Rai Cornell  00:02

Welcome to Season Two of the SOAR Podcast, the place for creative entrepreneurs who want to build healthier, happier, more profitable, self employed businesses. I’m your host Rai Hyde Cornell, business mentor at Chiron Consulting and CEO and senior copywriter at Cornell Content Marketing, get ready to soar. Welcome to the SOAR podcast. On today’s episode, we have Nicole Elliott. Nicole, tell our listeners what it is you do.

 

Nicole Elliot  00:39

Yeah, thanks for having me, Rai. I’m a conversion copywriter and messaging strategist. So essentially I work with entrepreneurs, small business owners, startups, industry experts, what have you, who are really, really good at what they do. But they might be having a difficult time developing clear messaging around that, as well as putting together a compelling copy whether website copy, email campaigns, sales pages, even case studies, that captures their voice, hones in on their story, as well as perhaps most importantly of all resonates with their audience.

 

Rai Cornell  01:11

Yeah, cause that’s where the money comes in. right? And it’s like, I think, especially in the freelance writing world, so I mean, you know, I’m in that world as well. I’ve been a freelance writer for 16 years. But it’s like everyone thinks, oh, conversion copy, like, that’s what you have to do. And I feel like there’s so much pressure around it, because, that’s what makes the money. So how did you get into conversion copy? And do you feel that sense of pressure? Or is that could just be me that I’m like, sensing this? Well, there’s so much pressure on the conversion copywriters?

 

Nicole Elliot  01:47

Yeah, If I can speak on the pressure. First, I think it’s definitely something that intimidates a lot of people just based on, you know, when I have clients come to me, or, you know, business owners, friends who are writing copy themselves, they’re like, oh, there are so many things to consider, I have to think about SEO keywords, I have to think about my own brand voice, I have to think about, you know, countdown timers, and what have you. And I mean, at the end of the day, kind of what I tell myself to take that edge off, as well as what you know, advice to people is to just remember that it’s all about being human. I mean, you are writing as a human to other humans. And so I do have kind of a certain way I think about that, about just what I would consider to be like the two main ingredients you need to copy that connects convert. So maybe that’s something we can get to afterwards, might be helpful for some people to hear. But to go back to your other question about how I ended up here, well, it was kind of unexpected. I got my starts, or the my start writing professionally in academic writing, actually, I studied English in college, I was a very typical, you know, English major with the turtlenecks and second hand novels and all of that. And so right after I graduated, I became a private tutor for academic writing. But pretty soon after, I just got kind of fed up with academic writing, it’s very soulless, there’s no personality, it’s really just a matter of seeing who can cram the highest concentration of fancy sounding words in a sentence, you know, you’re not writing for the person on the other edge, it’s just to make yourself look great. So I stepped away from that and became an English as a second language instructor. So I taught in a few different places around the world, and I loved it. But I still actually teach classes from time to time now, but I wanted to get back into writing. And so, I didn’t know copywriting existed. I wish I could say it was something I knew, you know, from age 8, I want to grow up and be a conversion copywriter. But I Googled how to make a living writing and I came across copywriting. And I started reading up about it. And I really resonated how it was so focused on the human on the other side and on connection and just, you know, telling people what they want to hear. So they know that you understand them and all that. So I learned everything I could and somehow made it to where I am. And you, quote unquote, “formalized your business”. You said about five years ago, was it? Yeah, the timeline’s a little bit fuzzy. I would say I first started writing copy about 8 or 9 years ago, but I was really taking a very by the seat of your pants approach at the beginning, if you will, like I never really went into it with the intention of being a business owner or an entrepreneur. I really just went into it because I didn’t want to go to an office because I wanted to pick my own schedule. And so I was quite lucky for those first few years, it worked out pretty nicely. I got a lot of work referred my way, I was hired pretty early on by somewhat of a growth agency which sends a ton of work my way and let me test out all sorts of industries and I’m still partnered with them from time to time these days. But I just was very passive about it. So I would just kind of accept, you know, any work that would come my way. I wasn’t very, you know, actively marketing myself in any capacity. I didn’t have a website. I didn’t bother with contracts, which is a terrible, terrible idea. Anyone listening, please make sure you have your contracts lined up. So it was a very relaxed approach, I think I was just so resistant to being a business owner. For some reason, I don’t know why I think I just, you know, by nature of being a writer, it was that whole like, nose up in the air. I’m an artiste, I am creative, I don’t want to be salesy. I don’t want to market myself. So that was a pretty significant mindset shift, as well as just overall shift on how I approached my business.

 

Rai Cornell  05:48

I think, I mean, I think the vast majority of writers who I know who do freelance writing nowadays for a living, we all started that way. I mean, I did pretty much the exact same thing, where, I didn’t start out. As legitimately as you. I started in academic writing as well. But on the non-legit side, meaning I wrote papers for people, and they paid me to do their homework, basically, whatever works. But then eventually, you know, I went to Google and I typed in, okay, I think I’m good at this, like, how do I make money as a writer doing legitimate work? And that’s, I think, where we all start is just going to Google typing it in, and then kind of going with the flow. And we don’t even realize, that we can turn our skill into a business. Like, that’s not even something that hits us until one day, we’re like, wait, I’ve been doing this for how many years? And oh, I guess this is what I do now. And I want to keep doing it. So we tend to then get our shit together and formalize things. So what was that like for you when you decided to, you know, file the paperwork? And did you do like an LLC and do all that stuff online? And what was it like for you going through that formalization process?

 

Nicole Elliot  07:02

So it’s still just me, I’m just a sole proprietorship. I haven’t gone through the LLC process. I mean, honestly, a lot of it was just kind of born out of desperation, where so I think, maybe three years ago is when I started taking it, you know, actually, seriously, this is a proper business. Nicole, you have to get your head in the game type of thing. And it was because it was the beginning of the pandemic, and I lost all my clients. And, you know, I was mentioning this one agency before, that, for a lot of work my way kind of since the beginning, they really pulled their, like steps back from a lot of work. And so all my projects, they’re dried up. And I just realized it was time for me to, again, not be so passive and actually take the time to consider my packages, and my overall messaging and who I wanted to work for, and get those contracts, lines up. And, you know, have an onboarding process and an offboarding process. And so actually, probably the best thing I did, which was actually quite scary to do at the time, because all the clients had dried up. But I joined a like, build your copywriting business program. And it was absolutely the one of the best things I ever did. It was, like I said, kind of a scary investments. But I just felt like I had no idea. Although I was definitely not new to writing copy. I was very new to all of the businessy side of things and wearing all the hats and how do I actively, you know, seek out clients and set up my own systems and processes. And so it was a very up and down route, I would say, I wish I could say that I still feel, you know, super strong and confident every single day about the prospect of being a business owner. But it’s definitely a learning curve and continues to be, and based on other business owners I talk about, it’s kind of like that for the rest of your life. There’s always new things thrown your way and new clients situations to deal with or developing new offers, or trying out different ways of reaching potential clients, whether that’s hopping on podcasts or starting to collaborate on workshops or tinkering with social media. I mean, it’s just, it’s just endless.

 

Rai Cornell  09:07

Yeah, absolutely. And when you are your own boss, and when you are a sole proprietorship, or a single member, LLC, or whatever the case may be. Your business has to ebb and flow with your life, your life is going to change and evolve and things are gonna happen, your business is right there along for the ride. It’s like a passenger, and you have to make sure that it stays a passenger and doesn’t become the driver. But at the same time, your business is there to support you and a lot of people get that mixed up and then they get lost in the business building of it all, they get overwhelmed. And I love that when things got hard, you doubled down on your business. You didn’t give up on it and go oh, well now I guess I gotta go get a job at Starbucks.

 

Nicole Elliot  09:53

I considered that, definitely considered that.

 

Rai Cornell  09:55

We all do honestly, especially when you are wearing all the hats. Some days, there are like, wouldn’t it be nice if I just had to worry about like frying french fries at McDonald’s? Like, that’s it. Like, I could have handled that. But you didn’t do that? What was it that made you decide to double down on your business and really take this seriously, and even though you were fighting an uphill battle during COVID, when everyone’s budgets tightened up? And I mean, I know we lost a ton of big clients during COVID. How did you come to that conclusion?

 

Nicole Elliot  10:31

That is a great question. Um, I think, honestly, I just gotten spoiled by working for myself for so long. And I just couldn’t imagine physically dragging myself to an office, or a nine to five. And my husband and I, we do a lot of travel, we spend probably half the year traveling. And of course, the vast majority of the jobs in the world don’t allow that, to be possible. So I think it was just a matter of, I work nine to five before, I was teaching before. And I just couldn’t, well, it seems like an uphill battle to get the business thing in order. That still seems more, um, palatable than, you know, actually applying to jobs and going back in and having a boss looking over your shoulder telling you when you can and can’t go on vacation and all that. Yeah. And also, I mean, I liked what I was doing, like I really enjoyed writing copy for clients, I enjoyed the opportunity to work in all these different industries, and speak with all these amazing people doing amazing things. And I didn’t want to lose that. So it was kind of like, well, okay, I guess I’m free to pull on like your big girl pants and figure this out, if you want to keep doing it in a more professional basis.

 

Rai Cornell  11:50

Yeah. And so, let’s go back to what you said a little while ago about your particular spin on copywriting. And you said that there’re two things that good copy always has. And, I really want to point out this variety that you keep among your clients, and when you work with the agencies, you get to dabble in working with all these different industries. I think that’s so important to highlight, because a lot of people think, Oh, I have to niche, I have to niche, I have to niche, I have to write about health and fitness, or travel, or fashion or whatever the case maybe. And you don’t niche by industry, I don’t niche by industry. But what we do is niche by, a particular process and philosophy. So talk to me about your philosophy on copywriting. And what are those two things that make copy really great?

 

Nicole Elliot  12:40

Yeah, absolutely. So I think I mean, obviously, there’s benefits to niching, as you’re saying, it’ll, you know, can speed up your processes, you can get really, really down into nitty gritty. But the variety of clients does keep things more interesting. And I think especially with copy, really, no matter which industry you’re in or who the audience is, there are still some kind of, you know, as core essentials that are going to be they’re going to be applicable no matter what. So the way I see it, I’ll probably just lead with the idea that copywriting is about more than just pretty words, since that’s kind of a bit of a misconception I hear. Yeah. And so every copywriter is going to approach this a little bit differently. I’m sure you approach it a bit differently when you write copy for clients. But I like to, kind of the two main ingredients I see, are the first one is focusing on the brand’s voice and the overall positioning. Or it could be you know, the voice of the entrepreneur themselves if it’s more of a solopreneur. And then building guidelines around what that looks like. So that’s going to include things like the brand voice personality, the value proposition, words to use versus words to avoid, taking a look at the competition to see what the best differentiator for you to lead with might be, considering things like whether you call your offer a program versus a course for some methodology, considering how you describe and define your specific process. And bonus points if you give your specific process a name. And so that’s really all just, that’s one side of the coin. That’s one of the ingredients. And I see that as the side that connects with your audience on the human level. But at the end of the day, as much as we would love to just connect with our audiences, we also have businesses, we also need to grow those businesses. So you also want conversion. And so that comes in the form of actual language from your audience. And so essentially, the voice is going to help you connect with them and the audience language is what’s going to help you convert. And so there’s a few different ways you can really dig into the audience language. I personally interview my clients’ clients. And then, after I interview you and I get the transcripts, and I look at all of the interviews together and look for patterns as far as like pain points, benefits, maybe hesitations that almost prevented them from working with my clients, ways they are actually using your product or service, features that surprised them the most major questions they had. And with that, you can kind of blend it together with your voice. So that way you’re focusing again, both on that connection as well as the conversion.

 

Rai Cornell  15:18

This is so important because what you’re describing is creating a new language out of two different languages, you have your clients’ voice and language. And then you have their ideal clients’ voice and language. And you have to marry those in order to create copy that converts because the people who are seeking out the service, that you’re selling in the copy, they are looking for something new. And yet they’re also looking for something familiar. And so by marrying those two languages, you’re doing that. You’re creating that sense of familiarity, but with the promise of a new territory that they’ve never explored before.

 

Nicole Elliot  16:00

Yeah, perfectly fit. That’s exactly it. See, I can tell you’re a copywriter.

 

Rai Cornell  16:04

It’s the words thing. Everyone has a skill. Mine just happens to be words. But so talk to me about one of the other things that you mentioned early on with, there can be some pressure when you’re a conversion copywriter. How would you, especially when you started out as an academic writer, which can be very stiff and formulaic? How do you then shift into being a conversion copywriter? And how do you deal with that pressure? And again, if I’m like, projecting, because I tend to feel pressure from clients, when they’re like, this page needs to convert, we need to get these results. How do you cope with that?

 

Nicole Elliot  16:41

Yeah, um, so I think I mean, kind of, like I mentioned at the beginning, it definitely helps to approach it from the perspective of just like you’re a human writing for other humans. But beyond that, I mean, there’s always going to be that pressure. But especially when I’m talking to clients, or if someone new comes to me with, you know, maybe kind of unrealistic expectations, the reality is, is that your copy is never going to sit in a silo. So it’s also very much, you know, maybe the copy is great. But maybe there’s an issue with the offer, or maybe there’s not a great audience fit. Or maybe the traffic that you’re getting to this page isn’t going to be, you know, the exact group of people that should be reading this. So there’s a lot of different factors that go into it. And another thing that I think can be helpful to keep in mind is that at the end of the day, I mean, you can work with the absolute, best, most talented copywriter in the world. But what we are doing, maybe I shouldn’t be saying this, maybe I’m shooting myself in the foot by saying this. But what copywriters do is essentially educated guessing. So there’s always going to be you know, there’s going to be extensive research, as I said, you know, interviewing your clients taking a look at your competition, there’s going to be all sorts of work arounds developing an interesting brand voice. But sometimes, I mean, people are full of surprises, sometimes you think a specific message is really going to hit right, and then it just doesn’t resonate. And so, a really useful process to build to add in or useful step to add into your copywriting process is to save room for that adjustments and experimenting and, you know, asking people, for example, you can have like an exit intent survey, if someone is looking at your page, and then they hop off before moving to see you know, if there was anything that wasn’t really hitting right. So it’s really just there’s always going to be experimentation, it’s always going to be trial and error. And I think that can be helpful to keep in mind knowing that even the absolute, greatest copywriters and messaging strategist might not get it right the first try. They’ll be probably at closer than someone you know, who’s not who doesn’t have the specialized skill sets. And they’ll probably have a clearer idea of what it means to them, switch it up or change it to optimize it. But there’s going to be, there’s always going to be changes, there’s always going to be tweaks needed. So it doesn’t need to be perfect that first try.

 

Rai Cornell  19:09

And I think that’s true for all creative services. I mean, when you say that, copywriting is educated guessing. I mean, really what you’re saying is, it’s a science and an art. The educated part is the science where we can do like A/B testing and looking at data and looking at best practices and trends. And then the guessing part is the art. And yes, anybody can do, quote unquote, “educated guessing”, but really good copywriters, or social media managers or designers, they’re really good at the guessing, like, a lot of their guesses are really accurate. And it’s because you have that experience. You have that intuition. And you have that emotional intelligence of how humans like to be spoken to, or presented with certain images and layouts and how they want to experience things and so, I think you’re right that it is educated guessing. But I don’t want to discount the guessing part of things, because there’s a lot of experience and knowledge and intuition that goes into getting those guesses right the vast majority of the time.

 

Nicole Elliot  20:16

Oh, absolutely. Yeah. No, I certainly wasn’t meaning to discount the experience of copywriters, designers, marketing strategists, what have you. There absolutely is a lot that goes into it. But I just think sometimes it’s helpful to keep that overall perspective in mind.

 

Rai Cornell  20:31

Yeah, for sure. So don’t worry, I don’t think you shot yourself in the foot. I think it’s much more involved, than people often give credit for and you know, I often hear like, oh, we just need one or two lines of copy. And I’m like, No. idea how long that takes exactly. The short things take the longest amount of time.

 

Nicole Elliot  20:51

It does. It really does. Yeah, short copy is always the hardest for me.

 

Rai Cornell  20:53

Yes. So there are a couple more things I want to ask you about, particularly around how you’ve built boundaries and success into your business model, we are going to take a super short commercial break, and we will be right back.  Hey, this is Rai, ready to build a business that supports a life you love, a life you’ve always dreamed of. It’s time to stop passively dealing with what’s right in front of you, and start deliberately designing your own future. That’s exactly what we do. In private business mentoring, you and I work together to create a completely custom to you business model that gives you everything you want and need while protecting you from stress and burnout. Ready to get started, go to chironconsulting.us/mentoring to learn more. There, you can also book a free call with me so we can start getting to know each other and see if mentoring is right for you. Plus, I love working with early stage entrepreneurs. That’s why my mentoring packages are priced so low, I want you to soar. So don’t worry about having to shell out 1000s of dollars, not here. Just go to chironconsulting.us/mentoring  to learn more.  We are back with Nicole Elliot, conversion copywriter. So Nicole, there are two more things that I want to ask you about one is a little bit of a hot button issue for me.

 

Nicole Elliot  22:18

I know what’s going.

 

Rai Cornell  22:19

Yes, it’s this whole trendy thing around AI. Have you had clients saying, hey, can you send this through an AI generator? Or are you using AI? Or like how has that come up in your client conversations? If at all?

 

Nicole Elliot  22:34

You know, thankfully, it actually hasn’t come up with clients. But it has come up with friends and family who have like sent me messages or I’ve met them, you know, for lunch or what have you. And they asked like, are you afraid of AI taking your job. Um, I mean, based on what I’ve seen now, that’s not to say that it will continue progressing and you know, eventually ruled worlds later on. But for now, I think it does a great job synthesizing and pulling from information and ideas that already exist. So for example, it can be a useful tool for research. Or if you’re developing kind of like high level content, you know, you search like 10 best things to do in New York City, it can give you those recommendations, and it can be fully readable. Or perhaps it can help with a bit of like outlining or giving headline variations. I’ve experimented a bit with, like if you just want to, you know play with different words or generating ideas. But I have yet to see any proof that it can generate something new and fresh. So if it goes you know, it goes back to what we were talking about, about those two ingredients. So both of those ingredients very much need the human touch because the voice like that’s all about you, that’s about your personal experience, your personal philosophy, how you actually speak, and there’s just not a way that an AI is gonna be able to replicate that. So you sure you can have an AI write your copy, but it’s probably not going to sound that different than anyone else’s.

 

Rai Cornell  24:01

Exactly.

 

Nicole Elliot  24:02

And as well as I mean factoring in the audience language. Same goes because as you were saying it’s a bit of an art and a science. So knowing when to integrate those things that are both going to make the copy unique. I have yet to see it come forth and produce something like that. But we’ll see what happens.

 

Rai Cornell  24:22

I think those are excellent points. I mean, the brand voice that’s a big one, you know, I’ve worked with Writesonic and Jasper and Chat GPT and all these things and you know some of the tools, it’ll ask you what tone do you want this written in? And for some, I’ll say educational and some I’ll say engaging and some I’ll say like entertaining. They all sound the same. Like they, the the tool is not evolved enough yet to understand what engaging copy versus educational copy actually sounds like to a human. So I think that’s a big one too, is the brand voice and it’s also kind of like, In my experience working with these AI tools, it’s like talking to someone who English is like their second or third language. And they’re relatively new to speaking English. And so they’re good at like forming structures of sentences and things like that. But they don’t quite understand the connotation that comes with certain words, you know. And so it’s like, I have meetings with people in Germany and Finland, often throughout my weeks. And sometimes the team members are saying something in English, but the word carries a lot of charge. And I’m like, well, I don’t think they mean it like that. I think they mean, like the dictionary definition of the word. But I don’t think they understand the connotation and the emotional charge attached to that word, in, let’s say, the US where I’m based, and AI is kind of like that. It can use the right words, but it doesn’t understand the feeling that is conveyed or the lack of feeling that’s conveyed in particular language.

 

Nicole Elliot  26:06

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it doesn’t capture any of the nuance. So it’s an experience which you need a copy. Absolutely.

 

Rai Cornell  26:13

Exactly. And just to put listeners’ minds at ease a little bit, before we move on to my last question for you here. So we’re recording this at the end of March 2023. And what I recently learned is that Google is actually going to start penalizing websites that are using a majority of AI generated content. So now, you saw all these AI generators come out. And then a couple weeks later, you saw all these AI, content detectors come out, right. And now, Google is very smart. And Google knows that humans like humans, humans don’t usually prefer bots and things like that. And so if a website has a ton of AI generated content, Google is going to notice that and start to demote it in terms of ranking. So I think for any writers who are listening and wondering about their job security, in a marketplace that is going towards AI generated content and copy, I think you can relax, I don’t think that any machine is ever going to be able to quite replicate what humans do. But I do think that, as writers, we need to familiarize ourselves with these tools, understand their strengths and weaknesses, and be able to make recommendations to clients on when to use the AI, and maybe how to edit it so that you’re saving time in the writing process, and leveraging that. But, you know, you’re still needing to infuse it with that human personality.

 

Nicole Elliot  27:42

Yeah, absolutely. I think at the end of the day, you I mean, that’s spot on is that it’s a tool that can help with some of the trickier parts of writing, but.

 

Rai Cornell  27:49

Exactly, it’s like when animation tools start coming out. And I think of South Park, because I watched that show like religiously, but you know,

 

Nicole Elliot  27:58

Me too, I love South Park.

 

Rai Cornell  28:01

You know, at the beginning, they had to actually move the little cart, not cardboard, construction, paper cutouts and things and like, put on the right mounds and all of that. And now they have tools that they can animate these things on computers in six days. So it’s like that, like, the AI stuff is going to be the tool that helps in the writing process. But it’s never going to replace the humans altogether. Yeah. Now, the other thing I wanted to ask you is, in describing the clients that you work with, you say that you work with brands, companies, entrepreneurs, that have a proven process. Now, that’s an interesting kind of like, line to say. Hey, if you don’t have a proven process, then we’re not going to be a good fit. Tell me what made you choose that as a selection criteria for your clients? And what has it done for your business?

 

Nicole Elliot  28:57

Sure. Yeah. So I would say, I mean, generally, you know, meeting a client for the first time, I don’t necessarily say like, Hey, do you have a proven process or not, I definitely frame it a little bit more soft plate, especially because a lot of clients, they don’t necessarily realize that they have a proven process. So perhaps a better way to describe it, it’s just that they have like proven results, you know, they have lots of happy clients, even if you know, they’re having some trouble defining their offer, or you know, figuring out how to actually break down their services. But regardless, they still are and have been providing great work or great services to clients. And so the logic behind that is something that, I guess just kind of developed organically because I was realizing I mean, this is you need to work. It’s much easier to write copy. If someone does have proven results to back up, you know, if they do then you can interview their clients, which is something I’ve mentioned is really, really important to my process, and they, you know, I don’t want to work with like salesmen, or snake oil salesmen, or anyone like that, or anyone who’s focused on just getting people to buy through angry countdown timers and excessive exclamation point. And so part of it was just a matter of I knew that this was going to allow me to work with people who were actually, you know, providing really high quality service. But it would also allow me to do my best job. So that’s not to say that I don’t ever work with people who are maybe you know, more early stage. There are alternatives, if they’re still figuring out the logistics of their offer, or their audience. There might be some ways I can still help them with their copy. But if you don’t have those specific things honed in on, it will be quite a bit harder.

 

Rai Cornell  30:48

You know, when I’m working with my mentoring clients, I often tell people, I probably sound like a broken record to them. But I always tell them, your process is whatever you need in order to do your job as best as you can. And so, you know, for my clients, I always need them to set up a kickoff call, I always need certain assets from them. And before I can start work, and if I don’t get those things that are projects can be delayed, and it’s on them, because I told them, this is  what I need in order to do the work that you’re asking me to do. And you have built that in to your client selection process. And I can’t emphasize enough how important that is to understand what it is that you need, in order to do your best work. You have identified that you need to talk to the happy clients in order to pick up that second half of the language that you’re creating. So for anyone listening to this, have a good long think about what do you actually need in order to do your job, and then ask for that, make it a requirement, make it part of your process, part of your onboarding. And clients respond well to that they like, they’re like children, they like structure. You have to give them a formula to follow. And then they understand the kind of creative woowoo genius stuff that you’re doing behind the scenes that they can’t do. But when you have a process, they understand it and respect it more and have those boundaries. Plus, then it makes your life a whole lot easier.

 

Nicole Elliot  32:21

Yeah, definitely. And I think it also helps with credibility, just as far as you know, outlining on your website, like, you know, you lead with this is the overall promise, this is the result I give you. And this process is how I actually do it. And I think my process, not I think, I know my process is called the three-step human first messaging approach. So if you can also add a bit of a sassy name on it. I mean, don’t stress too much about the name if you want to, you know, have a little fun with it, feel free, but it could also be something really, really direct. Yes. But just yeah, if you don’t already have something like that, I would absolutely do it because it’s helpful, both for you, you know, as the service provider, or as the business owner to own your own boundaries. But as well as yeah, just great. authority booster and credibility.

 

Rai Cornell  33:08

Absolutely. You are a wonderful conversion copywriter, you have been an amazing podcast guest. Do you have any last tips for our listeners who are thinking about either getting into conversion copywriting, or who are already there but need a little help making it work for them?

 

Nicole Elliot  33:28

I would say, oh man, there’s so many things to say here.

 

Rai Cornell  33:31

You’re like ok, you need another hour?

 

Nicole Elliot  33:34

Right. If you’re thinking about it, I would say go for it. Um, you know, you sometimes hear people say that the markets too saturated, or you know, there’s no space for more copywriters. But there always, there always is, and there’s so many different niches you can choose from, if you do choose to niche or as Ray and I were saying before, you can also niche more based on your process, or just kind of overall your service. And I think just at the end of the day, I’m gonna sound like a broken record. But it is just about writing for humans. So if you’re getting really in your head about it, which again, is very easy to do, just like tattoo that on your forehead, it’s all about humans or do whatever you need to do get a post-it and stick it on your computer, it really helps that it takes some of the pressure off like you don’t need to be, you know, using fake urgency or lots of angry red text or anything like you can just connect with people on a human basis, and make sure you’re interviewing people as well.

 

Rai Cornell  34:36

I love that. And I can tell you, because I do the same thing. Not nearly as refined as your process. But I always tell my clients, hey, if you’re looking for someone who’s going to do scarcity tactics, or like FOMO I’m not your copywriter. I don’t do any of that. I do psychology informed human to human communication. That’s usually what I say, and so, if you feel like oh, I don’t want to do I don’t want to even try conversion copy because I don’t like being salesy, and I don’t like the pages that have all this pressure, then break the mold, do it differently and help your clients do it differently because nobody likes to be sold to that way. So, thank you so much for giving us an amazing example of what’s actually possible. So, Nicole, where can people check you out? If they want to learn more about you?

 

Nicole Elliot  35:23

Yeah, absolutely. You can head to my website. So just Nicolleelliott.co . Unfortunately dot com was already taken.

 

Rai Cornell  35:32

Of course, all the coms are taken.

 

Nicole Elliot  35:34

Right, but we do what you can. And I also have a free guide that has five quick ways you can give your website copy a connection and conversion boost. So if you just go to Nicoleelliott.co/five, so five spelled out quick steps, and I imagine Rai will be kind enough to link it in the show notes. Absolutely. That’ll help give, you know, a span of before and afters and just a few ways that you can optimize your website copy overall.

 

Rai Cornell  36:01

Amazing. Thank you so much for being here, Nicole. This was fantastic.

 

Nicole Elliot  36:05

Yeah. Thanks for having me on again, Rai.

 

Rai Cornell  36:20

Hey, Rai here again, thanks for listening. If you liked this episode, please subscribe and rate us in your favorite podcasting platform. Want to be a guest on the show or know someone who has an amazing story of entrepreneurship? Apply on our website at chironconsulting.us/podcast