If you missed them, follow the links to read earlier parts of the Lessons in Copywriting series:
Part 3 of Lessons in Copywriting teaches you how to make sure the marketing copy you write is succinct using a tool I call the Red Pen Rule, which I discuss in detail in my book, Kick-ass Copywriting in 10 Easy Steps.
Let’s take a step back first.
Since I’ve introduced my professional and writing lives, it’s time to tell the Freelance Writing Jobs community a bit about my personal life. I don’t usually talk much about my personal life online, but when it comes to building a career as a writer, I think I’m a good example of the expression if I can do it, anyone can in action.
So here goes…
I grew up in New Jersey and as you already know, pursued a corporate career in marketing when I received my undergraduate degree in 1993. I met my husband in 1995, and we were married in 1996. I led the corporate lifestyle until 2004 when I gave birth to triplets. Yes, I said triplets. As you can imagine, that’s when my life changed.
Originally, I planned to be a stay-at-home mom. Let’s face it, paying for daycare for three infants wasn’t practical. In 2005, my husband and I left the fast-paced New York City area for better weather. With no jobs and 14-month old triplets in tow, we headed south to find better weather and a less frenzied lifestyle. We landed in Central Florida and haven’t looked back (although I do miss being able to zip into Manhattan whenever I want).
A year or so after our move to sunny Florida, I had an idea to write a book about copywriting for small business owners and beginner copywriters. As I researched the process of selling a book proposal to a literary agent and publisher, I learned that one of the most important aspects of becoming a published business nonfiction author is having a platform. That means you have to be able to prove to the publisher that you have an established reputation with enough reach to help sell copies of your book. I had the education, the marketing experience, the story to tell, and the ability to write that story, but I did not have a platform.
Typically, authors spend a lot of time on the road, speaking at events around the world to build their platforms. They teach seminars, attend conventions, and get in front of as many people as they can. With toddler triplets at home, this type of travel was not an option for me, so I turned to the social web to build my platform.
My first target was blogging. The more I researched, the more I realized that building a quality blog independently would take a lot of time. I needed to speed up the process, so I actively sought out opportunities to blog for networks that would help me build my online exposure more quickly. I took paying blogging jobs and nonpaying jobs that would help me establish myself as a blogger and marketing expert across the social web.
After I had a blogging portfolio, I was able to land higher paying blogging roles that offered even more exposure. From there, one thing led to another, and there was more work on my plate than I could have imagined. By doing my research, creating a solid plan, and focusing on my niche area of expertise, I was able to develop a career as a writer in less than a year.
Today, my triplets are just about to turn 6-years old. They’re home for summer vacation before staring 1st grade in August, and I’m trying to juggle my business through my company, KeySplash Creative, my speaking schedule through SusanGunelius.com, and I’m churning out more books than I ever expected. Somehow, I manage to juggle it all, and I can’t wait to see what’s next!
Of course, you can connect with me across the social web. The main places where I spend time where you can connect with me are: Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
So that’s my personal story. If I can do it, so can you!
How has your personal life affected your writing career? Leave a comment and share your own story. I can’t wait to read it and be inspired.
As a follow up to my post yesterday, Introducing the Professional Life of Susan Gunelius, today I’m going to share my writing life with the Freelance Writing Jobs community, so you can get to know me better.
Here goes…
Like most writers, I have always loved to write. I’d rather take an essay test in school than multiple choice any day of the week. English was a natural choice for my minor in college, and when I started my corporate marketing career, writing became a key part of my role. It was through my work in Corporate America that I learned how to write copy and marketing communications that get results.
In 2004, my corporate career came to a stop for personal reasons, which I’ll tell you about in my next post, but I couldn’t stay away from marketing and writing for long before I had an idea to write a book about copywriting that would help small business owners who can’t afford to hire professional copywriters create copy that works. I was tired of watching small business commercials and looking at small business print ads that had little chance of delivering the returns the business owners wanted and needed. That’s when I came up with the idea for my first book, Kick-ass Copywriting in 10 Easy Steps. Next, I had to learn how to get a book published, and that’s when my entire life changed.
I turned to the Internet to learn how to get a book published and found websites like AbsoluteWrite.com that taught me everything I needed to know about publishing nonfiction books. I spent months researching and learned that my best chance for getting interest from a well-known publisher was to build a platform across the social web. Blogging became my priority target. I taught myself to blog and realized that by joining a blog network, I could increase my online presence faster. I turned to my expertise, marketing, and pursued network blogging opportunities with respected networks that had a broad reach (there were several at the time).
Throughout this process, I was writing my first book. I spent about 6 months learning and building my online platform before I started to approach agents with my book proposal. I targeted ten agents and within a month had two agents express interest. One sent my proposal along to a publisher to gauge reaction, but at the exact same time, something else happened.
I wrote a blog post on a blog I was writing for a large blog network at the time about the Harry Potter brand. A publisher in England, Palgrave Macmillan (a division of Macmillan Publishing), saw the blog post and contacted me asking if I would be interested in writing a book about the Harry Potter marketing phenomenon. Of course, I said yes. Within a week or so, I heard back from my agent about the publisher’s reaction to my copywriting book. They wanted it. Within a year, Entrepreneur Press published my copywriting book, and Palgrave Macmillan published my Harry Potter book, Harry Potter: The Story of a Global Business Phenomenon. From there, the domino effect took over and my new career was born.
Since I started all of this in 2007 until now, I launched my own company and had six books published with a seventh on the way in 2011 and more in the pipeline. My blog for women working in the field of business, WomenOnBusiness.com, was named a finalist in the 2009 Stevie Awards for Women in Business in the category of Best Blog, and has been named to two “Top Blogs” lists by Forbes.com. I am a featured writer on Entrepreneur.com and Forbes.com, and my marketing related articles have appeared across the web on sites like MSNBC.com, FoxBusiness.com, WashingtonPost.com, TheStreet.com, SmartMoney.com, Yahoo! Advertising, Yahoo! Finance, Yahoo! Small Business, BusinessWeek.com, TodayShow.com, and more. I write blogs and online content for a variety of large and small clients, including About.com (a New York Times company), Cox Communications, Newstex.com, Corporate-Eye.com, and many more. Long story short, I’m busier than ever and desperately need an assistant.
I built my writing career by focusing on my strengths and leveraging the social web for organic growth. If you look at my Twitter profile or Facebook profile, you’ll see that I don’t have tens of thousands of followers and connections, and there is a reason for that. I’m a proponent of content marketing via social media where quality trumps quantity. Deb built Freelance Writing Jobs under a similar methodology where quality has always been placed first, and I certainly have no intention of changing that.
You can click on the following links to find my books and read some of my online articles and blog content.
If you haven’t already connected with me on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, please do so we can get to know each other even better!
Up next: my personal life
By the way, Deb interviewed me a while back for her Success Stories series on Freelance Writing Jobs, which you can read here.
Hello to the Freelance Writing Jobs community! I’m very happy to be a part of a network that Deb Ng led so successfully, and I hope I can do it justice in the future.
I’ve known Deb for years — since we were both writing for Know More Media back in 2007. Our paths have crossed many times since then — writing for b5media and later when I took over writing for About.com as the Guide to Blogging as Deb’s successor.
It’s amazing how our paths are crossing again since Splashpress Media purchased Freelance Writing Jobs from Deb last month. I began working with Splashpress Media in May 2010 and have been writing on three sites for Splashpress: Performancing.com, BloggingPro.com, and BusinessLogs.com. When Splashpress purchased Freelance Writing Jobs, they approached me and asked me if I would be willing to take the helm. Being so familiar with the community and with Deb, I had to say yes. And here I am.
You may have seen me here on Freelance Writing Jobs before. Deb has reviewed a couple of my books in the past and even given away copies in blog contests. If not, I’ll introduce myself to you. In fact, I know Freelance Writing Jobs is a very personable community — more of a family than a network — and with that in mind, I’m going to reveal more about myself over the next few days so you can really get to know me. I’m going to give you my story in three parts: professional life, writing life, personal life. I hope to learn more of your stories over the coming days and weeks as well!
So here goes… my professional life (which I’ll try to write so it doesn’t sound like a boring resume):
I have always loved marketing and advertising. I was probably the only teenager on the planet who had a collection of print ads. Naturally, I decided to study marketing in college. I got my Bachelor of Science degree in Marketing with an English minor from Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut almost 20 years ago and started my career working in the marketing field for a division of AT&T. Several years later I moved to take a marketing management role with HSBC (coincidentally enough at an office just a few miles from Deb Ng’s home – it’s a small world) where I managed multi-million dollar marketing budgets and directed all facets of marketing.
It was during my corporate career that I learned to be a copywriter and to write effective marketing and business communications. Suffice it to say, working for some of the largest companies in the world and directing marketing programs for global audiences taught me a lot. I mean seriously — a lot. I stayed in Corporate America for a decade and quite honestly, I hope to never return.
My next career stop came about a bit unconventionally (which I’ll tell you about when I write about my writing life tomorrow), but ultimately, I opened my own marketing communications company, KeySplash Creative, Inc., through which I offer all kinds of writing services as well as branding and social media consulting services. I’m busier than ever and life is good. Some of my clients over the course of my career have included Citibank, H&R Block, Jackson Hewitt, Cox Communications, and more. I work with large and small businesses around the world, and I love it! I also speak at virtual and in-person events about marketing, branding and social media, but not as often as I’d like (more about that in the personal life part of my story in an upcoming post though).
So the crux of my professional story is this — I’m a marketer and writer. You’re likely to find that a lot of the content I write on Freelance Writing Jobs will be about marketing yourself and your business. I can’t help it. I love marketing! You’ll also learn that my marketing approach is based on brand transparency and organic growth. Corporate buzz words really annoy me and hard sales pitches make me want to scream. I’m not saying that they don’t work, I simply don’t advocate them. For me, marketing success is long-term, sustainable growth rather than short term spikes that are gone tomorrow.
You can connect with me on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, too.
Up tomorrow: my writing life
