The One Thing I'll Never Do as a Freelance Copywriter

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When I first started my business I didn’t have a lot of rules. And I still don’t. 

But I made one promise that I would never do this one thing. 

I told myself that I would never, ever ghost an existing or potential client.

ICYMI: Ghosting is a familiar term in dating culture. If you’re in a happy, healthy relationship and long out of the dating game (congrats!), ghosting is when someone completely stops communicating with you without any reason.

Poof, gone. Casper enters the nonexistent chat.

I learned fairly quickly that in order to find work as a freelancer I can’t just sit around and wait for clients to fall in my lap. If I want to pay the bills and put food on my table then I have to pitch myself, follow up a lot, and schedule all of the dreaded discovery calls. 

The reality is that sometimes these leads do not reply to me, so I’ve gotten really comfortable being left on read, or not getting read at all. 

However…

This is not a strategy for how I personally want to run my business. Especially when I’m selling my services on the platform of Your Words Matter – it just would not be a good look for me. 

I stand on the belief that if someone puts forth the effort to reach out to me, then I actually do owe them a response – even if that response is a no.

I also believe that clear is kind. And kindness means being honest, especially when it’s uncomfortable. 

I’ve met a lot of people who say, but you don’t owe anyone a response. And in some cases that is true – like if a random man catcalls me on the street (ew) then no, I do not owe him a response.

But I run my business with different principles than I do on say, “the streets”. If you contact me to work together I promise you will get a reply, even if you’re contacting me to do something outside of my wheelhouse. 

For example: I once had a Fire Chief from Hoover, Alabama fill out a contact form on my website–shameless plug. He was looking for a writer to help him with a project. How a writer’s name in South Carolina got connected to the firefighting business in Alabama is still in question. And I had a feeling there wouldn’t be a spark (fire joke, please laugh!), but I still took the time to learn if there was another way I could help him. 

That phone call took all of 15 minutes out of my day. 

Instead of ghosting him completely because I knew I couldn’t help him, I explained what I do and the services I offer. Because maybe there’s a chance that someday he hears of someone who needs a copywriter and now he not only knows of one, he knows one who picks up the phone. 

Has this situation played out yet? To no one’s surprise, it has not. But this is why I don’t ghost, because I never know where that 15 minute phone call might lead.

If I want to be successful in my field as a business owner and copywriter, then I want to find that success with as much integrity and kindness as possible. 

So, you won’t be finding any ghosts over here. Just a writer making failed attempts at fire jokes, which is arguably just as scary. 

Xo, The Salesgirls