I just got off the phone with a high-energy client. Interesting products, and a willingness to look at online selling in a new way (perhaps “evolving” way resonates better).

I got the initial job, though at one point, it wasn’t looking great. He didn’t know if I was the “right” person for his company. He asked some tough questions, then went nuclear: “I’m not sure you’re really the right copywriter for me.”

In the first quarter of my career, it’s likely that sentence would have frozen me; a copywriting deer caught in the headlights of a fast-approaching pitch. Eventually I learned to stammer a few bits of boilerplate.

Today, I knocked him dead.

Am I writing this — still vibrating from the conversation — to brag?

No. I want to ask you a simple question: Can you tell someone why they should hire you — and mold that answer to fit their particular situation?

If not, why not?

The Freelance Follies

As a group, copywriters are usually a lot better at selling widgets than we are at selling ourselves. Most of us were raised that way; humility is good. Humble is good.

And it is — but not if stands in the way of speaking strongly about your thoughts.

One thing I know for sure; I’m a lot better pitchman when I say what’s on my mind. When I started, work was harder to find. I was scared about paying the rent, so I tried to kiss a few asses instead of just bouncing a little marketing know-how off the client’s forehead.

That didn’t work. Or it did — in some cases — but it never differentiated me from the other wordslingers.

So What Does Work?

At my ad agency jobs, I was often involved in creative pitches. It was easy to pitch the work I helped craft. But hard to answer client questions on my feet.

Verbalize the larger picture? Answer questions about the larger value of the campaign?

I was in trouble. Big trouble.

I got better at it because one of the best AEs I know gave me some advice: Practice.

Yeah — the same thing that gets you to Carnegie Hall. The same thing that puts athletes in a position to hold gaudy trophies over their heads.

Have you practiced your own pitch lately? Can you tell a prospective client — in a gripping 30 seconds — how you can make them more successful? Can you differentiate yourself from all the word jockeys?

Most of us can do it a lot better on paper than in person — probably because we never practice.

OK, I’ll admit the image of me standing in my office talking to myself is an amusing one, but for a few years, that was a regular occurrence.

It didn’t make me taller or better looking, but it did help me close a lot more business.

Today, I’m a lot better at my own pitch. And while I’m not about to launch a “Selling yourself on the Phone” seminar series, I don’t flinch when it’s time to pitch my work — and my value.

What to Say?

You should already be defining yourself in terms that differentiate you from the herd.

What do you offer beyond the words? How do you make a client successful? How are you different from all the other copywriters?

Today, I told a client they needed to add attitude to their marketing mix. Their customers and prospects exist in a particular pyschographic, so appealing to them was more a matter of displaying similar attitudes and values than it was pitching product bullet points.

I was able to enunciate a larger vision of his brand, including adding a few media channels to the mix.

That’s a far more potent sales technique than promising to write “hard-hitting” copy “that sells.” (If your Web site uses either term more than once, you need a rewrite.)

So write it down. Right now. Decide what you stand for as a copywriter, and then stand up and see how it sounds out loud. I know it sounds odd, but it pays off.

At least it will during your next phone call. Keep writing, and enjoy your weekend.

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