When you’re just starting work, you’ll do practically anything to get it—including making an offer that’s sure to tank any chances you have of making money or being respected. Oh, and did I mention that the majority of new copywriters make this mistake? Read: It’s a big problem. Let’s make sure you avoid it.
The Big Sin
Before you land your first copywriting client, or even after you’ve landed one or two, the desire for work is still really strong. There are certain clients you really want to work for. And, because of that, that desire will get you to do or promise just about anything. Including…offering to work for free.
See, here’s the thing about offering to work for free. I know it seems like a very fair way of getting them to work with you. It seems like you’re just saying, “Hey, I know it’s a risk to work with me! But I’ll take away all the risk! You don’t even have to pay me!” And that can be a worthwhile message to send—just not right away. (More on that in a moment.)
Why It’s a Bad Idea
If you start out your sales pitch by offering to work for free…why would anyone pay you? Or, at least, why would they pay you a good rate? You’ve already told them that you are more than happy to work for free. It would be ludicrous for them to say, “No, no, let me pay you $50 an hour instead.” At the very least, they’re going to feel like they’re doing you a favor by offering to pay you $10 an hour. To borrow a terrible aphorism that makes sense here, why would they buy the cow when they can get the milk for free?
If you offer to work for free, they have no incentive to pay you well.
The other problem with offering to work for free right away is that rather than demonstrating confidence in your abilities, you’re devaluing them. The thought this plants in a potential client’s mind is, “How good can she be if she’s willing to work for free?” It makes them think that you must be very new, very inexperienced, and probably not very good.
If someone doesn’t respond to a sales letter with an offer like that, it’s because they’re not interested in working with someone as inexperienced as that offer suggests. (It sounds tough but, again, it’s a common mistake. Stick with me here.)
What You Should Do Instead
So, what do you do? Get rid of that offer to work for free. Your initial sales letter/pitch should be full of confidence in yourself and your abilities. Don’t feel that yet? Fake it. (Nobody feels confident right away; it’s all about pretending like you feel it.)
Earlier, I made the caveat that the “work for free” offer can be a worthwhile message to send but not right away. Let me explain. As I just said, you always want to go into a sales letter/sales pitch/meeting with full confidence. That will often take you far.
But if you give it your all and present yourself and your work and your USP for all you’re worth, but the potential client gives you a “no” (I and mean definite no), that’s the only time you can offer to work for free.
In this case, it’s called “working on spec” (different from spec ads) and it means that you’re willing to do a small project for them without promise of payment on the understanding that if they like it, they’ll hire you for more work.
It’s a gamble, and it’s certainly not one you have to take. But if you really want to work with a client, it might be worth trying. After you’ve presented yourself with confidence and gotten the definite no, it does show confidence in your abilities to say, essentially, “Look, I understand I don’t seem like exactly what you’re looking for. But I’m very confident that I can do great work for you. I’d like to do a project on spec for you to show you what I’ve got.”
Some companies won’t take you up on it because it’s against their policies. And if a company does take you up on it, make sure to clearly define the project and make sure it’s a small one. You don’t want to give away hours and hours of your services to land this client. Make sure you don’t get taken advantage of by a company that wants free labor. Control the terms.
I know it seems strange, but you can see the difference between going in and offering to work for free right off the bat and offering to work for free after the “no,” right? One says “desperation” and the other says “confidence.”
And you always want to say “confidence.” 🙂
Watch More: Writing for Family and Friends
On episode 89 of the Build Your Copywriting Business podcast, Nicki and Kate dig deeper into why offering to work for free is a dangerous path to go down for any copywriter—even if it’s writing for family and friends.
Your Turn
Have you ever offered to work for free? How’s that worked out for you? Let us know in the comments below!
Last Updated on December 11, 2023
Ah, well I see my mistake now. I often search on VolunteerMatch for copywriting opportunities. I see now I sounded really desperate with a nonprofit I wanted to work with saying “this is exactly the niche I want to build my portfolio in!” Meanwhile I gave no reason on WHY their niche is perfect for me and why they’d be happy they chose me as a copywriter.
Hi Alina,
Yes – when you’re really excited about getting an opportunity with an organization, it’s so easy to focus on why you want it instead of what you can do for them. When you can come in and explain exactly how you can benefit them and what sets you apart from other copywriters, you’ve already won much more than half the battle.
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
I have never, ever offered to work for free, Not since I changed from lighting to writing 7 years ago. Writing is work and work deserves pay. Plus, as you said, it makes you sound desperate and potential clients will wonder why you are..
Hi Gary,
Absolutely – our work is valuable and deserves reasonable payment. You were very astute to bypass this mistake; many, many copywriters can’t say the same!
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
This entire article helps me understand one of the reasons why I hated blogging. I became bitter and resentful about WORKING FOR FREE!
I was attempting to build a group of followers for my Growth of Gratitude blog with the long-term plan of using the blog to market my book some day. (By the way, that blog is long gone so nobody should go looking for it.) I had an underlying feeling of bitterness because I was working so hard for free, especially when I was struggling to strategically place photos with WordPress. As I saw more and more and MORE people blogging for free, I started thinking, “Why are the good writers GIVING THEIR WORK AWAY?” Then, of course, there were all the bloggers who were poor writers driving down the overall quality of material.
Every minute we spend on free work takes away a minute that we could be supporting ourselves and our loved ones! This future copywriter wants a peaceful life of abundance and not one full of drudgery and struggle.
Hi Susan,
Yup – unfortunately, one of the main reasons content writing pays so much less than copywriting is that there’s just an absolute glut of “writers” (whether they’re any good or not) willing to work for just about any rate. Working for free (and, generally, for low rates as a whole) is both frustrating and unnecessary. Besides, it’s so much more fun to be paid well for our time! 🙂
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
Hello! Great article!
I saw the comment regarding doing free work for non-profits, but I have a slightly different question. I read somewhere that doing some volunteer work for a non-profit, which included letting the client know what you could do for them, was a great way to build your profile.
If you were wanting to also help a non-profit and build your portfolio, is this okay with limits?
Hi Amy,
Great question. What I’d much rather have you do, if the nonprofit *truly* can’t afford you, is to work for a lower rate than your standard one. The fact is that people just value things more if they have to pay for them. That way, you’re getting a piece (or several) for your portfolio and they’re getting a top quality copywriter at a very fortunate rate. If they absolutely can’t pay *anything*, it’s up to you to weigh whether it’s worth spending that time doing that work for free when you *could* be spending that time prospecting for high-paying clients or, better, writing for high paying clients. Does that make sense?
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
Hello
I did a free work as a translator for a non-profit. I wanted to build references for future clients, and I wanted to do this as a side hustle.
I translated from French to English a whole website for them, and it took me weeks since I was also working full-time and taking care of family !
They never bothered to put it online, I guess their free webmaster was not available or something I don’t know what happened.
I was so pissed I stopped doing this free translation altogether :-(.
Too much effort for no reward.
Definitely I won’t do that mistake with copywriting now !!!
Hi Leona,
Yup – it’s very rare for free work to end well. 🙂 Good for you for learning the lesson and vowing never to do it again! 🙂
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
Hi Nicki,
Great article! Had a feeling that you’re going to mention free, but also ‘free’ in terms of zero monetary cost to you. This definitely resonates with me to some degree. Based on some other personal experience with freelance skills I’ve offered, there’s definitely more disadvantages to offer to ‘work for free’ besides devaluing your skills and confidence, because it’s never free. To the business owner:
– You’re still taking their time.
– You’re still taking effort from them to work with you.
– There’s a degree of risk to take you on, especially if you’re starting out.
– To the business owner with a billion other priorities, you offering to work for free becomes “just another thing to do later”.
If you’re offering to write copy for free, but if the business problem that your copy is aiming to solve isn’t perceived as “a free solution” to them, they won’t take you on.
Hopefully other people checking this out can see the true cost of trying to offer such services for “free”.
Hi Dustin,
Absolutely – these are great points. “Free” to a business owner is likely to convey that someone doesn’t really know what they’re doing and there will be *more* work for the business owner in terms of guidance and feedback.
Thanks for commenting!
Nicki
Hi, Nicki!
Wow, your article and the other readers’ comments will save me time and money. I volunteered free editing and proofreading to a medium-sized non-profit. I explained my qualifications, showed how I was connected with — and passionate about — their organization/cause, and sent them a sample of (needed) work on two mission-critical website pages. This is a little-known rare disease research foundation — I don’t expect they have an abundance of offers for free professional proofreading.
I got no response.
As another reader said, it isn’t actually free for the director — there’s her time and the risk of working with an unknown who’s naive enough to beg to work for free and makes a poor pitch. Because I really, really wanted to help long-term. What I don’t want to do going forward is work they don’t actually value or use. (Because if I don’t value my own work, why would the client?)
Your approach is certainly the sensible one.
Many thanks!
Thanks for responding, we are really glad you found the post helpful!
Great article! I would ask, what might I do to rectify the situation if I’ve already offered free work? I offered to my mental health provider and my local library, both of whom I have appointments with in the next week. How should I approach this situation? I don’t think I can charge if I already offered for free?
Hi Sarah! If you’ve already promised to work for free, it will be really tricky to then charge. However, it sounds like if you’re meeting next week, you haven’t discussed the scope of work. What I’d recommend is doing a very (I repeat, VERY) small project for free and then discussing other opportunities to work together at your regular rate. Perhaps, if they already have a welcome email series, for example, you can offer to write some subject line options for free that they can test and see what performs best. Set clear boundaries now so you reduce any resentment down the line 🙂