If you’re hunting for a good freelance copywriter and have never
done it before, or if you have but find yourself needing another
for the first time in a while, I don’t envy you. This “brave
new” e-world has turned your once straightforward search of a
neatly stacked file of brochures and introductory letters into a
bothersome wade through a mucky world of half-baked online
listings and search results which only seem to list those
freelance copywriters who are experts in SEO, or at least know
what the heck it means (search engine optimization).
You: “I just need a good freelance copywriter to write this
product launch brochure who’s not going leave me hanging or make
me ask for another round of financing.”
Google: “Results 1-10 of 44,700 for brochure copywriter (0.17
seconds).”
And that’s not even a very popular search term. Yet, with 44,700
doors (or thousands more depending on your search) to choose
from, what are the chances you’ll click the one that leads to:
•A freelance copywriter who plays nice with designers and
doesn’t charge a first-born child
•A freelance copywriter who knows when and where to offer their
expertise on how to communicate a message
•Creative, cliché-free, differentiating, success-enabling copy
that is turned in clean and on deadline
It’s probably better than a 1-in-44,700 chance, but you’re still
more likely to fall short than be wildly ecstatic about your
freelance copywriter decision unless you add a few points of
structure to guide you through the online chaos:
1.Look at freelance copywriters further down the list. Unless
you’re specifically looking for an SEO copywriter, how high a
freelance copywriter or a link to a freelance copywriter ranks
in search results is not indicative of how good that copywriter
may be. Search engines rank web sites according to formulas of
keyword saturation in site copy, meta tags, links and other
places. Not how well a freelance copywriter’s work achieved his
client’s objectives. Spend some time at this. There is more to
the marketing, branding and advertising worlds than the
Internet, and there are many worthy and successful freelance
copywriters who work in the offline world, but have only a token
presence on the Net. Go ahead and look at the top-ranked
freelance copywriters, but investigate the others as well. Look
at who their clients are, the work they do, the brands they’ve
worked on, what their site is like and testimonials from past
and current clients. That should give you a good gauge. Or if
you like the advertising a specific company do a search for
“CompanyX AND copywriter.”
2.If you want quality, steer clear of “bidding” sites. There’s
too many of them already, and more seem to be popping up all the
time. The online auction is a great concept for your old fishing
equipment or clunker on cinder blocks, but not for a good
freelance copywriter, designer, photographer or any other
“creative service” professional. Sites like Elance.com, Guru.com
and their many cousins allow service providers to whore
themselves out for projects in a reverse auction where the
lowest bid wins. Unfortunately, there really is no winner. The
freelance copywriter (or whoever) gets a fraction of the fair
market value for their work and the client, unless they’re
extremely lucky, will be stuck with a student, green amateur or
someone who might not even speak English well—to say nothing
about the copy they’ll write.
3.Seek out freelance copywriters with online portfolios. Find
freelance copywriters who have some kind of online portfolio. Go
through it in detail. Try to get an idea of the communications
problem the freelance copywriter had to solve and get a grasp on
the talent and thinking that went into creating the finished
copy. Then ask yourself, “If I was in the market for something
like this, would this make me more interested in learning about
this product or want to buy it?” The work of a good copywriter
will be obvious.
4.Judge by the work, not the product. You may have a great new
product that everyone’s going to want, or an old product that
everyone already has, but with a new feature or something. Now,
your first instinct in finding someone who’s going to write copy
to sell this product is to find someone who, if you’re selling
underwater titanium door hinges, has written copy for underwater
steel or plastic door hinges. Yes, too many marketers think if a
freelance copywriter has only written for X and not Y, that they
can’t write for Y. This kind of thinking is misguided. Again, go
back to No. 3 and look at the portfolio. Gauge the talent. If
they did a great job communicating something about X, you can
bet they’ll be able to do the same for Y. A freelance copywriter
isn’t defined by the product. He is defined by how he writes
about that product.
These guidelines, along with a little “buyer beware” mentality,
will help you wield the Internet as the powerful information
tool it’s purported to be. You will find a good freelance
copywriter.
|
