Freelance Copywriters On The Internet: How
To Tell The Difference Between Heaven-Sent And Hack
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.
Author-Bio: Adam Barone is
a freelance copywriter from the Boston area, who writes results-generating
copy for such clients as The Timberland Company, Bank One, TJ Maxx, and
other clients and ad agencies. Visit him at http://www.adambarone.com.
Subscribe his e-newsletter, CopyTHINK at http://adambarone.com/mailinglist/?p=subscribe.
©Adam Barone 2005
Freelance Copywriters Resources:
Freelance
copywriter direct and web marketing, and consulting services.
www.writedirection.com
Bethanny Davis,
freelance copywriter. Ad copy, press releases, newsletters and more.
writergirl.stormloader.com
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