Six reasons to NOT to write that content

Let’s get straight down to business – you need to write it, but for some reason you just haven’t, don’t or can’t. Whether it is web copy, a leaflet, an e-shot, sales letter, a blog or even a Facebook or LinkedIn post. Here are some reasons our clients use us to write all their content, whatever it is:

1: Get your website sorted

The single biggest hold up to getting your website live is a delay in providing the content. Using a copywriter will get that onerous task completed within the correct timescale, saving you time and therefor money in the long run, but more importantly keeps you up to on track with deadlines.

A good copywriter for the web should be able to understand the need for keywords, the minimum requirements for Google and also format your copy so it is as effective as it can be online. We work very closely with both clients and web developers to ensure content, including any images are delivered in a timely fashion with a fully understanding of what is required from both sides.

It’s a simple process; we look at the pages you want, research the appropriate keywords and the volume of search, get a feel for your company, tone of voice, USP’s and then write it all for you. Even those fiddly descriptions you see in the search results, we do it all.

“Lucy provided expert assistance when I needed help to refresh the structure, copy and design of my website. 

In three hours, she swept through my site, providing insight, inspiration and a welcome fresh perspective on how to revitalise my business message to truly reflect my personality, experience and the services I offer, simply and effectively. 

Where I had feared criticism, Lucy actually gave me a huge confidence boost and some brilliant ideas about how to communicate better with prospective clients. Her enthusiasm is infectious, and after a thoroughly enjoyable and stimulating morning, rather than dreading the revamping task, I could not wait to put her recommendations into practice. 

Lucy is fun to work with, fantastic at helping clarify your business vision and really knows her marketing stuff. Excellent value and highly recommended”

Clare Parrack, Clarify Interiors

2: Keep to your deadlines

Out-sourcing the donkey work is an age-old solution to keeping you focused on what’s vital for your project. Copy-writing is no different, except that writer’s block, lack of inspiration and procrastination seems to effect those needing to put fingers to keyboard even more.  A trusted partner to help you get those words down really makes a difference, we can write it with you or for you, so you can move on and concentrate on the all the other stuff you do.

3: Staying up-to-date

When you’re running a business, chances are you don’t have time to review your original website for a change in direction, products, services and updating on page SEO keywords, let alone adding regular content. We can take all that off your hands, making sure your digital presence is in tip top condition, attracting leads and dispensing advice. We can work in the back end of most website platforms, so we can make the changes directly without having to go to a developer.

4: Remaining Consistent

We see it all the time with blogs, social media and emails; you might be inspired to take two days and go to town but can you keep it up? Can you post regular blogs, supported on your social media and emails and perform regular analytics reviews to make sure your content is working? Congratulations if you do, but if not and you’d like to then it is time to talk to us.

5: Copywriters write

You know WHAT you want to say, whether it’s for a leaflet, full blown brochure, social media or emails, but a professional copy writer ensures consistency across all platforms and mediums. They know HOW to write. How to engage the readers in a way that delivers the message succinctly and reflects your brand perfectly.

"The main thing that strikes you about Lucy is her energy, she is full of ideas and a real self-starter. This translates into the her work and content producing as she can tease out of you an angle or side to the business or your service you hadn't considered, or help you polish any ideas you might already have. If you don't have the time, she can pro-actively bring you ideas and move things forward, either way she is a practical and solution driven individual who makes the complex seem simple  She is friendly and collaborative and an ideal partner for any copyrighting and content creation you might need."

Malcolm Maclean, Director, Times Ten Media

6: Evaluating results

It maybe you are so happy you’ve actually got something ‘out’ you are not particularly interested in how it performs. We on the other hand are really interested in the results of our written work, open rates on emails, sharing and engagement rates on social media, click throughs on your website and seeing where your visitors are going, so what they’re reading on your website. We can’t help ourselves but be nosy and we share those results with you.

So what are you waiting for?

Get that monkey off your back and get in touch for an informal chat about what we might help you with. We are flexible, proactive and frankly very easy to work with. 

Ring Lucy Lavers on 07813 846569 or take a look at the Push Start Marketing website for some examples of our work

Tenacious me – The power of self-efficacy

When you were a child did your parents ever pick you up after a fall, brush you down and tell you, ‘you’ll be alright, off you go’? Mine did, but what they perhaps didn’t realise they were doing was teaching me to be tenacious, to be strong and to know that what feels like a failure, really isn’t that bad.

Of course there were times when I needed a plaster, an ice pack or once or twice, stitches! Did that stop me running? No. Did that stop me carrying in the milk bottles? Maybe trying to carry them all at once, but it didn’t stop me. Because I wanted to do those things. I wanted to feel like I was contributing, like I was achieving.

Tenacity

Having the quality of tenaciousness makes it easy to brush yourself down and go on your way. But what if you don’t naturally possess tenacity? Can you learn it?

Well, from an early age it can be instilled in you from your parents, teachers and other influential adults and older peers. You learn that crying about it doesn’t get other people to do stuff for you, if you want that thing, hold onto your dream and go and get it.

“There are times in life when people must know when not to let go. Balloons are designed to teach small children this.” - Terry Pratchett

In adulthood you’re expected to have a certain level of self-efficacy, to know how to approach a task and control your own motivation and positivity. If you aren’t a natural, you can learn it – you can learn by repetition, practice, listening.

Repeat, improve, grow

Practice makes perfect. We all know this to be true. So if you’re not confident, keep practicing until you are. In the real world you will not always succeed, but you will learn from those times and you will improve your methods - You will learn that carrying one or two milk bottles reduces the risk of you dropping them and falling in the spilled milk! If tenacity isn’t natural, wanting to avoid failure is. Repeat your methods, over and over again until you have it down and you’ll find tenacity grows as a by-product of avoiding failure.

Listen to yourself and be mindful

Listening to yourself is not a slushy, airy-fairy theory, no. Recognising and committing to memory, being conscious and committing to understand those changes you made in your methods – that’s teaching yourself tenacity. Be mindful of the moment a mistake is made because if you are un-focussed and doing your best to forget your mistakes. you will end up repeating them, you won’t be aware of where the changes are that can be made to improve. Think, where did I go wrong? How can I improve? Is now the right time to ask for help? Listening to yourself is teaching yourself tenacity.

Tenacious me – an example

When I started working with Push Start Marketing, I had never been a manager before and nor was it my goal to become one, but it was a necessary step to take in supporting my friend in running her own business and in developing my own skills within that business.

I started part-time, the odd couple of hours here and there, then it got serious… Lucy asked me what I wanted from her and from the next five years and I said, “I’d like a bigger chair and PAYE”. The next morning, there was my big chair and the rest is history…

But, I fell down. I didn’t know how to network and speak to a room full of business people. Then Lucy offered me real employment, with a contract and everything, just like I’d asked for! At that moment I questioned if I missed self-employment and walking dogs and cleaning on the side. And actually I didn’t, I knew that if I wanted to work for myself, I had to get serious and go and get it, even if that meant public speaking.

I was an adult and couldn’t rely on my mum to pick me up and tell me she’d do it for me because it was my dream, not hers. So I did. I thought long and hard about my barriers, I practiced mindfulness in situations that seemed unfamiliar and I was willing to make changes to my methods and practice them until I had it down. I’m still listening, I’m still learning and I’m still growing, but my tenacity is stronger now than it was last year and my self-efficacy is powerful – Not only CAN I do this, but I am DOING THIS!

The moral of this story? Maybe, ‘be careful what you wish for, Lucy’s listening!’ Or maybe it’s, ‘if you want it, go and get it’

“Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” - Thomas A. Edison

Planning my best year, being the best I can be (in just under three hours?)

Having started my own business there are SO many things I thought I would never do; read business books, wear flesh coloured tights, be a boss. But I am a true convert to business books and by extension using a business coach. If you want to get better at something then make the effort to learn, even if you already know it – be motivated to apply it.

So to take three hours of my time to attend ‘Make 2016 the best year ever’ with Penny Tunnel of DD Capace was a no brainer. Over the Christmas period I read Eat That Frog!: Get More of the Important Things Done – Today by Brian Tracy, got a dedicated note book, wrote a list of goals and plans for 2016, 10 things I wanted to achieve in 2016, like I had achieved them. In 2017…

1.      Push Start Marketing HAS doubled its turnover

2.      I am earning my old salary

3.      We had an awesome Christmas do

You get the idea..

I had certainly started to think best year ever, but how will I actually get there and what will all that look like?

The fluffy Part – A reintroduction to my values

Since I started working with a coach in 2013 I have been aware of my personal values and trying to hold true to them; honesty, trust, hard work, motivation, helpfulness, generosity, inspiration, value.

But as an extension to those what am I at my best? When I am in front of the room, in consultation with a client, working on a project?

Inspirational, motivated, solution driven, action orientated, future focused, supportive and fearless.

What lessons will I leave on my death bed? ‘Enjoy the now’, ‘fight not flight’ and ‘their circus their monkeys’.

And on my gravestone (hopefully)… She will be missed and remembered, but we’ll smile when we do.

The focused business planning part

Running your own business you have to be on top of so many 'things', and if you start to think about it are you? And if not what’s the worst, and what’s the priority?

I could see in a simple exercise where I was with all of these 'things' and what needed addressing.

1.      Brand and product

2.      Strategy and planning

3.      Financial management

4.      Profit and cost

5.      Marketing

6.      Sales

7.      People/HR

8.      Customers

From those eight, I could then create 24 goals (three per area) to achieve them, this is all practical things to do with my business I know need doing – but all of a sudden I have a 24 step plan to achieving 10/10 in all of those eight areas.

What is stopping me??

Great question. The answer is me.

1.      Time management

2.      Fear of failure/success

3.      Prioritising

4.      Distraction/focus

5.      Overload

Having to bullet point all that really hit home. I can overcome all of those, they are totally doable. How can I remove those barriers?

1.      Time management – planning and diarise

2.      Fear of failure/success  - Just do it

3.      Prioritising – numbered lists, use dates to help

4.      Distraction/focus – turn off emails and phone when focusing

5.      Overload – Delegate, organise and ‘delete’ what’s not relevant

So now I have goals, a 24 step plan to get my business in tip top shape and I can now break that down into monthly actions.

But can I actually do it?

If you want to get anything done you’ve have to be in the right mind set. Overcome and eliminate anything that is holding you back, get the environment right for being the best I can be. So I need to look at what has to go, and what I need to do more of. Not just in business planning but socially, relationships, clients. What shall I say no to and yes to, who or what has to go.

What and who are the ‘drains’ or the radiators.

Now I have identified those, I can make the changes I need to give me the best chance of success. With a clear plan, a release of everything holding me back and the mind set of ‘eating that frog’, I will have the confidence and freedom to achieve even more as the day, week, month and year progresses. Bon appetit!

Thank you Penny.

DD Capace.