Nicolas Cole has ghostwritten for a number of the largest tech founders, Fortune 500 executives, New York Occasions best-selling authors, Grammy-winning musicians, and lots of different completed enterprise house owners and creators.
Alongside the best way, he constructed a wildly profitable seven determine ghostwriting enterprise.
On this submit, you’ll be taught the step-by-step course of he used to develop into a seven determine ghostwriter.
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Step 1: Choose A Service Inside Ghostwriting
There are various kinds of ghostwriting alternatives, and every has nuanced variations.
So, grasp one ghostwriting format after which increase your providers.
Listed below are just a few of the best ghostwriting opportunities that Nicolas recommends for any freelance author.
Social Media Content material
Enterprise leaders understand that clients wish to eat content material from different folks – not manufacturers. So many founders, executives, coaches, and consultants rent ghostwriters to create social media posts for them.
Nicolas estimates you can make wherever from $3,000 to $10,000 monthly ghostwriting social media content material for executives.
The truth is, Chobani just lately employed a social media ghostwriter for practically $300,000 per year to write down content material for his or her executives’ social media profiles.
Touchdown Pages And Gross sales Scripts
YouTubers, coaches, startup founders, and different product and repair house owners want ghostwriters to create touchdown pages and gross sales scripts to promote their services.
As a touchdown web page or gross sales script ghostwriter, your job is to teach prospects and reply their questions concerning the services or products in order that they ultimately convert into consumers.
For instance, should you’re promoting a copywriting course, prospects would possibly wish to know:
- How a lot time will I’ve to dedicate to this?
- Will there be any accountability?
- What sort of copywriting will you educate me?
Nicolas believes ghostwriters can simply cost a minimum of $2,000 for a touchdown web page or gross sales web page, and the very best ghostwriters additionally negotiate a share on prime of the bottom worth.
Thought Management Articles
Nicolas’s first ghostwriting gig was writing thought management articles for an entrepreneur who bought a family-owned plumbing provides firm for over $1 billion.
This entrepreneur wished somebody to ghostwrite articles on Medium, Quora, and LinkedIn to determine himself as a thought chief on-line as he deliberate to publish a guide.
That shopper ultimately referred Nicolas to a good friend, which led to extra referrals and ultimately became a seven determine company.
You’ll be able to cost wherever from $250 to $2,000 per article, and on the top of his company, Nicolas was charging $5,000 per 800 phrase article.
E-mail Programs
Most companies make investments hundreds of {dollars} to generate web site guests, so that they’re additionally keen to rent ghostwriters to create electronic mail programs to retain and remarket to these guests.
As an electronic mail course ghostwriter, your job is to teach the reader on their downside and the way your shopper’s services or products can clear up it.
Nicolas believes that electronic mail course ghostwriting is likely one of the finest freelance writing alternatives as it’s extremely precious to companies and, due to this fact, very profitable.
The truth is, Nicolas quadrupled the opt-in fee for his personal electronic mail record after publishing an electronic mail course, and the enterprise’s income doubled.
You’ll be able to simply cost about $5,000 to $10,000 per electronic mail course should you’re a fantastic freelance author.
Video Scripts
Video content material is an efficient technique to construct relationships with potential clients at scale, so many corporations are investing in video script writers. So, should you’re an excellent author who can distill complicated concepts into easy, compelling scripts, you possibly can simply make six figures as a ghostwriter.
The truth is, these writers are incomes $100 per minute for video scripts.
Whereas it’s finest to concentrate on one service providing and develop into actually nice at it, you possibly can then scale your earnings by providing a number of providers for a single shopper.
Step 2: Ghostwrite For Free
Most aspiring ghostwriters strive promoting their providers by sending chilly emails to their target market or making use of for ghostwriting jobs on writing boards like Upwork.
Nonetheless, it’s troublesome to get a ghostwriting venture should you don’t have any writing expertise.
As well as, most high-level founders and executives rent primarily based on suggestions from associates, so that you most likely gained’t even get in entrance of your dream purchasers.
As an alternative, Nicolas recommends providing your providers free of charge to hone and enhance your talent set.
Nonetheless, don’t simply electronic mail folks and generically supply to work free of charge. As an alternative, pay attention to varied interviews they’ve completed and create a pattern piece of content material primarily based on that interview.
Then, ship them the pattern piece of content material and supply to proceed sending free content material every week.
Right here’s an instance of a script you would use:
This technique is very efficient as a result of it doesn’t require any effort from the potential shopper.
Nonetheless, writing a complete Twitter thread or article is time-consuming.
So attain out to solely your dream purchasers. Ideally, your dream purchasers also needs to have massive networks and a few authority of their business.
That is helpful for just a few causes:
- These influencers will doubtless pay prime greenback in case your providers are passable.
- Influencers are inclined to have bigger networks and may refer you to associates.
- Working for an influencer immediately provides you extra credibility, which can provide help to entice different purchasers as properly.
One other professional tip is to start by pitching influencers with a whole lot of content material (ideally long-form video or interview content material).
That is splendid since you gained’t even must ask the influencer to get on a name with you as they have already got loads of content material accessible on-line you can pull from to ghostwrite your preliminary few items of content material for them.
When you’ve confirmed that you simply’re a succesful ghostwriter, the influencer most likely gained’t thoughts getting on a name with you to do an interview for extra content material concepts. Nonetheless, most potential purchasers gained’t get on a name with you in the event that they don’t have proof that you simply’re a dedicated, good author.
You could find your dream purchasers by choosing a distinct segment after which figuring out the leaders inside that business.
Step 3: Conduct The Interview
The important thing to creating nice content material is extracting the distinctive experiences of your shopper after which organizing them into actionable insights that may assist their target market.
Shoppers usually simply wish to discuss their accomplishments, however their viewers gained’t learn it if there isn’t an actionable takeaway.
To make sure Nicolas will get the very best insights from the shopper, he has a few core frameworks to interview purchasers after which assemble his content material.
Template #1: The Errors And Classes
For this framework, Nicolas recommends that you simply begin by asking the shopper a few massive mistake or main failure they skilled after which dig deeper to see all of the little errors that precipitated that important failure.
For instance, let’s say you’re ghostwriting for a founder whose first firm failed.
There are most likely dozens of errors that precipitated that first firm to fail.
So you possibly can simply ask, “What was a significant mistake that precipitated that first firm to fail?“
Considered one of their responses could also be that they wanted assist hiring expertise. Subsequently, you would create a complete piece of content material round their hiring errors.
Template #2: The Framework
To get a framework out of the particular person you’re interviewing, all you need to do is ask them:
- What was the issue you have been experiencing?
- What have been a number of the belongings you have been doing that precipitated this downside, and the way did you clear up every one?
- What was the end result?
Nicolas additionally talked about that most individuals have a tendency to leap instantly to the conclusion. Nonetheless, it’s the errors that occurred between when the issue initially arose and the decision that creates the framework.
For instance, let’s say that the issue the shopper was going through (and ultimately solved) was round recruiting.
In that case, the shopper might say that these three points of their system have been inflicting the recruiting downside:
- They have been solely posting jobs on job boards.
- They didn’t have any pointers on what candidates have been required to submit.
- The CEO was sifting via the purposes alone.
Then, you possibly can ask the shopper how they solved every of these issues:
- They requested current staff to share open positions on their social media profiles to draw inbound candidates.
- They require candidates to submit Loom movies with solutions to a couple particular questions.
- They’ve a devoted committee for evaluating candidates.
As you possibly can see, the framework is now simply these options that you simply teased out in the course of the interview.
Template #3: The Future
The third template, which Nicolas calls “The Future,” is nice should you’re working with a shopper who doesn’t have a lot time as a result of you will get a whole lot of the data your self.
You simply ask the shopper a few development they’re enthusiastic about, after which you possibly can go and discover statistics about that development your self.
Template #4: Class POV
The class POV framework takes your shopper’s distinctive viewpoint on the place the class or business is headed after which makes use of their very own expertise to again up their thought.
This framework is very efficient as a result of it establishes your shopper’s credibility whereas nonetheless offering worth to the viewers.
For instance, Nicolas might share his viewpoint on the place he thinks the journalism class goes and assist it along with his expertise ghostwriting for high-profile purchasers.
This fashion, you’re nonetheless informing the reader about your shopper’s credibility, however you’re additionally offering worth by giving them a singular perspective.
Template #5: Myths
Oen of Nicolas’s most profitable items of content material was a submit utilizing this framework titled “5 Myths I Realized Weren’t True After Writing 400 Columns For Inc Journal.”
This carried out properly as a result of only a few folks have had the distinctive expertise of writing 400 columns for a significant publication like Inc Journal, and folks like it once you pull the curtain again and supply unique insider info.
Step 4: Write The Content material
The writing course of is fairly straightforward after interviewing the shopper utilizing the frameworks above.
The skilled gives the entire content material you want within the interview, so your job as a ghostwriter is to bundle it in a format that’s straightforward for readers to eat.
Nicolas’s strategy to writing is to take a seat down with the interview transcript after which primarily minimize the fats and arrange it into the frameworks we talked about above.
Nicolas makes use of Rev, however you may also use a software like Grain or Otter to get a transcript of the interview.
It’s extra like assembling legos than writing a chunk of content material from scratch.
Utilizing the transcript additionally ensures you write within the shopper’s voice since you’re utilizing the precise language they used within the interview.
“I simply undergo the transcript and pull out particular person sentences,” says Nicolas. “They’ve already stated it, so my job is to then simply work out the place that goes, and what goes forward of it and what goes after it.”
The truth is, Nicolas feels that 80% to 85% of voice is simply making certain the content material reads properly. The final 15% to twenty% is studying the vernacular they use. That is the place utilizing the phrases they already stated within the interview will help.
Moreover, should you concentrate on one area of interest, you’ll most likely discover that your entire purchasers have roughly the identical model. For instance, most tech startup founders have the identical voice and elegance.
Professional Tip: How To Deal with Rewrite Requests Due To Type
Nicolas additionally talked about that some purchasers would possibly request a full rewrite as a result of the writing model doesn’t sound like them.
Nonetheless, it’s often only a matter of enhancing just a few phrases and doesn’t require a full revision. So, if a shopper requests a full rewrite as a result of they really feel it doesn’t sound like them, the difficulty might be only one or two phrases or phrases.
Step 5: Value Appropriately
As you develop into a greater ghostwriter and earn extra referrals, you’ll attain a restrict the place you possibly can’t tackle any extra work.
First, you possibly can elevate your costs as you degree up your talent set and develop into a greater ghostwriter. To remind you, listed below are the common worth ranges for every of the 5 hottest ghostwriting providers:
- Social Media Content material: $3,000 to $10,000 monthly
- Touchdown Pages And Gross sales Scripts: $2,000 to $10,000 plus a share of gross sales
- Thought Management Articles: $250 to $2,000 per article, although his company acquired as much as $5,000 per article.
- E-mail Programs: $5,000 to $10,000 per electronic mail sequence.
- Video Scripts: $500 to $2,000 plus per video script (depends upon how lengthy it’s and the experience required)
Nonetheless, you’ll ultimately attain a degree the place you possibly can’t elevate your costs way more. The subsequent step to scale is to productize your services.
Basically, you write out your processes after which promote them to others to make use of and implement themselves.
He calls this the barbell pricing mannequin.
That is how one can infinitely scale your ghostwriting providers.
The truth is, that is how Nicolas scaled his earnings.
He started ghostwriting free of charge, ultimately began charging, and shortly earned sufficient to stop his full-time job.
Then, he continued elevating his costs and constructed the company to $5,000 per article.
Now, Nicolas affords a ghostwriting course as a product. This enterprise is way more scalable than merely ghostwriting for purchasers and has allowed him to earn seven figures.
Take The First Step To Change into A Ghostwriter At the moment
Following Nicolas’s playbook, it is best to have the ability to land your first ghostwriting shopper.
Nonetheless, in order for you extra assist from different profitable ghostwriters to hurry up the educational course of, think about becoming a member of the Copyblogger Academy.
Inside, you possibly can join with different extra skilled ghostwriters and content material creators to get suggestions in your writing, ask questions, and develop as an entrepreneur.
You’ll even have entry to varied content material advertising and copywriting programs you possibly can eat at your individual tempo.
So try the Copyblogger Academy in the present day to see if it’s an excellent match for you.
