Don’t you hate when you spend time crafting a killer query sure to attract attention only to find out the employer failed to fill you in on the most critical details? Like last week, I spent some quality writing time answering an ad that passed my BS Litmus Test (or BLT). The test parameters: 1….
Where is the Love?
Riddle me this, Batman – if you’re a salesperson and you come upon someone who isn’t buying what you’re selling, what do you do? Do you A) automatically turn off the sales pitch, the charm, and leave that person standing? Or do you B) continue to treat that someone as though he or she is…
Fake It Until You Make It
Having once survived a divorce, I picked up a little mantra we divorcing people repeated to deal with the onslaught of divorce-related depression: Fake it until you make it. Fake like you’re okay until that day when you wake up and don’t want to stay in bed. Paste that smile on your face until the…
Monthly Assessment – May
Many thanks again to Devon Ellington (aka Jenny Storm) for spending time last week with us answering writing and publishing questions and sharing her process with us. If you have any more questions, you’re free to ask them here or visit her on her blog. Another month, another assessment of how things went. May was…
The Vendor-Client Relationship: Real World Style
Many thanks to our own Copywriting Maven for sharing with me this hysterical video. If you’ve ever wondered if you’re doing the right thing in sticking by your price, wonder no more:
Guest Post: Pulling it Together
Today, a mid-week treat for you: I’m thrilled to have Jenny Storm (also known as our own Devon Ellington), author if Dixie Dust Rumors, give us a primer on her novel-writing process. Many thanks to Jenny for sharing her tips and insights with us! It starts with characters that appear and lead her to the…
Just Ask
One of the top tenets of the sales world is “ask for the job.” So I took this idea to the social networking world last week. There’s something to this asking stuff. Within hours of my Twitter post about being available to “rock your insurance articles” I was approached by a new client to write…
Can You Hear Me Now? Hello?
It happened again. Right in the middle of negotiations with a new client, smack dab at the intersection of “I like this person” and “Here’s my fee” – silence. Cold, echoing silence at the mere mention of what I’d charge for this project. My price was fair. It may even have been negotiable. But it’s…
Me and My Gang
Their gang colors were powder blue – not exactly fear-inducing garb. There were plenty of them, but we felt safe because this gang consisted of some of today’s best and brightest creatives. At Columbia’s School of the Arts graduation Wednesday, the message delivered was this – stick with your gang. Jerry Saltz, art critic with…
Judging Journalism – by a Non-Journalist
I was all prepared to write this nice post today about what I’d heard and learned at my stepson’s graduation from Columbia yesterday. That is, until Sid sent me a link to an article by a Swedish professor of media economics, posted in the Christian Science Monitor. It would seem the good professor thinks journalists…