By Joe Dyton
Congratulations! You have found some places to pitch your freelance writing services. Now, comes the hard part–crafting your freelance writing pitch. After all, it’s great that you’re putting yourself out there, but it’s not enough that you’re pitching—you need a solid sales pitch, too. Every pitch you send could lead to your next big freelance writing client. The stronger your pitch, the quicker you can secure clients and get to the point where you’re spending more time writing than looking for work.
Keep these five tips in mind as you’re crafting your freelance writing pitch.
Find a point of contact whenever possible
When you find a company, organization, blog, publication, etc. to pitch, find an actual person to email (or call). Your message has a better chance of being seen than if you send it to the company’s info@XXX.com or contact@XXX.com email address—who knows how long it will take to be seen. Even if the person you contact isn’t the right person to talk to, they can usually tell you who is.
If your desired prospect does not have individual email addresses on its site, check out its LinkedIn page and click on, “People”. There’s likely to be some employees listed there that you could send a connection request to. You don’t need to put your full pitch in your connection request—a quick note about being interested in freelance writing and how you’d love to connect will be fine for now. Once the connection is made, you could ask who might be the best person to reach out to about freelance writing opportunities.
Get to the point
People are busy and don’t want to spend a lot of time reading emails—especially unsolicited ones. Let the prospect know within the first sentence or two why you’re contacting them. If they’re interested, they’ll keep reading. I usually start my pitches either by asking if the prospect has any ongoing or occasional needs for freelance writers or expressing my interest in writing for the prospect on a freelance basis.
Choose good and, if possible, relevant writing samples
This probably seems obvious, but it’s still worth noting—always send your best writing samples when pitching a prospect. I have no doubt everything you’ve written is good, but you know what pieces you’re the most proud of. If you’re pitching for a copywriting gig and have stats to prove how effective a particular sample was (conversation rate, engagements, etc.) be sure to share them, too.
If you have samples tied to the prospect’s industry, even better. If a company or publication is going to take a chance on a freelancer, ideally they want to work with someone who knows their industry. Do not let lack of experience in a field prevent you from pitching companies if you want to write for that field, however. There are plenty of places that want good writers who are comfortable teaching them about the field. I just happen to write for a client that was willing to roll the dice on me despite having never written in their field.
Explain what you can do for the prospect
It is easy to get lost in writing about your past experience when pitching a freelance writing prospect. It’s great that you have all of that experience, but you have to let prospects know how you can solve their problems if you want to turn them into a client.
This could be as simple as, “I see you publish your blog weekly. I’d love to contribute so have enough content to publish a couple days a week.” Or, “I noticed you’re looking for a full-time copywriter. I was wondering if I could be of service until you fill the role.” If you can explain how hiring you will make life better for them, your pitch has a much better chance of being successful.
Include a call to action (CTA)
You’ve put in all of this work in crafting your freelance writing pitch—don’t derail it by forgetting to tell the prospect what you want them to do next! Your CTA does not have to be complicated—mine (for emails) is, “Please hit, ‘Reply’ to continue the conversation.” All you’re trying to do here is give the prospect a next step. Ask them to reply like I do, provide a link to your website’s “Hire me” page or give them a phone number to call you—just don’t end it by thanking them for their consideration!
Until prospects begin to find you, pitching is how you will land most of your freelance writing work. That’s why crafting your freelance writing pitch well is so important —your ability to sell your freelance writing services is what stands between you and a successful freelance writing career.
Now get to it!
Thanks for reading.
Joe
Joe Dyton (@JoeDyton) is the President and Founder of Dyton Writing and Editing, and a freelance insurance, real estate and personal freelance writer. He’s written for Connected Real Estate Magazine