How I Create Content That SLAPS as a Freelance Copywriter
I’m of the belief that I should have a conversation whenever I create content. You want it to feel like you’re talking with your home girl, like it’s a good time. Like how it feels to watch Keke Palmer or Issa Rae, you feel like you know them, and just watching their videos makes you smile.
On that note, every good conversation is a REAL conversation — so authenticity is a biggie. Authentic, human conversations that make people smile. That’s what I try to do with my content.
But how? Let’s get into it ⬇️
Research Foundation
#1. Voice of Customer Research
I love doing social listening to speak my audience’s language, so they always get what I’m putting down. I can do that on social media by looking at comments, reviewing discovery call transcripts, finding patterns in my client feedback, and crawling the internet to see what the community is engaging with!
#2: Cultural Context
My best-performing content is the stuff that aligns with my audience’s values, uses relevant cultural references, uses their words and phrases, and is attuned to our community’s nuances.
Like this post, where I use a trending reference — the Wicked Hollywood movie — to call-out the how only the most successful copywriters are white.
Content Planning Strategy
#1. Monthly Themes
I always like to have a mix of educational and entertaining content, and throw some promotional content in the mix (I should do more of this, to be honest).
Usually that looks like:
- Copywriting tips
- Brand voice & messaging insight
- Marketing industry news
- A day in my life
- Finding the funny in problematic situations
- Showing off my latest work + client testimonials
#2. Content Mix
As you know — since you’re reading this — I have a blog, which I post to twice a week. I also have a weekly newsletter and an Instagram page, TikTok page, and Pinterest feed where I post 2-7 times a week!
I do long-story-long content on my blog and newsletter, with the latter having more storytelling, weekly updates, and funny stories.
My social media is mostly for entertaining, BTS content, with educational and promotional content sprinkled in.
Because social media is such a rapid-fire environment, you want to keep your audience engaged. So having educational content ALL THE TIME can get stale — so I like to keep things fresh, while also reminding my audience that I am THAT GIRL with the big brain.
Creation Process
#1. Content Brainstorming
I love scrolling on Instagram and TikTok for inspiration on turning my content ideas to something fresh and engaging. And I always keep my finger on the pulse of what’s happening in the cultural community.
But I always stay true to what my audience wants to know, and create content that answers their questions. Like “How do I write how I sound?” and “What can I do to make my copy convert more?”
And keeping on top of industry trends by signing up for newsletters and keeping a rotation of media publications keeps me abreast of what’s happening, and makes me an authority figure that can clue my audience in!
Writing Process
Not gonna lie, this took me SO LONG before I used my friend’s AI Copy Buddy to train Claude (my preferred AI platform) to cut content creation time in half. But I still prefer writing all my captions and, of course, my blog posts too.
Because even though Claude does a great job writing in my voice, there’s only one Jemilla (PERIODT), and the posts that get the most engagement — specifically with comments about my caption — are times when I wrote the captions myself.
Because writing it out is so cathartic, and there’s nothing like letting your creative juices flow free. I add more personality, can be more culturally-relevant, and can adapt my content for different platforms.
For example, I can carry on what I said in an Instagram carousel into the caption, while a TikTok post and caption is better kept short and sweet.
Platform-Specific Tips
→ Use carousels for educational and informational content, but don’t have too much copy in your carousels. This is great for engaging your current audience, but adding audio to your posts can get your carousel onto the reels discover page, and expand your reach
→ Continue the topic of conversation in the caption, and always have some kind of CTA. Also, use emojis to break up the monotony of text, and break up chunks of copy. Have a sentence, then a paragraph, then 2 sentences, and then a single word. It gives your readers’ eyes some variety
→ Use your IG stories to share your life behind the screen, have an informal conversation about your post and/or what’s happening that week
→ Use short, engaging reels with trending audios to expand your reach
Blog
→ Use tools like SEMrush, Ubersuggest, Answer the Public, and even Google to find SEO keywords that you can target. This one, for example, is ‘create content’, and I know that 590 people search this term on average per month, and it’s relatively hard to rank for this keyword — but I’m gonna try anyway!
→ It’s always good to have an introduction that summarizes what the reader can expect with this blog post, headers to separate different thoughts, media like images and videos to break up the text, and CTAs peppered throughout to promote your resources
→ Again, brand voice consistency is a cardinal rule of being a BOSS business owner, so make sure your blog posts don’t sound like ChatGPT wrote it. And if it did, no shade! But at least train it to sound like you — again, you can use tools like the AI Copy Buddy to help you out with this.
→ Settle on how often you’ll send emails. I, for example, send an email to my list every Tuesday, and an email to my website copywriting guide & template waitlisters every last Thursday of the month
→ Choose your newsletter style. Are they going to be long, or short? Will you dive right into the meat and potatoes, or will you do a little storytelling? I, personally, write longer emails that start with some personal stories, segue into the topic of that email, enlighten them with some industry news, and end with some CTAs.
→ Have an equal mix of educational, entertaining, and promotional emails. Again, I need to do WAY more promotion of my products, but I know damn well I’ve got the educational and entertaining part down.
TikTok
I’m not going to lie, I haven’t cracked the TikTok nut. But I do find that talking head videos that aren’t planned — I just pull out my phone and press record — do the best. But I have found that:
→ Using their feature Creator Search Insights helps me find which topics to create content for
→ Using trending audios and having an equal mix videos and image posts do well
→ Quick, informational posts do best
→ Posts where I share my hot takes do well too
→ Writing scripts is fine, but it’s better if you can riff — because TikTok viewers prefer deconstructed posts that don’t seem like a performance. Authenticity is key
Organization Systems
I love me a content calendar. I couldn’t survive if I didn’t have my Notion content calendar and separate brain dump tab.
Also, batch creating my content on specific days — usually Sunday, Monday, and Friday — save me SO MUCH TIME during the week.
Plus, I use Later.com and each content’s platform to schedule content ahead of time so I don’t have to worry about posting manually!
Engagement Strategy
There are a lot of things you’re “supposed” to do and not do — but it’s overwhelming to keep on top of it all.
I find what works for me is:
- Responding to comments on my posts within 24 hours
- Replying to my friends’ stories, and having a relationship in the DMs
- Seeing who my people are following and following them
- Sharing my two cents on posts that reflect my values
Measuring Success
There’s definitely more I could be doing to measure my content success, but here’s what I am doing right now:
- Reviewing my top-performing posts every quarter and seeing what I can focus on
- Seeing which content gets the most engagement, and creating more of that
- Posting on IG stories often, which always keeps my DMs hot
- Tracking how many clients come from my content (spoiler: it’s most of ‘em!)
Lessons Learned
What works → educational IG carousels, short & entertaining & values-based reels and IG stories, educational blog posts, and newsletters with equal parts storytelling and education
What doesn’t work → Super long reels, static Instagram posts and TikTok videos, all promotion and no value, not posting enough sales content (it’s a slippery slope)
Adjustments made → Doing 1-1-1 mix of entertaining, educational, and promotional content on Instagram. Posting mostly 4-1 entertaining to educational content on Instagram. Promoting an offer at the bottom of my weekly newsletter.
Tips for Fellow Copywriters & Content Creators
- Find your voice, and stay consistent — you can use my free Brand Voice Guidelines Workbook to help you with this
- Pick a day to batch create your content for the week/month so you’re not strapped for time when you need to get work done
- Have an equal balance of educational, promotional and entertaining content, and showcase your values. Because your audience will appreciate you more for it.
Content Ideas for Copywriters
- A day in my life as a copywriter
- What’s in my bag
- What’s on my desk
- Copywriting tips
- Industry news and what your audience can do with this information
- Let’s write an [asset] for my client together
- Courses to take as a copywriter
- Copywriting tools I use in my business
- What to charge as a beginner, junior, intermediate, and experienced copywriter
- Industry average copywriting rates
- What’s the difference between content writing and copywriting (like I did here)
Conclusion
I hope this post was helpful for you, babes! Make sure to follow me on all my social media pages to see my FIRE content in action:
I plan to get on my zoom with my content game, so you’ll want to be in the loop.
Subscribe to my weekly newsletter for the funny, the insightful, and the tea on what you should know about brand voice, marketing and copywriting.
And keep an eye on my blog so you don’t miss a thing — I post twice a week, and go IN so you can POP TF OFF.
