“When you have kids, you have to be a parent to yourself. You need to make time to recharge because copywriting might not be physically hard work, but it’s mentally hard work.”
Angela Denly
Have you made small humans?
Do you find it impossibly hard to juggle parent life and copywriting life?
I started my copywriting business when my son was still in my tummy and that first year was a doozy, and I spent the next 7 years definitely struggling with mum-guilt, balance and getting the work done.
Well, our guest today, Angela Denly, doesn’t claim to have it all worked out but she’s certainly got a great mindset on how to run a happy copywriting business and spend time with her kids.
We also touch on retainers, dealing with self-doubt and Angela’s favourite copywriting tool.
Toon in to destress about parent guilt and learn how to manage your copywriting business without pulling your hair out.
Tune in to learn:
- Angela’s copywriting journey
- Her biggest win and worst fail
- Her favourite copywriting tool
- How she manages self doubt
- How she juggles family life, work and her expectations
- Her tips for newbie copywriters
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About Angela Denly
Angela is a copywriter and communications consultant who helps businesses who mean what they say to say what they mean.
She loves working with B2B services businesses and has a sweet spot for writing mouth-watering copy for food and beverage businesses.
When Angela isn’t writing copy for clients, she can be found playing taxi driver to her two daughters or lifting heavy stuff in the gym.
Fun fact: Angela has aphantasia – no internal imagery.
Connect with Angela Denly
Useful Resources
Transcript
Kate Toon:
Hello, my name is Kate Toon and I’m the head Copy Beast at The Clever Copywriting School, an online community and teaching hub for all things related to copywriting. And today I’m honoured to be chatting with Angela Denly. Hi, Angela.
Angela Denly:
Hi, Kate.
Kate Toon:
Pretty exciting to be the first guest on the first episode of the new podcast. And the reason I chose Angela is also she was the first ever member of The Clever Copywriting Community and the first one to win member of the year. So you’re pretty special, Angela. She’s like, yeah.
Angela Denly:
Yeah. No flies on me.
Kate Toon:
No flies on you. So who is Angela? Angela is a copywriter, obviously, and communications consultant who helps businesses who mean what they say to say what they mean. I love that. She loves working with B2B service businesses and has a sweet spot for writing mouth watering copy for food and beverage businesses. When Angela isn’t writing copy for clients, she can be found playing taxi driver to her two daughters or lifting heavy stuff in the gym. Fun fact. Angela has aphantasia, no.
Angela Denly:
Aphantasia.
Kate Toon:
Aphantasia. No internal imaging. What?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. So if you picture a rose in your head, do you actually picture the rose?
Kate Toon:
Yeah.
Angela Denly:
Yeah, no, I can’t see that. I know what a rose looks like, but I don’t see it in my head.
Kate Toon:
How did you work out other people had that and you didn’t?
Angela Denly:
So when you’re doing guided meditations and people tell you to visualise these things and I thought it was an abstract concept. And then I happened to come across an article about someone going …. And I was like, oh. So I went through my life thinking that these people were talking about this metaphorically seeing these things.
Kate Toon:
Oh my goodness.
Angela Denly:
And then discovered that, no, some people actually see stuff in their heads. It blew my mind.
Kate Toon:
Wow. I read an article-
Angela Denly:
And then most people, it blows their minds when they discover that. I’m like, oh no, it’s black. Right? I know what a beach looks like. I can imagine a beach, but I don’t picture a beach. My husband’s like, oh yeah, my beach it’s got a hammock over here.
Kate Toon:
That is freaky. I heard another one of these. I don’t know what the term for it is. But some people have no internal dialogue. That is freaky. I mean, I wish I could turn my internal dialogue she’s annoying as crap, but yeah I love visualisation. I spend a lot of time in my own little brain it’s yeah. Wow. Okay. Well, that’s weird, but awesome. What a great way to start the podcast. But look let’s talk about, this whole podcast is about real podcasts, not your fancy pants coaches and whatever, but people are actually doing copywriting day in, day out at the coal face, chipping away at their colons. So take me back. Why did you become a copywriter? When did you become a copywriter?
Angela Denly:
Yeah, sure. So I started my career. Well, so I started doing teaching, a teaching degree and I dropped out after six weeks and then went and did office work for a while. And when I was there, I did some media relations stuff as part of my job at Surf Life Saving New South Wales and I really liked that. And so then I left there and went to Uni to study public relations. And I worked in PR agencies for a while. And then after I had my second daughter, so she’s nine now, I couldn’t really see how I could make it work going back into PR agencies.
Angela Denly:
And the part of the work that I had always enjoyed was the writing. So I was like, okay, well I will put out my shingle as a writer. And yeah. And so it start growing from there, I would say I’ve been doing this since she was a few months old from some referrals, from past colleagues and stuff, and then really taking off and really focusing on it for maybe another, maybe eight years. So once she was a bit older, really started to dive in, so yeah. And-
Kate Toon:
I love that. I think that’s quite a common story. Not that you’re just a common creature. But a lot of us …. Some people have had no experience of copywriting. Some of us have done a bit of writing here and there, and then it’s the parenting that forces us to make a decision. And now we are like, well, maybe I could make this copywriting thing a thing. And that first year is a bit like, what the hell am I doing? And then as your kid gets a bit older and as you get a bit more confident, it settles. So you feel that you’ve been a real, I’m doing air fingers copywriter for about seven, eight years. That’s when start to say, I am doing this.
Angela Denly:
Yeah. I think that seems that’s fair. And that’s probably when I took it seriously, once it started to yeah, get a bit of momentum and it wasn’t just a few bits and pieces throughout the year when I was consistently having worked every month, yeah. I would say yeah, about that long. Yeah.
Kate Toon:
Did you feel right from the get go, because this is the common thing we talk about in Clever Copywriting School that you could say “I am copywriter”, or did you have a period of identity crisis?
Angela Denly:
I think I was pretty okay with saying it from quite early because I had a strong background in a related field. So it was quite easy for me to go, well, this is what I’m doing now. And it’s not so much a complete … It’s just a sidestep thing. So it’s the same skills just in a chipping channel in a different way. So I think if I was going from being, I don’t know, a physiotherapist to a copywriter, it would’ve taken much longer to be comfortable with the terminology, but because I had a related professional background, I didn’t really find that challenging.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. Yeah. I get that. Now I may sneeze at some point. I’m just going to put that out there, so I can feel it, you know that feeling, it’s coming but it might not come. Anyway, what were those early years like? What were some of the challenges in those first couple of years?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. I mean, definitely I knew I could write, but I didn’t necessarily know how to write in certain ways. So I think I said, so maybe a year or so in I did your recipe for SEO success course. And I remember saying that I felt like I knew enough to be dangerous. So you don’t know what you don’t know thing. So yeah, it’s like having that confidence in the level of knowledge that you have. So there’s that obviously it’s just the juggling of having a couple of small children, it’s always time pressures and stuff like that. And knowing how much to, how much to reveal that to people whether you know try to hide it, or I’ve never really tried to hide it.
Angela Denly:
I’ve just, I’m working around my kids that’s just how it is. But I think some people try to put on a front, like maybe they’re working a typical, 40-hour week or whatever. And yeah, I think just the challenge of finding work is always an issue. But I think I’ve been quite fortunate. I never get too worried if I’m not booked up in advance, because work always seems to come from somewhere. I don’t know. And if it doesn’t, then I’m happy to take a break, so.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. I mean, I think the common theme of what you bring as one of our ambassadors, Angela’s one of the ambassadors in the Clever Copywriting School, I call them ambassadors foolishly from a Ferrero Rocher advert. There’s no real reason to it. But one of the things you bring is that sense of reality and that sense of the juggle with the parenthood. And you’ve always been very honest about the fact that you’re not here to build an empire. You’re not here to build an agency. This is a career that works for you, that you can fit in around your parenting. And that’s the priority parenting is a priority, this fits in. So I think that’s a big challenge for a lot of other copywriters to accept that balance.
Angela Denly:
Yeah. Not so much now because I’m a bit more, confident in my choices, but certainly a few years ago, I was looking at people who were junior to me when I was in PR agencies and stuff. And next thing you know, they’re managing divisions in PR agencies and their careers are taken off and they’re doing all these things and I’m like, oh, what if I’d done things differently? But I don’t regret any of the choices I’ve made really, because I wouldn’t be any happier, I’d be a lot more stressed. As sorry, yeah.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. I mean, there’s lots of different ways to attack this copywrite thing, isn’t it? We’re going to be talking in the next couple of episodes to Matt Fenwick who has built more of a subcontract to model where he is got people working for him. Sarah Spence’s got an agency model. I went down the more teachy coursey model. But there’s also a lot of pleasure to be had in having clients, having a family life working between nine and three, then stopping there’s lots of different ways of doing this, isn’t it?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. I think that’s the thing I’ve come to learn that there’s lots of ways to be successful. So yeah. So that’s fine. Yeah.
Kate Toon:
There’s lots of interruptions. Angela’s phone just wrang, she looked at me with absolute terror. You’ve got to silence your phone.
Angela Denly:
I know, I’m sorry. I never actually get phone calls, so I’m kind in shock,
Kate Toon:
Who is ringing me?
Angela Denly:
It’s like, how dare they? Who
Kate Toon:
Who rings anyone anymore? My goodness, how rude.
Angela Denly:
It’s the vet, because my dog had dental surgery yesterday, so yeah. So they’re probably calling to make sure that he’s okay.
Kate Toon:
Okay. Well, we won’t be long. We’ll get back to the vet. So look, you’ve been doing this a while now and what do you think has been your biggest copywriting career win?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. So I think that the thing that I thought about this, so a couple of years ago, I won a really chunky retainer it was 12 articles a month, I ended up doing it for 18 months. And that felt pretty amazing to win that substantial piece of work for a long period of time. And I was shocked that …. I went in with what I thought was quite an aggressive rate because I was like, well, it’s going to take a lot of time and that’s going to cost money. And so it was that like, wow, someone will pay me this much money a month to produce these stuff and to do this volume of work. And so that was pretty good. And I loved doing it, but I also was really happy when it came to an end because it were starting to … Finding the ideas for that amount of content each month. That was a lot.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. We love a retainer. We talk about this in the community that retainers are great because when you are starting out, what you’re really in a way trying to do is replace the income you had in a full-time job and also have a degree of security and certainty in your daily life, your weekly life. And retainers give you that regular work, definite money paid at the start of the month. But you can have too many retainers and they can go on too long. I think I’ve mentioned before that I had a retainer with a tech client to write their email and it was highly paid and I kept on putting my rates up. But towards the end of it, I felt like I was just moving adjectives around. I had nothing left. And they can really drain your creativity, come what may. So you’ve got to be careful with retainers.
Angela Denly:
Yeah. So it’s like double edged definitely. Double
Kate Toon:
Double edged sword. So let’s talk about the other side of that then the flip. That was your basic biggest win or one of your biggest wins, what was one of your biggest fails? Come on we love a fail story. There’s so many. Which should we choose?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. Look there’s always just the little projects where you think maybe you could have done something a bit better or you look back and you’re like, oh, I should have approached that a different way. I’m lucky that I haven’t had any really massive fails. I was quite scarred as a baby PR consultant when I was working on an article for the server arm of a big IT firm that everyone would know the name of. And I didn’t understand the subject matter. And so I asked the client for some information and they didn’t get back to me until really, really late. And then it was just a total shitshow really.
Angela Denly:
So I really took a lot from that. And I made a lot of lessons about really making sure to ask questions to go back. If you don’t understand, just get in quick and nip it in the butt before it blows up. So I’m lucky that, I haven’t had any massive disasters as a sole trader now. There’s always the occasional job where things don’t always go perfectly, but generally speaking, I’ve been pretty fortunate.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. I think that’s a great point to make that often what we can do is, if the client doesn’t give us information and we really want to get going with the job, maybe we need the money, maybe we just feel like it’s a monkey on our back. We can go, oh, I’m just going to fill the gaps. I’m just going to write it. And inevitably, then you send it back to the client and they’re like, this is not what we want. And you are a bit like, well, you could have told me what you want, but also you need to ask and wait and wait and say, I can’t move forward unless I have this information otherwise I am pulling it out of my bum. You’re probably not going to like it, so.
Angela Denly:
Yeah. So I think I gained that confidence to push back on the client. It was just something that sometimes, especially when you are starting out, you’re like you’re the service provider. Client says, jump. You say, how high. Whereas now I’m a bit older, a bit crankier. I might, no, I’m not doing that. You need to give me blah, blah, blah. And then, I might not jump, but I might step up a little bit.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. Well, I think it’s like, we need the tools to do the job. We can’t do the job without the information. And if you are not willing to give me that, it’s going to be rubbish copy and you’re not going to be happy and nor will I. But you mentioned their confidence, a big issue for copywriters is self doubt. I think a lot of copywriters are quite introspective, introverted, sensitive, maybe. We’re empaths that’s what makes us great writers. So we feel things very deeply. And one of the things we feel is imposter syndrome and self doubt. How do you deal with that?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. I think it just comes from having 20 years of doing writing for businesses. So just remembering that you’ve done it before, you can do it again. There’s no real secret. You just got to keep doing the work and delivering and have people be happy with you. And remembering those people that are happy with you because for the 99 that are happy, you can’t let the one that comes along that’s not happy, wipe out and invalidate the 99. So that’s why I just have to keep reminding myself of the occasional job where someone’s … And it’s usually not about me. It’s often just an interpretation. It’s subjective. I can see how this meets the brief in any number of ways, but it’s not what the client wants. And that’s not really a reflection on me. It’s just they had something else in mind that they weren’t able to articulate to me until they see my interpretation of the brief.
Kate Toon:
I love that you’ve said that. I love that you’ve mentioned how subjective copywriting is and that you can take one brief and three copywriters could interpret it entirely differently. And that, yes, the whole point is if the client was super able to articulate their needs in the perfect pros, they probably wouldn’t need us. And so the fact that it’s a negotiation. I’ve done a little episode on you are not your copy. Because that’s something we talk about a lot. Is that it is a negotiation that you’re creating something for the client and they have to be happy with it. And that it’s natural for them to be a mends, it’s natural for the client not to like things. It’s natural for their need to be a discussion. So it’s expect it, rather than be horrified every time it happens. I think lots of copywriters go out there and think it’s such a win when the copy just signs off the copy straight away. And in a way I’m like, I’m suspicious of this. No one likes the first draft, what’s going on.
Angela Denly:
Don’t get me wrong. I’ll take it. But sometimes I’m like, really? Really? There’s nothing. Because it come back to you and think, oh, I’m just going to bang out a first draft as a starting point to just keep things moving, because that’s my approach. I’m like, I don’t aim for perfection on the first draft. I do treat it as a negotiation and a process and they expect there to be changes. So sometimes when they’re like, come back. Yep. It’s all good. I’m like, Oh, all right.
Kate Toon:
I know, you know what happens then though, don’t you? They take that copy and by the time it ends up on the website, they’ve rewritten it. I often think as well we need to let the client know that this is natural, that you’re not going to the first draft and I’m not expecting you to, and not take the first draft too far so that they know that there’s room for manoeuvre. And I think, if you send off that first draft kind of a fed of complain, you in your head think, well, I’m 95% of the way there. You’ve set yourself up for failure,
Angela Denly:
Yeah, because there’s nothing worse than when you’ve sent it going. I have 100% nailed have nailed and they come back and it’s covered in red pen everywhere. And you’re like,
Kate Toon:
It’s crushing, it’s crushing. That’s why I like to write less because it’s so hard to rewrite what you’ve already written. It’s like treading over ground you’ve already climbed a mountain. You have to start climbing that mountain again. So don’t get too far up the mountain in the first place, make it iterative. And go from there, I love that. All right. So we’re talking a little bit about parenthood and work life balance. What tips do you have for the parenting copywriter? The copywriter that is trying to squeeze this in, around looking after their kids?
Angela Denly:
You have to be a parent to yourself as well. And that means you have to make sure that you get enough sleep. You have to make sure that you are not eating shit. You have to make sure that you are taking time for yourself because especially when you have really little kids and it’s intense, you need to make sure that there is time for yourself in there. And it might be just going and sitting in the park for half an hour once a week with a cup of coffee, but you need to have that time to recharge because copywriting might not be physically hard work, but it’s mentally hard work.
Angela Denly:
And if you are not looking after yourself, you are not going to be able to produce anything. So yeah, I’m a total sleep knack. I’m in bed 9:00, 9:30 every night, because I know if I don’t get enough sleep, it’s just misery. So yeah. That’s my biggest advice.
Kate Toon:
I love that.
Angela Denly:
Especially when you’re in the trenches of that early parenthood. And just be realistic about how much you can fit in as well. It’s better to do less work well, than to push yourself to the point of a breakdown trying to fit in too much stuff. Because it’s not worth it. You’ve got years and years and years ahead of you to make money. Right? The first year I made, I don’t know, $15,000 or something. And I was pretty stoked with that to be honest. And now my business is in a different position, but my kids are older, I’ve got one in high school and one is year four. So they’re at school every day, it’s a completely different game, so yeah.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. There’s lots to cover there, but a few of the things you said there, parenting yourself, I think super important. And having that third space between being a parent, having a copywriting business, and then there’s a third space there. You can’t just quickly transition from one to the other. You need to take some time for yourself. And the mental game of being a copywriter, as you said, is huge. Coming up with ideas, being creative day after day is mentally draining. I’m reading a book at the moment by Matthew Walker while I’m listening to it called Why We Sleep. And it has completely transformed my idea of sleep from something that’s slightly indulgent and something that it can be couched in laziness to something that’s fundamental to my health. And actually sometimes more important to get that extra hour of sleep than to get up early and go for a run or whatever. We sometimes sacrifice sleep for exercise or even sleep for meditation, but we need sleep more than we need those things.
Angela Denly:
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah I’m a big, big sleep advocate and I’ve seen Matthew Walker’s TED Talk. So I was always a big fan of sleep before then.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. A big fan. I love it now.
Angela Denly:
I love it.
Kate Toon:
So great tips about mental health there, what would your number one tip be for somebody who is literally just starting out as a copywriter? What would be your top tip?
Angela Denly:
Just remember that you don’t have to be as good as every other copywriter out there who’s freaking their thing, all you have to do is be better than the client. When you’re starting out, all you have to do is deliver something better than the client could do themselves and just keep aiming for that. And as you grow and you will probably naturally get more experienced clients and stuff as well. So you will start levelling up to match the level of expectations of your clients, I think.
Kate Toon:
I like that. Okay. Favourite copywrite tool.
Angela Denly:
I keep it pretty simple, give me a laptop with Word and I’m pretty good. But I do really like, there’s a website called Punpedia, which I love because I do like a little pun. And especially when I’m doing a fun food job, puns can be fun. Although the saddest cake food job of my life was a cake business that didn’t want any puns. It was just devastating. And even things that I thought weren’t puns, they were like, that’s a bit of a pun. I’m like, no, you never.
Kate Toon:
Yeah. Oh my God. Copywrite without puns. I just don’t know if it’s even worth
Angela Denly:
Punpedia, is lots of fun, so.
Kate Toon:
I’m going to check that out. That’s one I haven’t discovered, I love a good idiom. I love taking normal idioms and changing them around and fiddling with them. That creative side of it is what I do. And I just love a client that lets me do that. So to finish up, I want to know what’s next for you. So you are about what’d you say eight, nine years into your business. Where do you see the next five years, that’s a big question. But your kids are near teenagers now there is a lot more taxi driving to do, but what next?
Angela Denly:
Yeah. I never know how to answer this question. I’m quite happy just chugging along. I’m really happy being a generalist. I see a lot of people at the moment doubling down on things like email copywriting seems to be the big thing that people are the new niche, the new SEO copywriting. But I’m really happy just being a generalist and doing a mix of things. I’ve got a great little base of recurring clients that are not retainers, but just people who keep coming back to me for things. And then so that’s like a nice little base level and then just one off stuff coming in. So I’m just really happy, just chugging along. And if I can just like maintain this same pace for a few more years and then see where we’re at, see-
Kate Toon:
I love that. I mean-
Angela Denly:
See that my mortgage paid off and then-
Kate Toon:
There you go, this is it. You don’t need to build an empire. What’s wrong with just being happy? What’s wrong with just having a nice day and just enjoying the clients you have, you don’t need to niche. You don’t need to jump on the latest thing. I mean, you can, there’s nothing wrong with that, but I love your approach. I’m sure you have bad days and I’m sure you get stressed, but you do come across as somebody that is managing the balance better than some. And I think it’s because you have this, I don’t know, maybe it’s because you’re so mature, but this maturity, this well, yeah, but is not necessarily ego driven, not hugely financially driven, just as, I think it’s wonderful. So I salute you. I salute you.
Angela Denly:
So yeah. There’s no big plan at the moment. I don’t know. I just keep ticking along and-
Kate Toon:
Keep on swimming.
Angela Denly:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Dory is my spirit guide.
Kate Toon:
There we go. Dory, #Dory. So my final question, which is the question on my contact form, my famous question on my contact form, which has served me so well over the years. What is your second favourite flavour of jam, Angela Denly?
Angela Denly:
I really don’t know how to answer this. I was going to say big jam, that’s really obnoxious. I don’t know. Blackberry.
Kate Toon:
Blackberry? Okay.
Angela Denly:
Yeah. I’m jam agnostic. I like all jam.
Kate Toon:
See if you said on my concept form that you were jam agnostic, I would really want to work with you.
Angela Denly:
I like that.
Kate Toon:
It’s the people who say, I don’t understand this question. I refuse to answer it or just leave it blank. I’m like, come on, play the game. Anyway, Angela Denly it’s always a joy and a pleasure to talk to you. Where can we find out more about your copywrite business?
Angela Denly:
You can go to my website, which is really easy. It’s just my name, angeladenley.com.au.
Kate Toon:
Well thank you for being the first ever guest on a new podcast.
Angela Denly:
Thank you for having me.
Kate Toon:
I will see you back in the community.
Angela Denly:
Okay. Thanks so much, Kate. See you later. Bye.
Kate Toon:
Bye.
