I just got my hair cut. Unfortunately, hair-cutting is all the hairdresser offered to do.
It makes me yearn for the good old days when a respectable barber would cut your hair, trim your mustache, and even pull your rotten tooth out for you.
Oh well. Too bad for hairdressers.
Copywriters can do better, though. Here are 10 additional services that I’ve used (or tried to use) to up-sell and down-sell and cross-sell clients:
#1. The Oliver Twist
This is when the client comes to you, soup bowl in hand, and says, “Please sir, I want some more.” In other words, you simply sell them the same service again. For example, last summer, I wrote one sales email for a guy with a big Clickbank product in the men’s health niche. He liked it, so he hired me to write a new such email every day.
#2. The top of the slide
This is writing copy for one part of the sales funnel, and then for an earlier part. Example: a couple of years ago I was hired to rewrite a VSL. When that was done, I kept in touch with the same client. Eventually, we agreed that I would also rewrite the emails he was using to drive traffic to the VSL.
#3. The after-party
This is just the opposite of no. 2. Example: I once had a job to write headlines for native ads. That job ended. But after a bit of back-and-forth, I was hired to also write the actual advertorials that the native ads led to.
#4. A second tunnel through the mountain
If you’ve done a good job for a client on one project, odds are good they have another very similar opportunity — another product, another funnel — which needs almost the exact treatment.
So just recently I was asked to rewrite a product page for a new supplement company. I did. the client was satisfied with the work, and I immediately got the chance to do another product page for another product in the exact same style.
#5. Oranges instead of apples
Sometimes it pays to stand up to clients. Last autumn, I was contacted by a client who wanted me to write a VSL. After a bit of talking, I told him he needs to pick a segment of the market he plans to target. And so we agreed that, instead of the VSL, I would write emails to his existing list to figure out which segment might sell the best.
#6. Outsourced kaizen
This is when you handle the optimization of the copy or of the funnel. Right now, I’m talking to a client who got in touch regarding an advertorial. So I asked him a question straight out of Jim Camp’s playbook: “Who do you have in your corner who can help you optimize this thing to ensure it performs well?” We’ll see if he has someone, or if he’s interested in having me handle this.
#7. Mouth flapping
Parris Lampropoulos, who is famous as an A-list copywriter, once said he actually makes most his money from consulting with his clients rather than the actual copywriting — in spite of the massive royalties he’s typically paid.
But you don’t need to be a marketer of Parris’s stature to get paid for consulting (aka flapping your mouth). Back in my dark and early Upwork days, I had a difficult client. However, one good thing was he would pay me simply to get on the call and brainstorm, or more often, to shoot his ideas down.
#8. The dreaded touchup
When asked to “simply fix up” existing copy, I usually run like I’m being chased by a bunch of angry bees. But I have done it in the past, and sometimes it proved to be good money for little work. For example, I once rewrote the lead (the first page and a half) of a pretty messy sales letter for a live event about investing, and I got paid what was a princely sum for me at the time.
#9. Money for nothing
This is an idea I got from Travis Sago: you take a client’s “trashcan asset,” turn it into risk-free money, and split the profits. I haven’t done this yet, but not for want of trying — I keep talking to all of my current and past clients about it.
#10. Trousers and britches
Sometimes clients need different formats and they are willing to pay you for it. Example: I once wrote a 2,000 word script for a Facebook lead-gen video. But is 2,000 words the right length? The client wasn’t sure. So I took that same script, pared it down to 600 words, gave him that as a second piece of copy, and earned a bit of extra money.
If you make a bit of an effort to suss out what your client might need, and then pick and choose from the above list, you won’t just make yourself more money.
Instead, you will also solidify your relationship with a client, help them be more successful, and profit doubly down the line. And if you want more advice on how to succeed in the business of copywriting, you might like the following: