Copywriting For Beginners [Click This - I’ll Teach You Everything]

Everyone starts somewhere. Once upon a time, I had no experience (and hardly any skills!).

In today's article, I'll give you my best copywriting tips for beginners, plus the process you'll follow on your way to a successful career in the field.

If I were a beginner again, here's what I'd do:

I talk a lot about turning your side hustle into a $10k/month copywriting business (that's what I did).

When you're just starting your copywriting career, though? That isn't important.

You'll get there, but you have to get your reps in. The copywriting world discriminates against nobody (who's willing to put in the work).

From Day 1, these are the steps I'd take:

1. Study copywriting.

To get started on the right foot, remember that copywriting is less about writing and more about marketing and psychology.

• Read "Cashvertising" by Drew Eric Whitman. This is the best place to start. Download it, read it twice, and keep it for reference forever.
• Google everything else. The internet is your friend! There are countless resources out there — blogs, articles, podcasts, videos. You can learn a lot from sites like Copyblogger and Very Good Copy, but you'll find the most success by looking for answers to questions as they pop up.

Educate yourself on copywriting formulas like AIDA and PAS, but don't spend too much time on them. Connecting with your target audience is more about speaking their language than following a set of rules.

You'll also want to focus on the nuances of different types of copywriting.

2. Practice at the same time.

You'll never develop copywriting skills without a learn-by-doing mentality. Great copywriting is nearly impossible to describe — you'll only get it by writing every day.

This is your opportunity to explore multiple niches (and potentially get a head start on one).

• Set up a Twitter/LinkedIn account if you're interested in ghostwriting social media posts.
• Create a Medium account if you want to get into SEO copywriting.
• Pretend to write copy for sales pages, web pages, and email newsletters if you want to get into direct response copywriting.

Not only will you refine your writing skills, but you'll have proof of them once it's time to find copywriting clients.

3. Pick a niche.

After you've been writing copy for a couple of weeks, choose a niche based on the type of writing you enjoy the most.

I'll keep it simple for you. These are the most profitable ones:

• Direct response copywriting — ads, landing pages, and email funnels
• Social media ghostwriting — Twitter and LinkedIn
• SEO copywriting — blog post and landing page content writing
• Email copywriting — e.g., for a newsletter like mine

Don't zero in on your 'ideal client' just yet. You still need to put yourself out there and learn. As you refine your writing process, you'll be able to follow the money.

4. Get to work (for free or low pay).

Nobody who runs their own business makes money right out the gate. Sad but true. You'll need to get some experience before you can start charging professional rates.

This is the tough part of copywriting for beginners.

• Copywriting jobs are harder to land.
• You'll face more rejection.
• Clients will lowball you and be hard to work with.

It's a humbling experience, but it's worth it in the end.

I had a client who penny-pinched me for $10. But I needed to deal with them to be prepared for the $5k clients I onboarded a year later.

5. Land your first big break.

After writing copy with multiple clients for a few months, you'll eventually see something that looks like this:

It could be revenue, followers, search engine rankings, website traffic, or conversions. Once you're here, you can turn them into a case study and use it to pitch other clients.

Once you have measurable success under your belt, you can start looking at copywriting from a broader perspective. At that point, you've proven yourself, and you are no longer a beginner copywriter.

Copywriting Tips For Beginners

Learn the art of the headline.

Most people never make it past headlines. If you want your reader's attention, you need to get good at writing them.

Headlines work best when there's at least one of the following:

• A time estimate
• A pain-killing solution
• A challenge or problem to overcome
• An alternative/opportunity for something better
• An eye-opening statistic
• Something “unbelievable” (e.g., a controversial statement or something you’ve been doing wrong)

To help you understand how to apply this, here are a couple viral Twitter threads I’ve created using these strategies:

A pain-killing solution. Who doesn’t want to learn faster?

A time estimate and unbelievable suggestion. I won’t waste more than 60 seconds to learn that?!?!?!

An alternative solution. 37 sentences are free, and I’ve been totally against buying a course…

Use wordplay.

Wordplay could be:

• Rhyming
• A well-known figure of speech
• Alliteration
• An oxymoron
• Creative use of a word or phrase

In this example from BarkBox, "Fetch it Fast" and "Our Pack Has Your Back" are creative, friendly, and on-brand ways to describe their shipping estimate and satisfaction guarantee.

Apple is always on-point with this (I'd also recommend studying Apple copywriting). Here's one of my favorite examples of the brand's landing page copy:

Light and years ahead of the competition. Get it?

Make it about them, not you.

There's a huge difference between saying "I can save you money on flights" and "Never overpay for flights again."

Write to one person.

You may have an audience of a million people, but none of them care about each other. Use the word "you" to create a personal connection between you and your reader.

Let your personality show.

Every brand wants to have a personality. The good news: you have one.

When you add a little pizzazz to your writing, your clients will love it. And their customers will convert.

Here's a look at a few slight changes to the Cards Against Humanity description that make it a little more playful and on-brand:

Anyone can come up with phrase like, "as despicable and awkward as you and your friends." Just don't be a potato! It’s ok to be witty and creative.

Know when to break the rules.

Copywriting involves a lot of conventions, formulas, and best practices. But you should use them as guidelines that apply to ~most~ scenarios.

• Be as short as possible. But it's okay if you need to list items or describe something with a few extra words.
• Use active voice over passive voice. But if you need to emphasize the object of the sentence over the subject (e.g., "Tropical island vacations enjoyed by millions"), use passive voice.
• Focus on benefits instead of features. But don't overstate benefits and understate features — your reader will have no idea what the product does.
• Use a conversational tone. But don't be afraid to use complex words or sentence structures if they better communicate your message.
• Create a sense of urgency and scarcity. But only do so when there's an actual time limit.
• Avoid using jargon in your copy. But, speak the audience's language. Writing web pages for a SaaS product? It's alright to use the lingo.
• Use my copywriting tips above. But don't overuse any of them. They won't have an impact if you do.

Here, it's all about knowing your audience. Whenever you start a new copywriting project, you'll need as much audience information from the client as possible. That way, you know exactly when to go against the grain.

Don't rely on Grammarly and Hemingway.

Gosh. These apps make me groan.

You can write terrible copy the Hemingway app passes. And you can write killer copy that it'll criticize to no end.

This photo sums it up quite nicely:

Grammarly, I actually use. But it always wants to shorten sentences to remove 'unnecessary' language. If you remove too much, you'll end up with a lifeless piece of content.

Hold yourself accountable from Day 1.

I can't tell you how many people I've seen build a little momentum, then spend all their money or waste too much time partying. If you don't stick to your writing habits, it's 10x harder to get back up once you realize how far you have to go.

• Always strive to get better at copywriting. You might have gotten results, but it's a dynamic industry with lots to learn. Always assume you're missing something.
• Don't spend all your money. Besides having enough for taxes, you'll realize pretty quickly that even $10k/month isn't that much money. It's easy to blow it all on bars, restaurants, and shiny stuff. You save money so money can save you. Remember that.

Nobody's coming to save you. It's only up from here, but only if you recognize that.

Invest in mentorship and paid information.

I don't include copywriting mentorship in the steps above because — for the most part — the only way to land a hands-on mentor at the start of your career is to pay for one. The same goes for copywriting courses, which are generally more helpful once you've already learned the basics and committed to the game.

That said, it's the best investment I've ever made in myself.

Three years ago, I sunk $6,000 (~80% of my life savings) into Dan Koe's coaching and mentorship program. It lit the fire under my ass that got me to keep going. And it was the stepping stone to building the network I needed to succeed.

From freelancer to Twitter ghostwriting agency owner, I've come a long way in three years. Along the way, I've coached ~120 through my Growth Ghosts cohort. Early 2024, I'm dropping my course. Join my email list to be the first to know.