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• Jonathan Green : Bestselling Author, Tropical Island Entrepreneur, 7-Figure Blogger

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Jonathan Green: Power of copywriting with special guests Jennifer Westbrook. On today's episode of The Serve No Master Podcast. 

Today's episode is brought to you by Builder All. They are my favorite all in one solution for your online business. Everything you need to start your online business from landing pages to emails to selling your first products, all without breaking the bank. Find out how Builder all can help you grow your online business at ServeNoMaster.com/builderall.

Announcer: Are you tired of dealing with your boss? Do you feel underpaid and underappreciated? If you want to make it online, fire your boss and start living your retirement dreams now. Then you've come to the right place.

Welcome to Serve No Master Podcast, where you'll learn how to open new revenue streams and make money while you sleep. Presented live from a Tropical island in the South Pacific by best selling author Jonathan Green. Now, here's your host. 

Jonathan Green: Today we have a really exciting episode. We're gonna talk about transitioning from corporate life to learning the power of words and learning how we can actually get clients and freelance, or start launching our own projects, all using the written word, which gets me very excited as a writer myself. So I'm so excited. Thank you for being here today, Jennifer. I'd love to know a little bit about your journey, like the moment where you said, I wanna take control of my destiny and kind of start doing my own. 

JenniferWestbrook: Yeah. You know, I started out as an attorney. I practiced law for a little over 12 years, and I did antitrust and trade regulations, so totally different from what I do now.

And I just got to a point where I started to feel like I really wanted to do my own thing and I didn't know exactly what that would look like or what you know I wanted to do, but it just this burning desire inside me where it seemed like everywhere I looked, I just saw signs that I should start my own business.

And so I just decided, hey, when I get to a point where I feel like I have enough money saved up and I can finance the business and and just go out there on my own, I'm just gonna do it. And so that's what I decided to do. And you know, I had been doing writing work in the background for so many years, even before I was an attorney, but I just never really saw the value of it.

I didn't realize how I could turn that into a business. It just seemed like something that came naturally to me. And so it took me a while to realize that that was the thing that I was supposed to be doing to help other people grow their services.

So eventually I transitioned into full-time copywriting and web design, which I kind of stumbled into because I didn't even ever think I would be a web designer, but I decided, oh, hey, I'm gonna start my businesses. I'll just make my own website. And then people started asking me, well, who did your website ? And so then I realized, okay, well, I've got something here too. 

So now I just merge them together and I help people to not only write their copy, but also strategically design their website to optimize that copy.

Jonathan Green: Lawyers charge by blocks of time. I know some law firms it's fifteen minutes, some, it's three minutes. You have to write down what you're doing every three minutes, not including bathroom breaks. So it's all about billable hours. Now as you've transitioned into this type of work, did you start off wanting to bill by the hour or do you do by the project?

JenniferWestbrook: You know, I kind of did both in the beginning because I had to sort of feel my way through it while the billable hour was sometimes tedious. As an attorney, there is a lot of value in really documenting your time and seeing, well, how am I spending my time and you know, what am I getting for that time? So I've always documented my time, even to this day, I keep track of everything I do all day long, and it's not as, as, you know, regimented as when I was an attorney.

But it is very helpful to just monitor my own productivity and to help me with pricing. But, um, I started off, I did offer some services hourly. and, um, now I really don't, I, now everything is pretty much a package pricing except for I may have one or two legacy clients that I do certain very specific types of jobs for where I may charge them an hourly rate, but, um, but yeah, I, I don't really charge by the hour anymore except I do one day intensives, and you know, that's a big thing that a lot of people are doing now, but even that's really not an hourly model. 

You're paying still for a block of time, but some people kind of in their minds, they think it's hourly, but it really is still a package prize. 

Jonathan Green: I think you brought up two really important things here that get me excited.

The first is that it's much easier to charge by the projects, because when you're charged by the hour, you get punished for efficiency. If you do one hour instead of two hours for the same job, you have to either get another client or find more work. And um, there's this mindset that sometimes you have like, oh, I wanna pay for how long it took and it's like, I wanna pay for excellence and we wanna be in that mindset. It gets us the better type of client. 

And the second thing is the biggest, one of the biggest failure points for entrepreneurs. And when they have a full-time job, they leave that full-time job and they go from having two hours a day to eight hours a day to work and they don't track their time and there's massive inefficiency. 

This is a huge problem and it's always been a problem in my career, is when you have huge blocks of time, especially if you've hit a financial goal, you're like, oh, I've already made my money for the month, and you just slack off for the rest of the month. So it's very interesting coming from the world of lawyers that you're so strict with your time. Did you go through a period of time where you were, had some inefficiencies, or did that strictness keep you steady the whole time. 

JenniferWestbrook: You know, I would say that the strictness, it kept me very mindful of how I was spending my time, but I still did have inefficiencies because there was so much stuff that I was trying to figure out, and I would spend so much time, you know, in the, the research whole, you know, trying to learn all the things and take all the classes and do all the courses, and so I did have inefficiencies in the sense that I was looking to so many other people to give me the answers and not trusting myself because I just felt like, well, you know, as an, as a lawyer, you don't do anything before you do research. 

You know, you, you research, you find the answer, and then you go from there. And so I was, I was trying to apply that to my business and that's all fine to a certain degree, but at a certain point we have to say, okay, this is my vision for my business. This is what I wanna do. I'm gonna go forward and if I make a mistake, I'll course correct once I make the mistake. But I can't stay stuck in this research hole forever. So I did have those inefficiencies where I was spending so much time in that, you know, research and you know, let me go to this person, this expert in this course.

But once I realized, you know, that wasn't gonna get me where I wanted to go, then I was able to make that correction. 

Jonathan Green: How did you get your first client? 

JenniferWestbrook: Wow. So my first client, really, I had my first clients before I even had a business because I, I started doing writing work before I was a copywriter. I did editing work in terms of book editing and academic editing. 

And so I was doing that back when I was in law school. , you know, people just knew that I had an English degree and that I could do that type of work. And so I got my first client without realizing I had my first client. You know, somebody said, Hey, I'm writing a book, can you help? And then they paid me.

And so it really started, you know, over probably 25 years ago. And it wasn't until after I left my career in law and I decided, okay, this needs to be its own business that I formalized into a business. 

And so, you know, I guess if, if you were to say, when did I have my first business? Once I, my first client, once I officially became a business, then that would be maybe, you know, 2017 or something, you know, right after I decided, Hey, let me put up a website and, and start this.

But I guess that question's kind of hard for me because, Yeah, I already had clients before I had the business and sort the, the business sort of came about because of the clients that I already. 

Jonathan Green: So, I think you brought up something really interesting, which is a lot of people don't realize they're entrepreneurs.

For most of my life, I thought I could never be an entrepreneur, I could never start my own business. And then, cuz you always hear these stories like, oh, this guy had a lemonade stand at 12, it made $10,000. I'm like, oh, not born entrepreneur, that's not me. 

But then I realized I was hustling like in summer camp, I would order pizzas and then sell 'em by the slice for a little profit at 12, and I look back and go, oh wow I was an entrepreneur. I thought I was just like a little bit of a sleazeball, like, and so you don't, I always thought, and I had like I started a tutoring agency and I would do a lot of things that people would consider entrepreneur and I always thought, no, I'm not an entrepreneur, even though I was running my own business, getting my own clients, making money.

So a lot of times we do these things that we don't realize are entrepreneurial. So that's really good that you kind of recognize that as part of your journey for, and it is for most people, it's the first client or the first dollar online. That's the proof that goes from, I think I can make money doing this to, I know I can make money doing this.

So that's a very good and interesting journey you have. And often it's just letting people know what you're good at, isn't it Like people always say to me, Jonathan, how do you get really big ghost clients? I don't advertise it. I don't advertise ghost writing my website. I just let people know. And then if they know someone who needs a job, it comes my way.

And oftentimes that's all you have to do. But most people were afraid when we're like a new writer, we go, I'm not that good. I don't wanna tell anyone in case I fail. And that actually causes the failure. So it sounds like you had a really good mindset, um, having been, you know, in another career for so long, do you think that was, if you could go back, you would've started the copywriting journey earlier? 

JenniferWestbrook: You know, maybe, but not by very much earlier. You know, I, I really, I enjoyed my career as an attorney. It's not that I, I stopped doing that because I didn't love it. I just felt the pool in another direction.

And so I feel like the timing of it was, was really, was right for me. I would say the thing I would do differently is my, my copywriting and web design business, it wasn't my first business that I started, I went in a totally different direction because I wanna do, I wanna have like a decompression zone from the law.

And so my first, my very first business was a home staging company where, and if anyone's unfamiliar with that, that's people who come into your house and make it look really good to help market your house when you're trying to sell it. And so, um, so I started that company first and I loved it, but, and I was still doing writing work too, but even then, I still hadn't made it into a business. 

And so I think what I would do differently is I probably did the home staging business maybe a couple of years longer than I needed to because I was afraid to fully commit to being a copywriter in web business. That sort of last couple years of my saging business where I was juggling both, I should have just said, okay, it's time to put this one to rest, and then focus on the thing that where I saw the greatest need and where I saw the greatest opportunity to make more of an impact.

Jonathan Green: A common mistake that people make is, Overextending their focus. We think, oh, I wanna try these 10 different things. The problem is it takes 10 times longer than just doing one. And sometimes, and this just happened to me recently, one of my friends was like, Jonathan, every time you pivot, you always end up doing ton of writing.

Like I've stopped doing ghost writing, stop doing book writings. I've written so many books and I'm writing tons of blog posts for my blog. And I was like, oh, you're right. Whatever I do, I always fall back to content writing. This varies, no matter what I do, I always end up doing a lot of writing. And I kind of was like, oh, she's right.

That is my circle of excellence and it's the one thing I'm the best at as we get further and further out of our circle. We're less good at it and we're less valuable. Like, yeah, I can help set up a website, but it's pretty far outside my circle of excellence. And so I would have to charge less, deliver a lower quality product.

But sometimes we're tempted, there's this temptation to wanna do everything. Like if a client comes to us and says, Hey, do you do social media? Do you do text advertising? Do you do web design? Do you do all of these things? And we end up taking on projects that are a mistake, and that certainly has happened to me. Right? 

Taking on projects, especially if I'm laying on the. I'm like, okay, I'll take that job with that. And, and it turns into sometimes you take a loss and the project, I did one project where I did the math and I was like, I made a dollar 17 an hour. Cuz it took so much extra time. A three week job, took three months, tons of phone calls. Have you run into that? 

Like can you talk about some of the early mistakes you made, whether it was pricing or the types of clients you accepted or even working with the client that you regretted or had to fire? 

JenniferWestbrook: Oh, absolutely yes to all of that. I, um, it, it I've done something similar to you where I've done things outside of my, my zone of excellence and, and it's hard whenever you have things like financial pressures like, okay, I've got this bill, I've got this bill, I've got these things that I have to pay for in my business and in my personal life.

So how dare I say no to somebody who wants to hire me for something, even if I don't wanna do it. And so I've made those mistakes. I would, I would definitely call them mistakes because the time, not just the actual time, but also the, the time in my brain, you know, the energy that it took me to focus on that and not focus on pursuing the right kinds of clients or, you know, getting stronger in an area where I wanted to really focus, that really, I would say was, was harmful to me as a business person.

And, um, I've had to fire clients who, you know, when I took the project, I didn't want the project. And even though I gave it my all, they just weren't the right client. And, and it just got to a point where I had to say, you know, hey, for all these reasons, and by the way, read in my contract where it says I can fire you, you're fired,

And that's, that's tough because I, you know, that's also disappointing to me to have to walk away from somebody after I committed to helping them. So, Yeah, I've, I've, I've had times where I did a, a service that somebody asked for it, and I did it because they asked even though it wasn't something I wanted to do, or a client said, well, no, I really, you, you did so great at this, couldn't you also just do that?

Or, I know you mostly do, you know, website copy, but I really need help with my social media and, you know, I don't do social media, you know, so, um, it's hard to say no when it's either, Hey, I need the money, or, Hey, I don't wanna let this person down who has already put their confidence in me in other areas.

But what I've learned is that it's better for everybody to just say no. Because what I want for clients is for them to find the person that's right for them that's gonna help them get the results they're looking for, even if that's not me. And so if I say yes to somebody who's not a good fit I'm keeping them from finding that right person, and that's not what I want for them, and I'm keeping myself from doing the thing that I am most excellent at doing.

So, yeah, I, I, I've made countless mistakes and sometimes, you know, you get somebody who doesn't pay you, you know, there're just so many things and it's like, well, all the warning signs were there and so I just should have said no from the beginning. So I've definitely learned the hard way, , um, how to say no to the things that aren't right for me.

And I'm still having to do it. It's still a struggle because I have clients who, you know, find me and say, oh, well, I, I want you to just do all these things because you're so great at this, so what else can you do? And I have to be very careful about the, what else can I do, , because sometimes they want things that I'm not, you know, not comfortable doing.

And, and what I've learned now is okay. Let me try to find people who can do that. So if clients keep saying, well, hey, I really want somebody who does email copywriting. Well, I don't really focus on that right now, but I'm building a network of people who do. So I can say, this person is really great, so I'm still giving you access to somebody who's excellent, but I'm not putting that strain on myself.

Jonathan Green: I think that's really good. A lot of people make this mistake. They think all copywriting is all copywriting. There's writing an email, writing an infomercial, writing a sales video, writing a long form sales page, writing an opt-in page. They're all different and we often think, oh, copywriter can do everything because we think of it as broad.

Recently someone came and said, oh, someone in my life wants to do video editing. Can you give them some advice? And I said, well, what kind of video editing? Because editing tiktoks is not the same as editing a movie or editing documentaries or editing. They're all very different. And, um, music video editing is different from commercial editing and I know people that do those things, so it's we sometimes get too broad. And that's the thing is when you're really good at one thing, then you can charge a lot more. Just like when you're a specialist as a doctor, people pay a lot more for the surgeon than for the general practitioner. Because of the specialty, they can handle less clients we can charge a lot more.

So what are some of the signs look that you've now learned that you go. This project is, or this client is not the right fit for me. Kind of like, cuz sometimes, you know how sometimes you're on that first date with someone and you ignore the red flags because they're so handsome or so cute. I think we put, everyone's guilty of that and your friends are like, you gotta get out relationship.

It's a nightmare. And a year later I'm like, oh yeah, you were right. I just wasted a year of my life and a nightmare relationship. And but if you, if you, we are objective, right? It's when we get emotional. So can you tell me some of the red flags? You go, uhoh, I gotta get outta here before they say the number because sometimes once you hear that number you go, maybe they're not so bad.

JenniferWestbrook: You know, there, wow. There are quite a few. One red flag that I would, I would examine, I wouldn't say this would definitely rule somebody out, but if one of the first things they tell you is, oh, I had this other person who did this and it just didn't work out, that's usually, not always, but usually that's a red flag if, um, it seems like they have a pattern of not getting along with people.

You know, usually if the common denominator and all of the broken relationships is done. Then that is a telltale sign that they are probably not gonna be a great client. Or the moment they aren't happy with something, it's gonna be a disaster. Instead of them trying to work it out with you, you know, they're just gonna wanna blow up.

So that's, that's a big red flag. Um, another red flag is, um, sometimes when people are a little too specific, and this may sound weird, but if they're too specific about what they want, for example, if they want a web design and they are like on my homepage, I want this, this, this, this, and this. They may be a little bit too much in the weeds and not willing to, um, work within my process because my process is much more strategic.

So maybe all the things you think you need on your homepage are really not appropriate for what you're trying to accomplish. So if it sounds like they're gonna be too, um, too much, uh, expecting me to be like a waiter where I just take their order and then go in the kitchen and cook it up, I know that's not a good fit for me.

I need somebody who's willing to let me be the chef and say, these are the specials of the day. This is what I can offer you in order to get you where you wanna go. So is this what you want? So, um, so I look for that, someone who doesn't seem like they're open to, uh, allowing me to be the guide. Um, another thing that I look for is, um, somebody who, this is I think big for entrepreneurs.

If they're looking to try to make me an employee instead of allowing me the space to be an independent contractor, that's a red flag because sometimes those clients are not respectful of time and don't completely understand I'm not gonna be available to you 24 hours a day. Like I work for your company, I serve other clients and I want everybody to have, um, the appropriate amount of time and access to me.

So that means I work within certain parameters. So I, I look for people who maybe, uh, will try to be a little too controlling of my time and not understanding that I know how much time I need to spend on your project. So let me you know show you my process instead of you trying to, you know, make me fit into your company as an employee.

So those are some of the, the big red flags. And of course, another big one is if someone right out of the gate is trying to negotiate on price. You know, I don't negotiate on price. I modify the scope of your request. So if my price doesn't fit your comfortable budget then we can talk about how to modify the scope of what you're asking for so that that can fit within your budget.

But anyone who's trying to change my pricing, that's a big red flag.

Jonathan Green: Yeah. I love the one where they go, oh, I need a big discount now. Cuz there's gonna be a lot of future work. There's never future work. So for me, so some, one of the other red flags, if it's like when you get a job and they go, oh, around here, everyone's family. That's when you know they're gonna ask for unpaid overtime.

Like it's such a red flag. I think what you said was so good. Those are three of the best answers I've ever heard, which is that you look for someone's history. Like I had a business partner that ended terribly and he is like, oh yeah, I've had five business partners, they all stole from me and I'm on my third marriage.

I was like, oh wow. I guess that's unlucky. I didn't go, wait a minute. There's one thing common that I was like, that's a lot. Like, that's a, and he was, he just gotten married and a year later he was divorced and our partnership was broken. 

So it is really good question is to ask someone, oh, have you worked with a copywriter before? Have you worked with a web designer before? How did it end? It's kind of like the person who talks really bad about their exes, you know, they're gonna eventually talk really bad about you. Like, so that's a really good one because we often we're so busy trying to get the job like, oh, the last person failed. Don't worry. I can do better without realizing maybe the last person was really good. 

And then I think it's also important to pay attention to pricing. This is a real struggle for new entreprenuers. They go, what's my time worth? And what most people do when they first start out is they charge at their new job, whatever they're making at their old job.

So if they were working at in an out burger, they're going, oh, I was making $15 an hour, so I charge $15 an hour, even though their expertise is way higher. And this actually repels the best clients. I've had clients come to me and I tell them my price, and they go, oh, that's so low. You must be terrible.

And I went, what? And he hung up. And I go, okay, raise the prices. And that's when I thought my price was, gives people get sticker shock when I say it. And um, it's, but there's always someone who's like, that's so low. You must be terrible no matter what your number is. Right. And it's very important to figure out your pricing strategy now. 

For me, when I, when I started out, my very first client was $200. The next one I said 500. The next one I said a thousand. So I just kept doubling. And then the next one he goes, what's it cost? I go 10,000. And I just said it cuz it was the biggest number I could think of. And I was like, my top client's paying me 500.

Why did I say 10,000? I don't know. And I'm standing there sweating, sweating and he goes, that's too high. I'll give you two grand. And I go Deal. Cuz he just fourexed my income. But it's so scary because we wanna negotiate against ourselves. The hardest part is the silence where we have to wait for them to go.

Okay. So how did you find the right price for you? 

JenniferWestbrook: Oh gosh. You know, I think I found the right price for me when I finally realized that if I kept going the way I was going with my pricing, then I would have to go outta business. It wasn't sustainable. And so I just said, okay, well I'm either gonna charge the right prices or I'm just gonna quit, so which one is it gonna be?

And, and, uh, for me, I just started doing a lot of math. I am a spreadsheets, you know, Fanatic . And so I just started looking at all those numbers that I tracked already my time, how much time did it take me to do this project? How much time did it take me to do that project? 

And then I started calculating, okay, if I were to get paid by the hour, which course I don't. But if I did internally, what's my hourly rate? What does it need to be in order for me to make the amount of money I need to make every month, every year? So I just kind of worked backwards from what's my revenue goal, and then what types of projects do I want? And how much would I need to charge per project in order to get to that revenue goal? 

And then of course, I also did research to see, okay, are these prices crazy? You know, what are, am I, am I totally off my rocker with this? Or is this something that people would expect? And, and of course I don't base my pricing on anyone else's pricing, but I do wanna have an awareness of what's going on in my market so that I know kind of where am I among, you know, other people who I think are good or, you know, am I, is my pricing higher than people who I think are bad ? 

And so, um, so I factor all those things in and that's how I came up with, with my pricing. And I'm constantly adjusting it. I, I still, you know, once I finish one project, I reevaluate everything and say, did I get the value that I should have gotten out of this. And if I feel like, you know, I spent, you know, 80 hours on this, but I don't feel like I got enough pay for that, then I'm gonna make my pricing higher for the next one. So I'm constantly adjusting pricing. 

Jonathan Green: When you raise your prices, was there a lot of pushback and sticker shock from clients or were new clients like, oh this is fine, cuz they just, it was the first price they were hearing so it seemed okay.

JenniferWestbrook: My existing clients, some of them had some pushback because, you know, the pricing was higher than what they were used to. And some of them said, yes, okay, I understand you need to raise pricing. And some said, well, you know, I can't afford that. And. And that's fine. You know, there are gonna be people who say no.

A lot of times the people who say no, they come back around later when they realize, Hey, I really do want this done and I want you to do it. Or they try to get it done elsewhere and they're not happy with their results. And then with new clients, I would say it's the same thing. Some people say, Hey, that's out of my budget.

And then some people say, okay, yeah, sure, let's go ahead. Um, I find that the people who say no, they, it's usually because they really just don't have the money, because they'll say, I really wanna work with you, but this isn't, you know, I can't afford this right now. And a lot of them come back around at some point, you know, maybe a year later they'll say, Hey, you know, I, I'm ready to do this.

So I, I know that a lot of times when people say I can't afford it, there's something else going on. Maybe they don't believe that they can do it. They don't, they're not sure I can get them the results or, or they think I'm the person responsible for the results, which I'm not, you know, they're responsible for the results.

Um, so sometimes that is an issue and I will try to talk people through that just to try to see is, is that what's going on? Are there questions I haven't answered that will help you understand, you know, why this price is is right and why you shouldn't be afraid of it. Um, but then there's some people who just really don't have the money and I don't like to push people to spend money that they don't have because then there's so much more pressure on me.

So I like for people to be ready. 

Jonathan Green: That's really good because, dodging bad clients and like figuring out pricing are two of the biggest struggles for any type of freelancer and especially a copywriter because sometimes people expect you have the pricing email copywriter when you're website copywriter, which is not the same as an e-commerce copywriter or an Amazon copywriter.

So this has been really, really informal. I appreciate you giving me so much of your time. Where can people visit you online to spend more time with you and learn about what you do and maybe just start their own copywriting? 

JenniferWestbrook: Yeah, so my website is jenwestwriting.com, and that's where you can find out more about me, connect with me, grab any of things that I have available. So I'd love to see you over there. 

Jonathan Green: Okay guys. That's at jenwestwriting.com. I'll make sure to put it in the show notes and below the video on YouTube. Thank you so much for giving us your time. I really appreciate it. 

I hope you enjoy today's episode as much as I do. Copywriting is a passion of mine and getting started doesn't have to cost a penny.

I've put together a collection of some of the greatest ads of all time and some exercises to get you started. You can get my ultimate swipe file right now at surfmaster.com/ultimate. 

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