Thinking of Hiring a Copywriter? Ask These Questions First!
- Background
“Can you tell me about your background, training, or experience?”
It goes without saying that you’re going to want some of these questions answered before deciding on the best candidate.
2. Experience
“Do you have any relevant experience in our (or a similar) field?”
If you’re looking for specialized content (medical, high finance, science), you’re going to want someone experienced.
3. Knowledge
“Are you with our discipline, practice area, and company?”
Have they done any research on you since you first reached out? How fast can they get up to speed?
4. Onboarding
“How do you go about onboarding new clients?”
Pay attention here. This is when your candidates should stop marketing themselves, selling or up-selling their services, pivot and focus attention entirely on you and your content needs.
5. Process
“What’s the process that you use to go from onboarding to final draft?”
Ask about drafts, revisions, and amendments. How do they go from kickoff meeting to draft, to submitting polished content?
6. Research
What research do you do before drafting your client’s content?
Some background, market and qualitative research is always useful and shows in the polish of the copy.
7. Ideation
“Without leaking any trade secrets, do you have any broad ideas about how you might be able to help us beyond the brief we’re discussing?”
A seasoned professional (like me) will have come to the meeting or call having already done a some light reading, ready to share a few points on where I can add value, offer a few suggestions and leave you feeling that you absolutely can’t survive without me.
8. Professionalism
“Do you see any areas in our online presence that stand out as needing, that you would do differently or could review and revise for us?”
Lean forward and listen carefully to how this delicate question is answered. Even if you know that the quality and tone of your written content needs work, a professional will not take advantage of the question to berate and disparage a predecessor, offer to redo everything, rewrite the wrongs, or offer a total teardown and rebuild of your brand identity.
I create original content, edit copy, and address tone of voice based on methodical qualitative research. And that’s not all!
Looking for ideas for your blog, content, or written communication? Visit my Recommended Reading List of suggestions.
