This board is so chock full of success stories and happy endings (which is great!) ... it makes me wonder if any of you - at any point along the way - have ever had a project just go completely wrong. Perhaps it was a case of not being able to make the client happy no matter what, or trying to sell what ended up being just a poor product. Etc. etc.

I can't imagine that for any copywriter, things have gone 100% smoothly from Day 1. As a newbie, I anticipate there will be kinks in the road ahead and want to be prepared!

Susan,

I really beleive behind every successful person irrespective of what field theyre in, there are failures - multiple failures. I dont buy any successful persons story who states theyve never failed. Everybody fails. Sports people fail. Politicians fail (Abraham Lincolns story is inspirational). Actors fail. Musicians, students, military - nobody is exempt.

As for copywriters, theyre human like everyone else and yes they fail. From personal experience, I had a client ask me to write copy for classified ads and they failed. Yes it was early in my career but I took it like a man and moved on. No excuses, no self pity. And to any copywriter out there who has failed...congratulations! Youre a step closer to success.

Hi Sue,

Great question!

My biggest failures seem to pivot around getting clients to understand the value of good copy and to pay accordingly (and hence choosing the best clients to work with in the first place!).

Disaster 1: the client asked me to tinker with an email she was just about to send to her list. I quoted a price based on 2 hours work. In the event, I ended up doing 16 hours work and completely re-writing what she had written. Unwise, I know, but I loved the product so much and she was someone I knew personally, so I really wanted the promotion to work. I was also hoping to get the contract to be her webmaster. She loved what I'd done for her and doubled my fee (so now I'm paid for 4 hours work!). In the UK there is very much a "scratch my back and I'll scratch yours" culture in business. She knew that she had got much more value than she had paid for, so I asked her if I could attend the seminar we were promoting either for free or for a hefty discount. From my point of view, it takes little extra effort to put another chair in the room. She didn't see it that way and refused. Before that particular conversation, she had already decided to give the webmastering to another company. There was no upside for me and I felt ripped off. I promptly fired her as a client. Interesting to note that she was from a country where people obvioiusly take things very literally.

By the way, I heard that she sold out her seminar ... and a slightly edited version of my copy is still out there on the web ....

Disaster 2: I was mentoring a client on a fixed monthly fee, and he presented some copy to me that he was just about to email to his list. I took a look and it was truly awful, so I persuaded him to have it re-written, and quoted a very reasonable fee + some royalties. I bent over backwards to get the first draft done before I went on holiday. When I returned, I found that he'd decided to completely re-package his service and restructure the offer (on the advice of some other "mentor" - grrr). I'm sure that most copywriters would agree that this constitutes a fundamental deviation in the scope of the project and should attract additional charges. He didn't seem to appreciate my request for additional fees to cover the rework and promptly disappeared off the radar - and has never been heard from since. Rather unwisely, I had not taken a deposit from him (because I implicitly trusted him) - which meant that it was much easier for him to abandon the relationship. Interestingly, however, some themes from my copy have turned up in his truncated version on his website.

Lessons learned - get your money up front and only take on clients who understand that good copy is the same as money in the bank and are therefore prepared to make the appropriate investment in it.

Hope this helps!

Jane

Well said. I'll sum it up in 2 words. And pardon the pun ...

Vampires SUCK

... Your time, your energy, your money, your sanity, your quality of life, your money, your productivity, your results, your money, your good clients, your focus, your money, your peace of mind, your reputation, your money, your health, your mariage, and oh, did I mention your money?

Janebert, wow, reading your bad experiences was pretty awful. Don't worry about it, I know some really really really good...

hackers

Mmmmmmmmmm

I'll tell you.

3 years ago one company paid me £6k UK and had NO BUSINESS from the advert! Not one little red bean! There was a reason that happened.

The reason was me, NUTS

P.S.:

I am in the UK also. I disagree. Mikes right ...

Vampires Suck

Thanks, you guys, for the wonderful (as always) feedback - and a nice blast of reality. I have this awful perfectionist side to me that leads me to get a bit loopy at the slightest sign of something gone awry. I need to get over it, fast, and realize (like Sammer said) that occasional failure is inevitable even for the most successful people out there.

Jane, those were some horrid experiences. Especially about the seminar - good grief, I would have been irate if she had turned me down like that. The nerve of some people!

Vampires ... ahh yes. Those pesky blood-suckers have caused me many sleepless nights. I try to fend them off now by heeding the warning signs, i.e. 20+ emails from them in my inbox, before the project has even begun.

Can you give us some details, Alan? What do you think caused this "disaster"?