What I’m reading: Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
What’s on the iPod: Only For You by Heartless Bastards
My busy Monday became a busy Tuesday became another busy one today. The projects I have aren’t complicated, but the deadlines are short. Plus, there’s some corralling of interviewees, so that takes some time. One project is roughed out and waiting for input. The others — sales sheets — are well on their way to being completed.
I had a conversation with a new client prospect last week. In it, the client asked me if I’d ever written anything specific to their business. I had, and I sent over clips. However, even if I hadn’t, I had enough clips that touched on that specialty, albeit inadvertently, that I would have sent.
It’s a conversation many of us have with writing clients: do you have any experience in this area? Can you show me writing credits/samples or written articles?
The client wants reassurance that we writers can handle their industry. You can’t blame them. Still, how do you convince a client who’s working in, say, the ergonomics field, that your work in medical case management or workers’ compensation translates?
Here are methods I use to show clients that my skills and knowledge translate:
Make the connection in the intro. Whenever I get in touch with a new client prospect, I let them know that my skills lend themselves to their industry. So if you’re trying to win over a client in the fashion industry, you could let them know that you’ve written for the retail shoe or intimates industry. “My experience, which has been in the retail shoe industry, could be an asset to you as I can write about both consumer and manufacturing aspects, as well as talk about trends.”
Show them loosely connected threads. For one client, I’d never written about Medicare set-asides (and if you have, you know what I’m talking about). However, I’d written several articles on workers’ compensation and how costly it can be to a company. Same thing with the ergonomics company — I’d written enough on return-to-work programs that showed them I could understand this new-to-me focus area easily.
Use the buzz words. Industries do love their buzz words. While it may drive the freelance writer nuts trying to convince them not to use “value proposition” or “paradigm shift”, it never hurts to know a few acronyms or key phrases that will show your client prospect your understanding of the industry. Every industry has them — use them to gain the trust and the job.
Send high and low samples. Besides reassuring them that the topic isn’t over my head, I’ll send clients samples that are much more technical than what they need, and I’ll show them samples that are more conversational/easier, as well. Then I explain that I can handle both ends of the spectrum as well as anything in between.
Write a short piece and send it as a sample. I don’t do this often (last time was years ago), but it’s a good way to show them you can do the job by choosing something about blog-post size and whipping up a short piece that demonstrates your knowledge of the topic.
Writers, what do you have in your published background that can cross over into another area?
How do you convince clients that you can do the job even without the exact experience?
I love the idea of sending "high and low" clips. I've never intentionally done that, but I have always tried to give a broad example of longer and shorter pieces.
The fact that I'm a fairly skilled home cook helped me land several copywriting jobs for a custom publishing company with a lot of clients in the food industry – retailers, restauranteurs, chefs, etc.. Of course, having written for a produce trade probably didn't hurt, either. But I pull more from my own cooking experience than anything I learned from the produce trade.
Paula, we should trade recipes sometime. I'd love to see what you cook up. 🙂
Super example of making a transition with skills other than writing!