Is cold calling to get new copywriting clients a good, bad, or
\nterrible idea?<\/p>\n
EF writes:<\/p>\n
“I did have a question that I thought you might be able to
\nanswer. I’ve been receiving a lot of mail attempting to sell me
\ncredit cards from big names like Discover, Capital One, and
\nChase.<\/p>\n
“But I’ve noticed the writing is rather poor–it’s a statement
\nof features, sometimes of benefits, but with no real attempt at
\npersuasion. I’ve done some brainstorming and believe I could
\nrewrite these in such a way as to increase sales for these
\ncompanies.<\/p>\n
“My thought was to try cold-calling\/emailing these companies and
\nattempting to sell them on my idea of rewriting for greater
\npersuasion. So I was wondering if you had any advice, ideas, or
\ntips on the best way to go about this–or even if it’s a
\nworthwhile idea!”<\/p>\n
My bad news for EF is: cold calling to get copywriting clients
\nis a terrible idea – probably the worst way to go about looking
\nfor copywriting clients ever devised.<\/p>\n
There are 5 reasons why I urge freelance copywriters to avoid
\ncold calling at all costs.<\/p>\n
1-Clients want to work with vendors whom they perceive as busy
\nand successful. By logical extension, if you have nothing better
\nto do than sit at your desk dialing the phone and asking
\nstrangers to hire you, clients conclude you are not busy,
\nsuccessful, or in demand. So right away you cause the prospect
\nto be repulsed by your seeming desperation rather than to be
\nattracted to you and your services.<\/p>\n
2-When you quote your fee, the client whom you find through
\ncold calling will almost always try to beat you down. Why?
\nBecause they know you need the work. Otherwise, why would you
\nhave called them? Cold calling destroys your leverage.<\/p>\n
3-If you tell them you are calling because you have received
\ntheir marketing campaigns and believe them to be ineffective,
\nyou risk making a fool of yourself, because the marketing you
\nsay stinks may in fact be working like gangbusters. You don’t
\nknow.<\/p>\n
4-Another problem with telling potential clients their copy
\nstinks is that the person you are speaking with may be
\nresponsible for it and not agree with you. So you start off the
\nrelationship by arguing with and insulting her. Is that smart?<\/p>\n
5-Cold calling is a form of telemarketing, a marketing
\ntechnique that has slowly fallen out of favor over the years
\nbecause it is overly intrusive and interruptive. Lots of people
\nhate telemarketers, so for you to become one does not position
\nyou favorably with your potential clients.<\/p>\n
The bottom line: cold calling is a bad idea because it violates
\nthe Silver Rule of Marketing, formulated by my colleague Pete
\nSilver, who says: “It is always better to get them to come to
\nyou than for you go to them.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Is cold calling to get new copywriting clients a good, bad, or terrible idea? EF writes: “I did have a question that I thought you might be able to answer. I’ve been receiving a lot of mail attempting to sell me credit cards from big names like Discover, Capital One, and Chase. “But I’ve noticed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1848,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1848"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=950"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":954,"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/950\/revisions\/954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bly.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}