Thought: short-term costs of changing my service offer
Historically, I wrote lots of content that educates versus copy that tries to get people to take an action. Lots of blogposts, case studies, long-form articles.
I’ve been doing this type of thing for such a long time that I’m comfortable charging quite a lot for it. I also have lots of muscle memory and documented processes, so I can produce high-quality work, fast. This means high prices and high margins (as I charge fixed rates).
Earlier this year, I decided to change my focus, taking on less content stuff and more conversion work. Now I’m working on home pages and landing pages, which has sprawled a bit into messaging and positioning consulting, coaching and copy training.
This has been great. More challenging, very stimulating, and (I think) adds tons of value to my clients’ businesses.
But there’s a tradeoff: I don’t have anywhere near as much muscle memory with this stuff as I do with the content stuff. I’m still working out how to structure this work. I take my time doing it, because I want to do it right, and I charge somewhere in the middle of the market rate for it.
This means: lower prices, lower margins. But only for now. Because the upside is that there’s a lot more growth potential in this kind of work. Growing my content business would have been a matter of taking on subcontractors and increasing volumes. Not really for me.
This type of work has potential to grow the value of the work without growing the volume. And that’s exactly where I want to be – even if it means taking a bit of a hit in the short term.
We’ll circle back next year and see how I got on.