Copywriter Eman Zabi joined Kira and Rob for the 82nd episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast and we had a great conversation. She became a copywriter a little over a year ago, but in that time has accomplished more than many writers with several years of experience. We talked about her experience in The Copywriter Accelerator and Think Tank and what she’s done to grow her business to the point where she’s working with major outdoor consumer brands. Here are a few of the topics we covered:

•  how she went from star engineering student to copywriter (with a stop at the UN along the way)

•  what the early days of starting her own business

•  what she’s learned from the copywriters she’s surrounded herself with

•  what she’s done to stand out online (her SEO secrets)

•  why she cut the number of projects she will work in half

•  how she’s raised her prices and didn’t worry about “paying her dues”

•  how she goes after the clients that she wants to work with

•  what you have to know to write in the outdoor industry

•  why she threw away her entire list (every single name) and started over

•  her thoughts about creating a signature service

•  how she deals with clients who think she’s too young

•  why she adopted a penguin, two tigers, a great white shark and a llama last year

•  how she built a beautiful website for just $47 (and some tears and caffeine)

•  why she moved half way around the globe last year

•  climbing Kilimanjaro and what she learned from the experience

•  how branding can make a big difference for copywriters

We also talked with Eman about her best advice to copywriters who are just starting out. And what she shared sounded good to us. To hear the whole discussion, simply click the play button below, or scroll down to read the full transcript.

 

The people and stuff we mentioned on the show:

Mount Kilimanjaro

Ban Ki-moon

The Copywriter Accelerator

The Copywriter Think Tank

Lessons from Kilimanjaro

Wix

MooseJaw

Sean D’Souza

Hillary Weiss

Laura Belgray

Eman’s Twitter

The Outdoor Copywriter

Kira’s website

Rob’s website

The Copywriter Club Facebook Group

Intro: Content (for now)

Outro: Gravity

 

Full Transcript:

Kira: What if you could hang out with seriously talented copywriters and other experts, ask them about their successes and failures, their work processes and their habits, then steal an idea or two to inspire your own work? That’s what Rob and I do every week at The Copywriter Club Podcast.

Rob: You’re invited to join the club for episode 82 as we chat with freelance copywriter Eman Zabi, about how she got into copywriting, dealing with clients who think she’s too young, choosing her niche to rebranding to reach her ideal clients, and what it’s like to stand on top of Mt. Kilimanjaro.

Kira: Welcome, Eman!

Rob: Hey, Eman.

Eman: Hey, thank you!

Kira: Great to have you here! So, we’ve been able to get to know you—we’ve had the privilege of getting to know you—over the past, well almost year, through the Accelerator Program, and then now through The Copywriter Think Tank. So we’re excited to kind of dig into your past, and your copywriting, and your business a bit more. A good place to start is with your story. So, how did you end up in copywriting?

Eman: So that’s a funny story, actually. I kind of started off as like every brown parent’s dream, because as a kid, I was like making websites at eight; I was building radios and Morse Code oscillators; and I was going to be an engineer, and I was going to be a great engineer. And then like I started writing, and then I got something published by Bloomsbury at eleven, and then I ended up at the U.N. at fifteen, and then I’m like, “Oh my goodness. I don’t want to be an engineer anymore.” And my parents were devastated. And then I went into politics, and you can’t get a job in politics. I was unemployed; there was no way I was going to get a job with a degree in international politics. And,