliner.
I'm going to start painting.
Like I've quit everything.
I hate this so much.
And what I did on my website is I put a revision limit on my sales page.
I'm like, this service comes with two revisions.
After that, you pay additional.
Period.
Period.
Yeah.
And I created, I formed that service that had this sort of like penalty possibility
for endless revisions.
And I just stopped that.
Like you get two, that's included.
And then you pay for the rest.
And my other services, because I really hate revisions so much, my other services don't
even come with revisions.
Revisions are extra and that curtail that tendency of that certain type of clients.
And they understand it going in because you're laying out the ground rules immediately.
So if they want endless revisions, they can go to Fiverr.
Yes.
Oh God.
I can totally, I can totally relate to that because I had a gal who, she was forever changing
her mind.
Like she would give you the assignment and then you would send her what she said she
wanted and she would literally send back, oh, that's not what I wanted at all.
And so I started recording her.
I started saying, okay, every single interview we have, every single conversation we have
must be on record because it got to a point where I was spending three, four, five hours
with this woman.
And I would submit her the article that she asked for blatantly, like verbatim, I would
say every word she wanted.
And when I sent it to her, she'd go, that's not at all what I asked for.
Oh no.
Yeah.
And so the beauty of saying, okay, every conversation we have will be recorded, I could say at timestamp
10 minutes and 52 seconds, you said, I want X.
I gave you X.
Why are you going to go and ask for Y?
Because-
So how about her?
Did that work?
She fired me.
That's a true story.
She fired me, but what's funny is I got a message from her that what I did for her because
she asked for X is she was not even, I'm not, I'm from Lyon, I'm dying.
She said, I am ranking number one on Google and I never would have done that before if
you hadn't done X.
Wow.
And yet she still wouldn't hire me back.
Yeah.
Some people do, well, I don't think anybody really wants to hear the truth.
That's true.
That is true.
But isn't it so funny how if we don't put up these boundaries, we will be taken advantage
of and then the funniest part is they get mad at us that they don't get what they said
they wanted, even though in first conversation it's what they wanted.
Yeah.
I love putting the ground rules on my website.
I reinforce the ground rules in my contracts.
You know, you send a contract and you can really, you don't have to stick to the straight
legalese of whatever template you're using.
You can put in your own stuff.
Yeah.
So, yeah, I put in, you know, this, I need revision requests back within one month.
You get two.
I have a clause that I've never enforced.
In fact, it's probably unenforceable, but it's there to show intent.
But it's, you know, if you don't pay me within two weeks of receiving the final draft, there's
going to be an extra fee added, you know, a late fee.
Unfortunately, I have had to start incurring that late fee because even though you say
there's going to be a late fee, people are like, oh, I got time.
She does this for fun.
Oh, my gosh.
That's, you know, that's some of the, some of the toughest boundaries I've had to put
in place is how to get money out of clients who are very, very late in paying.
And I've had suggestions from friends, like have a separate email account that's from
your accountant and have them bill.
Now I like to do this through PayPal, PayPal, you can set up automatic reminders, but that's
really just going to bug them.
And that's a hard thing to guard against too, because I never could figure out who was going
to actually pay and who was not.
So many shenanigans around payment, especially for content, especially at a certain price
point.
Now everything is automated in my site and they click a button and they prepay.
So you're prepaying everybody?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Except for the full service folks, but it's still a 50% deposit.
Now, see, that's smart.
That's really smart.
Yeah.
Well, that was that smartness that was earned through a lot of not getting paid.
I can relate.
Yeah.
I mean, I don't understand, like some people, oh, and my favorite was a person who told
me she couldn't afford me.
I gave her a blog post idea.
It was brilliant.
Like when I say it was brilliant, it was brilliant.
And so she's like, oh, well, I really can't afford your fees.
And then the went and wrote it and sent it to me.
And she's like, so could you please edit this and tell me what you think?
Oh my gosh.
Do you want to know what I sent back to her?
Yeah.
I sent back, well, yes, but it's that fee plus 10% because I charge extra for people
for editing.
And my husband was like, yeah, that's the asshole tax.
Pretty much.
Oh, I was so pissed.
Wow.
Where did these people like, maybe they're made in a factory and we just don't know it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, I think I mean, I've certainly gotten into a better class of clients going for conscious
entrepreneurs, heart centered entrepreneurs.
You find those qualifying statements of the kind of entrepreneur that you want to work
with people who have ethics and values, you know, in large fonts.
You do get a better class of people.
Okay, so I'm curious, what is it that you do in your writing practice that brings you
the kind of clientele that you're willing to work with?
So I changed my niche entirely three years ago because the software as a service folks,
they were just driving me batty with their jargon and their revisions and their teams
and their, you got to be on Slack all the freaking time.
No, gosh, no, that is not the creative process.
So they were driving me nuts and I wanted to find the clients that brought me the most
joy, the people that I really enjoyed working with.
Otherwise I was going to quit.
That's where I was like, things have got to change or I'm going to quit.
And so I did the thing where you make a list of your favorite clients, you figure out what
they have in common.
I figured out they were coaches, they were teachers, they were people helping other people
to live their best lives.
So that was the big shift.
But since then I've been dialing it in, gathering more information, figuring out exactly the
characteristics of the people that I love working with.
And they tend to be the heart centered, conscious entrepreneurs.
They hate bro marketing tactics.
So all of the marketing tactics that just strike us as used car salesman icky, they
hate that they're repelled by it.
And that is how I created my brand for the people who have been told this is how you
do marketing and they hate it because it feels icky, it feels false, it feels smarmy.
So my brand is the opposite of that.
So like, no, you can market yourself in ways that feel good to you, feel good to them.
You're not talking to anybody into things, you're not doing a hard sell, not even doing
a soft sell, but you're selling a lot more.
And you're attracting wonderful people who love that quality about you.
So it's, you know, what, what it's sort of like our common enemy is one of the qualities
that I'm looking for in my clients.
And that ensures a pretty good fit.
And I also do a values fit.
And you do a values fit just by stating your values on your website.
So if you go to my website, I have a, it's in the footer actually, and it says values
and it just says my three core values as a, as a person and as a business owner and just
having a value statements.
It sends a message to other people where if values are important to them, they'll want
to hire me because we have that in common.
You mean I don't have to take a neuro linguistic programming course to be able to get my ideal
client?
Oh, heavens no.
Although that would be fascinating.
I can't tell you how many people who have sent me inquiries who are like, Oh, I studied
NLP and so there are linguists in programming and they're like, Oh, I studied NLP and I
know how to find my ideal client.
Really?
Cause you think you think that scamming people or, or, or tricking them into paying you is
going to get you the results you want.
How about no.
And the thing you could actually write that you could write that as a blog post on your
website.
You could write that on your services page.
If that is a inquiry that you get a lot, if you're into LML, NLP, and you think that is
the answer to copywriting and attracting clients, we're not a good fit.
You can, you can, you could say that.
I love that.
So you're telling me that if I was a baby copywriter, I can say no.
Oh yes.
And you can say no upfront.
You can say no before they even ask you a question.
And that's what a check is.
But, but, but Lauren, I have to pay the bills.
Why, why can't I just take every job?
Oh my gosh.
I have never been so poor as when I took every job.
Say it a little louder for the people in the back.
I have never been so poor as when I took every job from every type of client, every business.
I mean, giant inflatable water slides.
What?
Right?
I have written for literally every kind of business, including a giant inflatable water
slide company who by the way did not pay.
Okay.
See, some things just require hazard pay.
And asshole tax.
And asshole tax.
Yes.
So, okay, so let's wrap this up with the big takeaways for the baby bloggers who are listening
to this who are like, okay, I need income, but I also need boundaries.
What would you say are the top boundaries a baby blogger copywriter needs?
Okay.
Top boundaries are you need to know who is a good fit for working with you, who you enjoy
working with.
You can actually put this on your website.
This is for you if and list all the good qualities.
This is not for you if and list all the qualities you hate.
And you can actually put that on your sales page, on your services page, on your homepage.
Like pick a page.
You can put it there.
Don't put it everywhere because that's crazy, but pick a page and just line it up for them.
And the people who share those good qualities will contact you.
And the people who see those other qualities and go, oh, that's me, they'll go away and
never darken your doorstep.
The second one is don't be afraid to turn away work because believe it or not, and this
is not woo woo stuff, this is proven through hard experience, the more you say no to wrong
fit, the more right fit will actually come to you.
Like the money will come and it'll come because you've made space by not driving yourself
crazy and filling up your schedule with clients who are terrible.
Your contracts are your friend.
Just outline what you want, what the parameters are, and for goodness sakes, put a limit on
how many revisions come with each service.
Two is a good number.
And try to do it in one.
And don't be afraid to make it a policy.
Your policies are also your friend.
Make it a policy to charge extra for additional revisions.
And that usually encourages your clients to get it done in less time.
I think those are my big ones.
One of the things I will drop in the show notes that everyone needs to read is Denise
Duffield Thomas.
If you don't know who she is, she is also known as Lucky Bitch.
She has the most amazing posts on boundaries.
And I'm obsessed with her.
I'm actually a member of her Lucky B's.
I am in her money boot camp and her sacred money archetypes.
So I will drop all that in the show notes.
Everything you were saying, just I was hearing Denise in my ears.
She's a big advocate for saying I serve, I deserve.
And that's one thing that all copywriters need to know is if you are serving your client,
you deserve to be paid.
You deserve to be treated like a person, not just a person who has to do a service.
You are more than just a service.
You are more than just a paycheck.
You are giving value.
You are giving a voice to the people that you are serving.
And I absolutely am so excited.
I'm so excited about everything that we talked about here today, because I mean, there are
so many people that I have talked to who have worked for the shitty clients.
They have worked for the assholes.
And you don't have to, I mean, you do not have to write for crappy fees and be treated
like you're worth nothing.
Because when we are giving people what they actually need, they recognize it.
They want it.
And there are some people that are out there that are jerks and they will not pay you what
you're worth.
They will not treat you like you need to be treated, like you deserve to be treated.
But you are still providing a service.
You still deserve to be paid a valuable wage.
And treated as a valuable member of their marketing team, because that is what you are.
Absolutely.
And so if you're listening to this and you were thinking, oh, well, the reason that they
don't want to pay me is because I'm a shit writer.
That might not be true.
Okay, let's be honest.
It could be true.
You could be a shit writer.
It could be true.
But don't get your validation from bullshit sources.
Think about what you're doing, what you're providing and go after the people who are
hearing your message, hearing what you're trying to deliver and work with those people.
Work with the people who are not jerks.
That is boundary number one.
Work with people who are not jerks.
Absolutely.
And the thing is, if you have been writing for five minutes, five months, five years,
odds are you know what you're doing.
And if you don't, there are resources out there that you can figure out what you're
doing.
And it doesn't mean that just because you are learning a skill, you have to work for
jerks.
Yeah.
If you take nothing else away from this episode, please understand.
You don't have to work for jerks.
Hashtag no jerks.
If that's the name of the episode.
So we'll call it episode Lauren with no jerks.
I like it.
I'm just kidding.
We won't call it that.
We'll call it something else.
But is there anything that I didn't ask you, Lauren, that you wish I had?
Oh, gosh.
Boundaries are the biggest struggle of my life.
I am a compulsive overgiver.
You know, I will basically throw myself under the bus for any and all of my clients.
So yeah, it's been a journey to realize that to do my best work, I can't afford to do that.
So they deserve my best work.
That means I've got to I've got to create the boundaries that protect my ability to
do that.
So yeah, I guess that's it.
Actually, I want to bring this back.
I want I want to I want to pull it back.
I have to ask you, what was it that gave you the confidence to have boundaries?
Who?
So I may have mentioned this, but I work with a lot of life coaches.
And when you work with a lot of life coaches, sometimes you do some trades and sometimes
you just learn what they've got to say because you have to write it in ways their clients
will understand.
I've learned a lot about doing the deep inner shadow work where you are dealing with your
inner child shit and you are figuring out why you do what you do and why you keep shooting
yourself in the foot and figure out tools to stop doing that.
So I have I have a business coach now.
I have an energy coach now.
People that I've written for and I've loved them so much.
I'm now paying them.
But yeah, then you to be an entrepreneur, you've got to do some inner work around money.
Mindset is a big one.
You know, do I deserve to be paid fairly?
Do I deserve to be paid at all?
And how do I deserve to be treated?
And fighting that terror of if I set a boundary, will they scream at me?
Will they abuse me?
Will they hate me forever?
Will I be cast out from the tribe?
Will I starve and die in a hole?
Like these are the sort of lizard brain fears that we're working with when we set a boundary.
OK, so one of them recommend, Lauren, that you think is just fantastic for boundaries.
Oh, gosh.
But yeah, I'm actually I'm working with a shaman right now.
Oh, yeah.
Oh, my gosh.
I was a bastard.
So cool.
It's actually really difficult to write about shamanism at the moment, because unless you
are an indigenous person, you're not allowed to use that term for what you do or you risk
blowback.
So it's complicated.
It's one of those words that's shifting right now.
It's interesting time, but she specializes in boundary work and creating energetic boundaries
specifically.
So not, you know, if somebody comes at you and they are just filled with hateful, negative,
sad, horrible energy, it doesn't have to affect you horribly.
Like you can just be OK in your center and not have that be an issue for you.
And that's very difficult for me.
I'm sort of a sponge for other people's energies.
So if they're coming at me and they've had a bad day and they're taking it out on me,
like I take it super personally.
I don't anymore, but I used to.
And yeah, her name is.
See.
So I should preface this by saying I work with a lot of coaches at one time.
Do you want to send me links with that baby's way to do this?
Yeah, I'll send you I'll send you a link.
OK, so Lauren is going to be sending me a bunch of links that I can share in the show
notes.
And I think that if you are listening to this and you are curious about how you can handle
writing for people with boundaries, you should totally check out our show notes for this.
Yeah, this is super fun.
I loved it.
I absolutely loved it.
Great podcast energy.
Because I get so excited to ask you is Lauren, will you be my bloggy friend?
Totally.
Absolutely.
BFF forever.
I love it.
I love it.
I love it so much.
I appreciate you taking the time to do this with me.