For a freelance writer, there’s nothing more exciting than waking up, opening your e-mail and seeing messages from prospective new clients.
It warms my little heart like a Sunday evening fire.
You always love to see what businesses need and how you can help – especially when it’s something outside of the box or interesting.
Like any business, sometimes the leads are great. Sometimes they’re not a fit. And sometimes they’re downright odd. I thought it might be fun to take a look back at some of the odder requests I’ve gotten over the past year and share what I might have quoted those fine folks.
1. “Can you do my homework?”
This kid gets 100 points for ingenuity, but an F for effort. An enterprising young student with too much disposable income decided he’d like to outsource his English assignments, presumably so he could spend more time playing Call of Duty or frolicking merrily in a field somewhere as teens are known to do. I declined for ethical reasons – mostly my strong belief that learning to read and write is one of life’s most noble pursuits.
If I HAD decided to take it on, though, you’d better believe I’d blackmail that young buck for hush money. One evil deed deserves another.
Still, I’ve got the suspicion this kid is going to grow up to be a millionaire.
Rate: $500/assignment (sneakiness has a premium); ongoing extortion at a rate TBD.
2. The Second Best Man
Being a best man is an honour – I’ve had the grand pleasure of doing it twice. That said, it’s an honour that comes packaged with what is for some a crippling fear: The need to stand up in front of people and make a speech. Some will go a long way to avoid that – and while most turn to a little liquid courage, one fella decided he’d dodge the bullet by having someone else write about the most intimate and personal moments shared between long-time pals.
I was all for it, as long as he let me make up every single memory and include at least one reference to hijacking a speedboat from an international drug cartel and driving it off a waterfall. Strangely, I never heard back.
Rate: Unrestricted creative liberties, no allotted revisions.
3. The Link Ninjas
Not so much odd as extremely ballsy, I’ve had offers from people willing to sneak me money under the table to throw a link into pieces for other paying clients. Doubling down? Now, that’s tempting. Who doesn’t like money? But it’s also a good way for me to torch my existing relationships and drag my reputation behind a speeding pick-up truck full of broken trust.
Instead of flipping me cash for links, how about we write something that earns them? I can make that happen!
That’s what I’m actually good at, not discreetly peddling links like a back-alley SEO crack dealer.
Rate: $2000/month per link (Hi, Matt Cutts!), long-term relationships with awesome clients, my self-respect.
4. Sha-WING! (An erotic catch-all)
Every writer has niches they just won’t touch with a ten foot pole. That’s largely because to write convincingly, I’ve got to get into the head space of your clients and spend a fair amount of time learning about what it is that makes your business special. There’s competitive research, lexicon building, social listening… the works. I get my hands really dirty, even if I’m only writing a few headlines.
So when I got a lead for a Swinger’s Club (which, to be fair, is a legitimate business), it was a job just a little too far out of my range and experience. Although… I had been looking for a chance to use the words “gyrate”, “sweat-soaked” and “impassioned thrusting” in a project. Bah, next time.
Interestingly, one of my first writing jobs EVER was a few hundred product descriptions for a sex toy website. After thousands of trips to the eyewash station, a few nights staring at my ceiling in terror and several moments of “I-can’t-believe-this-exists-why-why-why”, I vowed never to tinker with the nether regions of copywriting ever again.
Rate: Judgemental looks from people at Starbucks; unsuccessful attempts to convince my girlfriend it was all “for research”.
I love my job.
This post is a spot of fun; I’ve been lucky to work with some awesome brands who really get it. A sincere thanks goes out to everybody who has chosen to trust me as their scribe and put the tender, budding flower of their branding in my hands.
It’s been almost a year of operation under the ol’ Business Casual Copywriting moniker. I’ve loved connecting with, learning from and indoctrinating the masses alongside so many awesome companies.
Keep it weird.
There’s nothing I love more than reading interesting articles like this.
They brighten up my day, since it’s ice-cold here in Joburg (Johannesburg), South Africa.
I love your sense of humor, not to mention your clever turns of phrases. Glad to see you have some ethics, too. And I couldn’t help but click on the Zombies link. 🙂
Such kind words – thanks, Linda!
That made me laugh… I heard about the method of sneaking in link s in the content written for others, I know some people use it as a legitimate way for backlink building. Sneaky and can easily destroy reputation of a copywriter = not worth it.
Totally; I only link if it’s relevant to the case I’m building! Thanks for reading, Maggie.