EPISODE 81: Introducing the Copywriter Collaborative

Jessi:
Welcome to the copywriter collaborative podcast, where we're digging into how you can build a sustainable writing business. We're your hosts, Jessi...

Marie:
...and Marie. We're the co-founders of North Star Messaging + Strategy. When we started our business in 2010, we had no idea what we were doing. We just knew we wanted to write. Since then, we've learned a lot and we've grown into a successful multi-six-figure copywriting agency with a talented staff of writers and project coordinators. We've served hundreds of clients and we've seen it all. We wish we could have had a resource like this way back then. So we created it for you.

Jessi:
We're here to share our and top tips to help you achieve personal and professional success in the copywriting industry. Every week, you'll get valuable insights from us, members of our team, and special guests. Whether you wanna write better copy, create a stronger copywriting business that can support you financially or both, grab your earbuds.
All right, welcome back. And this is an exciting episode because things are changing. You may have noticed a few changes to our email that goes out about the podcast or to our social media, or maybe you have no idea what we're talking about. But that's okay, cuz we're gonna dive in today.

Marie:
Yeah, for sure. So when we started this podcast we initially thought we would be sharing our insights and wisdom with CEOs who are looking for the support of content strategists and copywriters. But pretty quickly we realized that the audio and so we actually wanted to focus on for the podcast was our fellow writers. Both in helping them with the sort of technical side of copywriting, but also on the business side. We started bringing in team members and we've even had a few guests come on and really that's been the main focus. But the branding of the podcast was still focused on CEOs all that time for like a year.

Jessi:
Yeah, it was kinda a classic case of the cobbler's children, having no shoes where we were actively creating episodes that were more and more talking to our fellow writers, but the rest of the marketing and had to do a little bit of catching up. And so we sat down with our marketing team recently and talked through what that might look like and they helped us generate some really fantastic ideas for how we can use this podcast moving forward to better serve writers and content creators, and copywriters; Those of you who are actively supporting businesses through some sort of content creation. Because that is a unique type of business that has unique challenges and we wanna help support you through them.

Marie:
So if you've been listening to the podcast previously, probably nothing really is going to change except, you know, a new intro recording from us and some new branding and things like that. Although we do plan to bring in more of our team members and more guests for you. But if you are new to us, here's what you can kind of expect going forward.

Jessi:
Yeah. So we, as Marie mentioned earlier, we tend to talk about copywriting and content creation in two different ways. One is the more technical side of how do you write well, how do you create great headlines? How do you make an about page that really stands out, all of that. So sort of copywriting strategy, content strategy, and the nitty gritty of how you actually execute on that strategy. The other side of things is really where we spend most of our time because it's something we love talking about, which is how do you successfully run a copywriting business or a content creation business? Because copy and content, aren't exactly the same, but there's a big ven diagram where they overlap. And we wanna make sure that you are equipped to start a business, to grow your business and to feel like your business isn't running you along the way. And so we're going to share stories from our own successes, our own failures, our own we're not sure what to call it, and help you hopefully avoid some of the pitfalls that we had and celebrate some of the successes with us and maybe take some of our better ideas and run with them.

Marie:
Exactly. We also will be sharing with you ways that you could potentially work with us or leverage our resources to that we've created. Over time, we've made so many resources and like Jessi said too, so many. Yeah. We also have a lot of stories to share. And so we plan to be offering opportunities for you to dig into some of those resources that we've created, but also to potentially join us in some programs where you could get support directly from other writers and Jesse and myself are members of the North Star team. So please stay on the lookout for that if you feel like that's something supportive for you. And in the meantime, you can always join our mailing list because that's where we're going to be sharing all of the best stuff in terms of new episodes dropping, if there's cool guests that are coming on, that we wanna share with you, if there's new programs that we're releasing communities that we want you to join, anything like that at all. It's all in service of our fellow writers because we believe that you should have a successful business because you deserve to get paid well for the work that you do. And also you deserve to have professional development resources to become an even more effective writer.

Jessi:
Yeah, absolutely. So we'll drop all of that information in the show notes that you can join our list if you're not on it. We also have a private writer's community, which is really designed for writers to connect with one another, find referrals, ask questions, take the conversation off of podcast, because as much as we love talking at you throughout this time, we love to talk with you as well. And so we created this community for that purpose so that we can continue the conversation and get your own insights. And if there's something you wanna hear, you can let us know and all of that good stuff.
Also just to back up a tiny bit in case you're new to this, and this is the first episode you're ever listening to, so that you know that you can keep listening and trust that we know kinda what we're talking about, we should probably introduce ourselves, right Marie?

Marie:
Oh yeah. Hello everyone! So I'll go first then. So my name is Marie Parks and I am one half of the founding team of North Star Messaging + Strategy, which is our content strategy, content creation and brand voice focused agency that we designed and developed in 2010. So it's been over a decade since we established our business. My personal background before that was in the nonprofit sector. So I learned a lot about persuasive writing and viewing that with values and benefits. So that was sort of my entrance into this world, but of course things have changed a lot. And of course you'll hear lots of stories from us about that.

Jessi:
Absolutely. Yeah. And I'm Jessi and my background prior to North Star was in marketing sales and education. And one of the really cool things that Marie and I realized early on is when you go to a lot of businesses that have both fundraising and marketing, those depart must kind of tend to butt heads sometimes or operate completely in silos and never talk to each other. So when we first started the business, we had our own ven diagram of a really cool skillset that often there wasn't a lot of kind of talking with each other on and that kind of served as the basis for our business. And as Marie said, things have changed a lot. We have grown to primarily work with on the CEO side, on the business owners side, for the business owners, we support with their writing. We primarily are supporting, you know, business owners who are running service based businesses that are making six, seven, maybe even eight figures and have reached a point where they have so many content needs that they cannot keep them under control. And they also have a team that is overwhelmed with content creation or they haven't built their team out yet and they're just trying to get it off their plate so that they can get on with business, but they also don't wanna sacrifice their authentic voice and personality.
And that's really the sweet spot that we've found is the ability to capture the voice of our clients and then reflect it authentically in the content that we create. And so we'll talk about that too, during this podcast for you as a writer, because one of the most important things that you as a writer can do is make sure that you're accurately reflecting your client or customer's voice while also maintaining best practices, staying strategic, hitting their goals, all of that good stuff.

Marie:
Absolutely. We've been really honored and fortunate to be able to grow our business quite a lot since those early days. It's allowed both Jessi and me to go full time with our business, to have a team of just extremely smart and talented folks, and to be making continually year after year multiple-six-figures of revenue. So we really want you to know that it is totally possible to create a high revenue business, as a writer, and that you can do what you love. A lot of it is around boundary setting, becoming more of an expert in what you do, making sure that you get paid, all that good stuff. So we'll talk through all of that, whether it's on, whether you're interested in becoming a more effective writer or you're more interested in becoming a more effective business owner as a writer, we will be tailoring our content to you and bringing guests in whether they're from our team or outside of our organization.

Jessi:
Absolutely. So stay tuned for more episodes about all that goodness, and we look forward to continuing to support you.

Marie:
Thanks for joining us for this episode of the Copywriter Collaborative Podcast. Make sure to visit our website, northstarmessaging.com/podcast, where you can subscribe to the show on iTunes, Spotify, and more.

Jessi:
If you found value in this episode, we'd love for you to leave us a review on your favorite podcast app and share it with your friends. Thank you, and happy copywriting.