Keep Your Eye on the Prize
“Get real, Will. Stop pretending you’re a copywriter and get a real job!”
I might have ignored these words if they didn’t come from a source really close to me: me.
About 15 years ago, I was ready to toss in the towel. To give up my pretense of being a copywriter.
Initially, I did fairly well writing insert copy and small promos. Then after about 2 years, everything seemed to peter out. I was doing a little work, but hardly enough to call it a career.
I was about to give up!
Ever felt like this?
Self-doubt is part and parcel of seeking any goal worth pursuing. The easy goals – the ones you achieve with little effort – may bring immediate satisfaction. But they never bring rewards that truly make them worth going after.
And those rewards aren’t just money. When I wanted to become a copywriter, I wanted the money, of course. I also wanted the respect being a writer brings. I wanted time I could call my own. I wanted … Well, you get it. You understand.
You can achieve those rewards. But self-doubts can choke your efforts if you don’t get a hold of them and convince yourself your new career is worth the fleeting doubts.
The problem, though, is with how we writers live. We mostly write alone. Your solitary work life keeps you from knowing, “I am not alone.”
So if you’re feeling alone with these doubts, here’s what a Circle of Success member wrote to me two years ago:
“Can you help out a newbie who can pretty much talk herself out of anything? I need to know, is this doable? Is this learnable? As you can see, doubt has crept in where enthusiasm and motivation once was. I guess what I really want to know is can someone with no background in writing, or sales for that matter, conquer copywriting and be successful?”
The most significant problem with this solitary life is that isolation can keep you from knowing others feel the way you do. And learning that they do succeed. (As this “newbie” has done.)
Self-doubt may be normal. But don’t let it freeze you in place. It doesn’t have to keep you from reaching your dream. If I had let my self-doubt control my life, I wouldn’t be writing this message to you today.
If Paul Hollingshead had let his doubts control him, he might still be stacking shelves at a Publix supermarket. Or Don Mahoney might still be making cabinets.
Let me give you some encouragement.
First off, I am tremendously proud of you for taking this major step in your life. You show tremendous courage, drive, and commitment by doing this.
But let me also put this into perspective: many AWAI members feel they’re expected to make huge changes in their lives really fast. Nobody expects this of you. Or those people who do don’t really understand how dreams come true: a step at a time.
The type of change you’re seeking has to come at a pace that works for you. If you approach your new career in a reasonable, systematic way, you will make progress and you will be able to achieve the success you desire.
If you put those self-doubts aside, you'll do it sooner, not later.
The First Key to conquering self-doubt
One of the huge benefits of AWAI is they have everything you need to make a success of your career. I’m proof. Just about the time I was ready to toss it all in, I got the very first version of AWAI's Accelerated Program for Six-Figure Copywriting. It’s what gave me hope. And the skills I needed to really get moving.
But AWAI’s abundance of resources can pose a problem. There can be so much to absorb that it’s hard to know what to do and where to start.
So the first key to overcoming self-doubt is to put your career study in a manageable order. Look at the materials you’ve already acquired and put them in some sequence of attack that makes sense in your life.
Here’s a good “for instance.” If you’re in the Circle of Success Headlines Targeted Learning Program, it makes sense to concentrate a significant amount of effort on your work there. If you have the Six-Figure program and have not yet tackled it, it’s a good program to study alongside the headlines intensive. Doing this gives you the proper perspective on how powerful headlines fit into the structure of a successful direct mail letter.
But let’s say you’ve already studied the Six-Figure program and have other programs; pick one that attracts you and start studying it together with the headlines intensive.
Here’s the key: Do not try to do more than two things at a time. It’s too easy to get overwhelmed. If you feel this way, take a deep breath. Then chart your work for the next month or two. If you look at your progress in terms of small, measurable steps, you'll discover something. The steep learning curve you thought was there was really an illusion caused by standing too close and thinking you had to accomplish too much, too soon.
But I have no experience!
Does lack of experience bother you? I started copywriting after first majoring in biochemistry and then deciding my career was teaching severely disabled children (which I did for 25 wonderful years). There wasn't much preparation for copywriting.
But I did it anyway. I started writing small assignments, like I said before. And even though I hit a rough patch along the way, that patch didn’t last long. I started writing in a niche I enjoyed. Got good at it quickly. And made a success of my career choice.
Was it hard? Sometimes. Was it worth it? Ask the 6th to 8th graders I tutor in math because I have a career that allows me the time to do what I want.
If I can make it, so can you … IF you give yourself the chance. And if you do the one (and only) thing that ensures success: write.
AWAI’s Accelerated Program for Six-Figure Copywriting
Turn the ability to write a simple sales letter into a successful freelance career. Find out how you can make a six-figure income working from anywhere you want as a direct response copywriter. Learn More »
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Will,
First off, thank you for writing this piece.
You have provided a methodology to newbie copywriters about how to pursue the AWAI program.
How do you make the most of the literature or material that you receive?
Your post answers this question. In that sense, it works as a great stress-buster for wannabe writers.
Some of the greatest copywriters were sailing in the same boat. When their boat was about to sink, they decided to take the plunge--nothing ventured, nothng gain, just like the old saying.
Cheers.
Archan Mehta – May 14, 2011 at 4:28 am