AI is coming for everything from writing and video to voice and gaming. New tools like Midjourney and ChatGPT let people compress time immensely by generating plausible content in minutes, not months.

If you haven’t already used these tools, I highly recommend doing so today — they feel like magic.

And of course, people are going ballistic.

Artists are howling bloody murder about AI scraping human artwork to generate new pieces. ArtStation and DeviantArt are the first of many platforms to grapple with this issue.

Lawyers are suing large tech companies over potential copyright issues from AI-generated code — GitHub’s CoPilot is the first such target.

This isn’t just faraway rage, either. I was at a gaming convention in Sandton recently and casually mentioned “AI art” mid-conversation with some animators.

There was a nervous silence — before they all erupted into passionate defenses of human art.

Their concerns were valid. They also missed the point.

No matter how loudly artists rage against generative AI, the tech is here to stay. This forces one of two options: adopt or adapt.

Adopt

You can choose to adopt AI into your workflow. This can mean using CopyAI ($), Rytr, or similar tools to generate first drafts of marketing copy after completing customer research.

It can mean using Midjourney to generate illustrations for your blog post, as I’ve done in this newsletter.

If a new technology isn’t going away, and it threatens your professional prospects, co-opt it into your work. 

Content marketers are learning this lesson (again). A writer’s work goes beyond just banging out words — a business pays you to think.

Instead of raging against the machine, use AI to automate your business.

Adapt

Your second option is to adapt to the coming of the machines by pivoting to a higher-level role, a more manual one, or switching to a new career entirely — preferably one centered around the new technology.

I tweeted recently that manual (not necessarily menial) jobs are the safest from AI. Robots can’t do a plumber’s job (yet), nor can AI replace a carpenter. By contrast, coders and copywriters are more at risk.

If you work with your hands, you’ll be fine for the foreseeable future. If you’re a knowledge worker, now’s the time to rise up the ranks and get paid for strategic thinking instead of just execution.

For instance, if you’re a copywriter, take the bird’s eye view and learn account management or marketing strategy. If you’re a content marketer, pivot to product marketing. If you’re a coder, master project management to better handle deployments.

By design, each of these pivots requires you to zoom out of your role to understand how it fits into the wider business.

Better yet, become an AI engineer. Codecademy will teach you coding and AI fundamentals for just $25/mo, and starting salaries for AI engineers are north of USD 120,000/yr.

That’s an insane ROI for ~3 months of learning — your university degree can’t match that. Best of all, you can work remotely as a coder or become a highly paid tech writer on AI.

Humans wanted — robots need not apply

AI can bang out words, numbers, and graphics, but these are a small part of any corporate job.

Right now, AI cannot think (it just matches patterns really well); cannot discern between good or bad (it will defend any point of view you ask it to); and cannot curate or collect data from the web yet (this will likely change soon).

And while AI is great at working with data, it’s not adept at working with and managing people — the ultimate subject in any business or social setting.

In short, AI sucks at critical thinking, leadership, creativity, negotiation, collaboration, cognitive flexibility, people management, emotional intelligence, problem-solving, and judgment.

These are also the top 10 skills humans will need in the workplace over the coming years. No matter what anyone says, AI can never fully replace people.

As a young professional or entrepreneur, now’s the time to pick a path. 

Most AI tools today are cheap enough to adopt into your workflow without feeling the pinch. With a few subscriptions each month, you can 10x your productivity and secure that promotion.

AI tools are also evolving slowly enough that there’s time to adapt your career toward higher-paying, human-centered roles AI can’t perform.

No matter your choice, complaining won’t get you anywhere. AI is here to stay — don’t let it harm your pay.

Till next time,

Mo

Programming note: I’m taking the rest of the year off — see you in 2023.

Everything’s getting more expensive.

Utility bills are rising, marketing is getting costlier, and vendor fees continue to rise.

This leaves little profit after you’ve paid all your suppliers, subscriptions, and salaries (if you have a team). Low profits hamper your ability to grow, expand, or pivot your business.

Plus, nobody wants to work forever — we all want to work less and earn more. But while your business struggles to stay afloat, inflation sneaks up on you, eating away at your income.

Translation: it’s probably time to raise your prices.

The benefits of raising your prices

Higher prices mean you can cover your expenses more confidently.

This means retaining the best staff, expanding your business to new premises, building out new offerings, and upgrading existing equipment and services (like getting faster WiFi).

More importantly, you win back time to plan for the future without taking on more debt.

But it’s not all roses.

The dangers of raising your price

Customers will balk at your price changes. Everyone loves a discount — nobody likes an increase.

Cash flow may dry up temporarily as the market adjusts to your new pricing. More of your quotes and proposals will be rejected, especially in a price-sensitive market.

Worst of all, you’ll beat yourself up when your revenue doesn’t automatically rise as fast as you thought it would.

Why you should raise your prices anyway

Despite the above reasons, there are five reasons why you should raise your prices anyway:

1. You don’t get what you deserve — you get what you ask for. As a founder, you must permit yourself to raise your prices — there’s nobody else to ask for permission. This mental hurdle is often the hardest to cross.

2. Your service providers are raising their prices, too — they don’t care about your cash flow problems. To keep up with this rising cost of doing business, you’ll need to raise your prices, lower your costs, or both.

3. You can always revert to your old pricing if the new one doesn’t work out. Worst case, you lose a few gigs and piss off a few customers. Best case, the market adjusts to your new pricing and you’ve permanently raised your income.

4. The growth of your business depends on higher revenue — making more than you do right now so you can do more than you can currently. The fastest way to make more than you do right now — without adding new products or switching up your business workflow — is to raise your prices.

5. Raising your prices forces you to deliver more value to your customers since you have to justify the price increase. This can mean faster or higher-quality service delivery, which only enhances your reputation and gives you more leeway to raise your prices in the future.

How to raise your prices without pissing off your customers

The five-step process for tactfully raising your prices is as follows:

1. Determine unit prices and margins

2. Know your business and life goals

3. Adjust your prices competitively

4. Communicate the price change

5. Soften the blow

#1 Determine unit prices and margins

Before raising any prices, calculate the unit prices of your offerings. This calculation hinges on your monthly costs, desired income goals, and ideal work schedule. 

Let’s say you offer portrait photography on an hourly basis, with your monthly costs as follows, denoted in Simoleons (§):

At 40 hours a week (160 hours a month), your time costs §13.75 per hour (§2,200 / 160). 

If you deliver 10 photos per shoot and spend about 4 hours on each gig for scouting, traveling, shooting, editing, and delivery, then your unit cost per shoot is §55, and each photo costs you §5.50. 

Get super clear on your numbers — they’ll come in handy in the next step.

#2 Know your business and life goals

Goals drive gold. A clear idea of what you want helps you work backward to achieve it.

Following our photography example above, let’s say you’d like to work only 20 hours per week (80 hours a month). This means you’d need to charge a minimum of §27.50 per hour (§2,200 / 80) to reach that goal and still break even.

But you don’t work to break even — you work to make a profit.

Let’s further assume you want to earn at least §4,000 per month. This means you’d need to charge at least §50 per shoot (§4,000 / 80), leaving you with §1,800 in monthly profit.

Those margins and profits give you breathing room to save up for an extra camera, hire an assistant, and spend more on marketing.

More importantly, they cushion the blow of unexpected expenses — a lost gig, broken lens, or urgent emergency.

The extra money also means you can save for a rainy day, invest, or spend more time with friends and family.

#3 Adjust your prices competitively

‘Competitively’ in this context means pricing according to your desired positioning and the market.

You may be a low-end product seeking to command higher premiums. A higher price sends the right message and filters out low-paying customers.

But the market also affects how much you can charge for something.

If you charge §100 for a fungible product (i.e., easily replaceable), and other competitors who are as good or better than you charge §50, you’ll have a hard time convincing anyone to buy from you, no matter how premium you want to position your brand.

This is where the principles of luxury marketing come into play. You can highlight your higher quality, better processes, or rich history and pedigree.

After all, all soaps clean, but some soaps are better than others.

#4 Communicate the price change

Once you’ve done the math, it’s time to inform your customers of the price change across as many channels as possible.

This can mean:

1. Communicating the increase in your newsletter

2. Posting the price change on social media

3. Updating your website’s pricing table

4. Putting up posters on your premises

5. Informing your suppliers or resellers

6. Sending a broadcast text message

7. Updating your WhatsApp Stories

Do all of this at least a month in advance, especially if you have retainer or subscription clients. You don’t need to explain yourself extensively — the following template should suffice:

Please note that we're increasing our prices by 20% as of [date]. This increase will allow us to cover our costs, ensure continued growth, and improve our services.

We appreciate your support and understanding. If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to reach out at [email address].

This brings us to the last step:

#5 Soften the blow

You can soften the blow for your customers through grandfathering and bonuses.

Grandfathering means your current subscribers are exempted from the new price. If you’ve ever bought a lifetime deal for a software tool (like on AppSumo), you know how beneficial this is as a buyer.

As a seller, you gain lifetime loyalty and free brand ambassadors who are less likely to switch to a competitor.

You can also time-box the grandfathered discount by giving current customers time to enjoy the old price (say, for 12 months) before you upgrade them to the new price.

Bonuses grant customers who switch to your new price before a given date a little extra product.

Let’s say you sell one bag of garri for §20 and plan to raise the price to §30 per bag next week. You can offer to sell two bags of garri this week only at the new §30 price to drive last-minute purchases. Thereafter, the price reverts to §30 per bag.

Petrol stations do the same thing — think of all those long queues on the night before a petrol price increase.

Bonuses drive urgent action and play to buyers’ sense of greed and loss aversion (“Buy now and gain extra or risk losing out on a good deal”).

Don’t be afraid to raise your prices

No matter your business, you’ll need to raise your prices at some point. Business growth doesn’t happen without additional time and effort, both of which need money.

By calculating your unit costs, aligning your future goals, communicating with customers, and softening the blow, you can kick off the next quarter or year with higher pricing, more revenue, and more room to grow.

Connect with me on Twitter or LinkedIn.

Marketers and founders rush to market with half-baked thoughts about what their customers want. This leads to long, expensive, and painfully ineffective campaigns.

Customer interviews help you position yourself better, charge more to the right people, and sell exactly what they want.

To leverage this money-making magic, you’ll need to:

1. Set up customer interviews

2. Ask targeted questions

3. Record their answers

4. Apply the learnings

5. Ask for referrals

Let’s dig into each step.

#1 Set up customer interviews

Firstly, reach out to your ideal customers online or offline. This can be through social media, your mailing list, or your personal network.

The request:

“Hey, would love to get your thoughts on [product] and how we can improve it. Opposed to a 30-minute chat?”

Most customers or prospects will say yes, as people want to help you create a better product for themselves. Their selfishness works in your favor, as you’ll learn what they’re willing to pay for.

Face-to-face meetings are great, but I prefer Zoom — it’s faster, cheaper, and more scalable. It also allows you to record your interviews.

Create a quick Calendly account, send a meeting link, and have them pick a suitable time.

Keep your interviews between 30-60 minutes — if it’s engaging, you’ll likely go over an hour.

#2 Ask targeted questions

Throughout the interview, talk less and listen more. You’re trying to understand the following:

1. Profile: Who are they? (E.g., Female, 32, Johannesburg, MBA grad, mom) 

2. Triggers: What made them seek out a solution? — “I wanted to make a Christmas meal for my family”

3. Media: Where do they consume content? — “I watch a ton of cooking videos on TikTok and Facebook”

4. Impression: What do they think about your product? — “I love your site” or “Your layout isn’t the best”

5. Challenges: What fears, worries and roadblocks are they facing? — “I tend to overthink recipe-making”

6. Alternatives: What other tools or solutions have they tried and paid for? — “I tried hiring a private chef”

7. Expectations: What do they expect from your offering? — “I’d love to see a way to filter by ingredients”

Customer interviews tell you what to build, how to build it, and what to charge. For example, you might mistakenly think:

• …you’re writing for Gen Z when your real target market is Millennials

• …the restaurant next door is your competitor when it’s your customer’s workplace cafeteria

• …you need more product guides but your customers struggle with impostor syndrome

• …they want more features but they prefer less things to remember

• …discounts were necessary but they send the wrong message

You won’t catch any of these flaws unless you speak to your customers. 

#3 Record their answers

Take lots of notes in Google Sheets. Structured data makes analysis easier and faster.

I use a souped-up version of this template — make a copy and tweak it to your liking. 

Record each call via Zoom or Meet and store them in the cloud. I use Dropbox, but you can also use Google Drive or OneDrive. There are a few reasons to use cloud storage:

1. You won’t remember much of the interview, so recordings help preserve the insights you gleaned

2. You can transcribe the videos for easier scanning and analysis later

3. Your team can gain access to customer interviews in your absence

Don’t get hung up on this part — just use any tool you’re comfortable with.

#4 Apply the learnings

The insights you’ve gathered can help you improve your business.

First up, assess your current target market — are they the right people you should be selling to? Your interviews might reveal you’re targeting people without much buying power — and that you might need to move up the ladder.

Next up, review your business model — does it benefit you and your customer? You might discover that selling one-off products harms your bottom line when subscriptions would make more sense. Or that customers balk at paying up-front and want a free trial first.

Then, assess your pricing — are you under or overcharging? There might be a lower-priced offering you can use to attract the lower end of the market or a premium offering you can sell to your superconsumers.

Next, review your offering — are customers delighted by your product or service? If so, use their words as testimonials in your marketing. For example, “I love your events — they’re always so much fun!” can be your next landing page headline: “The most fun you’ve had in a while.”

Lastly, assess any concerns, goals, and expectations around your product or service  — these usually provide a direction for your business roadmap. 

For example, concerns around safety might suggest the need for more behind-the-scenes content around your processes. Similarly, expectations around benefits and features can help you prioritize what to build next.

You don’t have to implement every suggestion you get, but customer expectations give you an idea of how to strengthen your moat.

#5 Ask for referrals

One customer interview usually leads to another. At the end of each interview, ask, “Do you know anyone else I could talk to about this?”

Referrals expose you to more insights from people in your target market.

If someone is willing to do an interview with you, there’s a high chance they’ve also told all their friends about your product.

Leverage that to form a small community around your product and even start building your mailing list.

Go forth and talk to your customers

In summary:

1. Set up customer interviews

2. Ask targeted questions

3. Record the answers

4. Apply the learnings

5. Ask for referrals

The best part? A podcast lets you do this all in one go and generate content for your channels.

Connect with me on Twitter and LinkedIn for more.

Here are three ways AI can shorten content creation time by up to 80%:

1. Writing

2. Editing

3. Visuals

#1 Write with AI

Nothing sucks more than writer’s block. Thinking of what to write likely sucks up more time than the writing itself.

Use Rytr (free) to create copy for social media, your website, and marketing assets.

Plug in your brand name, details, and desired tone, and watch it generate the right words.

Below is what Rytr looks like in action. I asked for three variants of landing page text for a content marketing agency:

#2 Edit your writing with AI

Your first draft is always shite, and that’s okay. AI-powered editing tools like Grammarly can help you polish your work before publishing. Here’s what editing this post with Grammarly looked like:

Pair Grammarly with Hemingway to help you publish work that’s easy to read. Hemingway identifies long, confusing, or unnecessary words in your writing.

#3 Generate visuals with AI

It’s hard to find visuals that haven’t been used everywhere. Thankfully, you can now generate the basic visuals you need with some prompting.

I use Midjourney to generate almost all my images and logos, but you can also use DALL-E or Dawn.ai. Here’s an image of a sunscreen bottle you might use for your website:

And here’s a photo of a model you might use to advertise a photo studio:

The output isn't perfect — it may add extra fingers or misshaped eyes. But this tech gets better daily, and you can always edit the output if you wish.

You can also use AI to generate logos and, soon, even turn those logos into vector files. Here’s a sample logo I generated for a copywriting business:

You can also use Pixelvibe to find AI-generated stock photos and generate your own.

And more

Here are just a few more ways you can save time and money in your business with AI:

• Caption your podcasts and videos with Descript

• Generate ads for social with Clickable using your brand name and logo

• Run automated ads on Facebook based on your audience, budget, and goals

AI allows you to market your brand better, faster, and in most cases, cheaper. Try out the tools in this piece and let me know how it goes.

Business whales

A whale is a large client that contributes significantly to your income. When you’re a founder, one big account can help you pay rent, buy new equipment, hire, and invest in marketing. 

This gravy train is great until it’s not. When you depend on a whale to fund everything, you risk your income when it no longer makes sense for them to retain you.

Long before this happens, you’ll also deal with other unpleasant side effects, such as:

• Unreasonable demands from the whale

• Limited room for dissent as the whale holds all the power

• Distress and attrition among your team when you can’t stand up for them

Your whale suffers too, as they encounter less resistance to potentially bad decisions that you keep quiet about to avoid upsetting them, leading to poor results.

As a business owner, avoid customers turning into whales by always adding new clients to your roster. Do this even when you’re making enough money. Aim for four clients or income sources to de-risk your revenue and bring peace of mind.

Career whales

Whales aren’t just a business phenomenon — you also encounter them in the workplace. Everyone is a freelancer by default; most people simply choose to have one client — their employer — as their whale.

When the going is good, you can fund your lifestyle, support your family, and swell your savings with one salary.

But your income becomes at risk when there’s trouble in paradise: disagreements with management, missed annual quotas, open hostility between colleagues, or changing market conditions. 

Sometimes the trouble is personal: sudden debt, an expensive illness, or an unexpected child. In each of these cases, you’ll need more money — and in most cases, you can only request a salary review once a year.

If you work a 9-5, diversify your income. A side hustle doesn’t always mean a new business — it can mean doing the same job in different ways. 

For instance, if you work in social media or SaaS writing, you can work in-house, consult, publish books and guides, teach it to others, or speak about it to business owners. You don’t have to leave your field.

Whatever you do, always have options. It’ll make you richer, put you in a better position to negotiate, and let you leave bad arrangements.

Need help?

1. Connect with me on Twitter and LinkedIn

2. Book a coaching call with me to grow your business

3. Get my 30-day content strategy template to help you create business content

There’s no getting around it — switching careers is scary. I’ve done it a few times now: from lecturing to advertising to content marketing and all the side quests in between.

Whether you’re moving jobs for higher pay, greater job satisfaction, or to own more of your time, a career switch means leaving predictable pay at a safe job to wade into uncertainty.

The key to making the switch is fairly simple — but as with all advice, it’s easier said than done:

1. Find a transferable skill you can get paid for

2. Add new skills to your skillset

3. Massage your CV to match your new career

4. Create a portfolio around your next role

5. Ask your network for referrals

6. Improve your online presence

7. Apply for jobs in your new career

#1 Find a transferable skill you can get paid for

Your first step is to comb through your career history and look for practical transferable skills — ones you can apply to any job.

Most online guides list communication, dependability, and teamwork as transferable skills (and they’re not wrong), but these skills are a hard sell when transitioning from, say, HR to engineering.

Companies need something more practical to justify hiring someone from an unrelated career path.

Examples of practical transferable skills include project management, sales, coding, speaking, writing, and design. Master these skills and you can work anywhere.

Examples:

1. You worked in telecoms managing implementation projects. Apply those project management skills to campaign planning at an ad agency.

2. You ran a photography business (like I did). You can take your image-capturing and editing skills into marketing and work as a social media professional (like I did).

3. You worked in waste management. Polish up your community advocacy and project management skills and seek work in the sustainability departments of companies like Coke and Pepsi.

4. You were a teacher or lecturer. Reinvent yourself as a corporate trainer to earn more money teaching professional skills.

5. You’re a journalist. Your writing skills would be useful for tech executives in marketing, PR, or even ghostwriting.

6. You’re a club promoter. Since that job is about image management and event coordination, you can transition to PR, broadcasting, social media marketing, or even a speaking career.

Transferable skills are everywhere. Think of your skills as library books: which bestsellers can you gift your next employer?

#2 Add new skills to your skillset

To improve the success of your career switch, add one or two new skills to your skill set:

1. If you’re good with social media, take a short writing course to transition to content marketing.

2. If you’re a whiz with cameras, learn how to use Illustrator to transition to graphic or UI design, or copywriting to make you a better social media manager.

3. If you work in finance, polish your coding or project management skills to land lucrative jobs in fintech (a $115 billion market).

You can learn new skills from Udemy, LinkedIn Learning, or Codecademy (coding). Give yourself three months, practice every night after work, and create simple works — a drawing, speech, blog post, or browser app — and post them online to attract new opportunities.

#3 Massage your CV to match your new career path

Your CV will need a makeover to match your new career aspirations. Carefully review past roles and rewrite them to reflect your new aspirations. Don’t lie about your roles — reframe the work you did.

Example #1: You handled social media management at an ad agency.

1. If you’re switching to a data science career, emphasize the analytics you gathered — audience insights, ROI, and revenue growth. 

2. If you’re switching to a career in design, emphasize your creative work — images, posters, and other campaign assets.

3. If you’re switching to the writing track, emphasize the copywriting you did.

One job — different faces.

Example #2: You worked as an engineer at a plant.

1. If you’re switching to a coding career, talk about the hardware and software systems you worked on.

2. If you’re moving into project management, bring up all the internal projects you led — goals, milestones, challenges, and results.

3. If you’re moving into a people management role, talk about the team(s) you worked with or led.

Same job — multiple roles.

Massage your existing CV to suit the new career you want.

#4 Create a portfolio around your next role

You’re coming from an unrelated field, so you must work harder to prove yourself.

As you learn new skills, one way to improve your chances of switching careers is to create a small body of work around the new path you’re considering. This body of work will consist of content and case studies.

Create content

Content is everything you’ll write or say about the new career you’re aiming for. If you’re transitioning to coding, you wanna talk about software best practices, your favorite IDE, popular apps on the market, and the programming language you’re currently learning on Codecademy.

Create case studies

Case studies are everything you’ve done in your previous career(s) — projects you’ve managed, content you’ve written, and roles you’ve hired for (if you worked in HR).

These case studies are brief write-ups (under 250 words) that live on your website (use Carrd or Wix) and improve your credibility, making employers and customers more likely to trust you.

Nobody knows what you’ve done till you tell ‘em — so tell ‘em.

#5 Ask your network for referrals

Your network is the first (and easiest) place to start searching for jobs in a new field. Tell friends, colleagues, and customers about your career intentions and ask them to keep you in mind for any new opportunities.

1. That marketer you sold software to can help you transition into content marketing

2. That derivatives trader whose house you designed can point you to finance or fintech jobs

3. That chef whose child you taught can show you where to find hospitality jobs

Ask and ye shall receive. When you know what you want, people conspire to help you.

#6 Improve your online presence

If they can’t find you online, you don’t exist. If you want to break out of your current career and expand your pool of options, you’ll need a LinkedIn presence. 

LinkedIn is the easiest platform to start with for the following reasons:

1. It’s your online CV, so you can send your LinkedIn URL instead of PDFs

2. All the recruiters and hiring managers in your new field are already on LinkedIn

3. LinkedIn has a jobs section you can use to find new opportunities

4. Most LinkedIn users don’t post regularly, so it’s easy to stand out

Here are the basics of starting on LinkedIn:

1. Sign up for a LinkedIn account

2. Upload a nice headshot (a smiling selfie against a white wall will do)

3. Add a headline in this format: “[x] looking for opportunities in [y].” (E.g., “Social media manager looking for opportunities in sales”)

4. Add a short bio of who you are, what you’ve accomplished, what you’re learning, and where you’re headed next (E.g., “I’m a social media manager who has grown audiences for Coke and Fanta 30% each year through organic and paid marketing. Currently completing a sales certification and looking for sales and account management roles in SaaS.”)

5. Add your previous job titles and duties (massage them accordingly — see above)

6. Add a few related skills to your profile and ask for endorsements and recommendations from your network

7. Add the right keywords to ensure you get found in Search results

8. Connect with a few people in your target field to start building your new network

Once your profile is up (reach out to me for LinkedIn profile revamps), start creating content around your current role and future path.

Add at least 20 people daily to ensure you have enough people to engage with — otherwise, you’re just shouting into the void.

See my LinkedIn playbook for insider secrets on how to win on LinkedIn.

Mo's Letter

The 14 Hidden Rules Of LinkedIn: How To Stand Out, Get Hired, And Win New Customers

LinkedIn is a goldmine, but most people don’t use it to its full potential. As of writing, I’ve got over 30k followers and connections (connect with me!) — but I didn’t get here overnight. It took lots of small interactions to build my audience — and with LinkedIn, you get out what you put in…

Read more

3 years ago · 3 likes · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

#7 Apply for jobs in your new career

Getting a job is a numbers game — the more jobs you apply for, the higher your chances of landing a great one. So don’t despair — keep applying. 

You can find job vacancies in your local newspaper (yes, still relevant), on LinkedIn Jobs, and on job boards like PNet (for SA) and Indeed (global).

If you’re looking for a remote job, I wrote an extremely detailed guide on that. If you’d rather sit back and let me handle that long process for you, apply to work with me.

Track every application in a document like this one — it’ll help you stay up to date on application statuses and let you determine if you’re applying enough (because finding a new job is a full-time job).

A few things to keep in mind

As you make the leap, you have a career advantage. You’re coming in with skills and experiences your future colleagues don’t have, which gives you a unique perspective on solving problems in your new domain.

Secondly, you may take a small income hit as you switch careers. This is normal — you’re coming in from an unrelated field.

Unless you’re starting your own business, you’re most likely competing with people who’ve been doing your desired job longer (and better) than you have.

You may have to compromise on income — but look at it as pulling a bow back to launch an arrow forward. A small step (back) income-wise becomes a huge step forward for your career.

It’s best to switch careers after you’ve saved up cash to cushion your move. Finding a new job is easier when you’re not drowning in bills or worrying about cash flow.

Thirdly, you’re leaving your current career for a reason. The last thing you want is to dive into a new career that doesn’t address your reasons for switching in the first place.

If you left for more pay, don’t wade into a career with historically low earnings. Avoid careers that suck up all your free time if you want more time.

Don’t go work for a company that requires you to use time trackers or with lots of bureaucracy if freedom is your priority.

In short: don’t make the same mistake twice.

In summary:

1. Find a transferable skill you can get paid for

2. Add new skills to your skillset

3. Massage your CV to match your new career

4. Create a portfolio around your next role

5. Ask your network for referrals

6. Improve your online presence

7. Apply for jobs in your new career

That’s it — a straightforward guide to switching careers. Connect with me on LinkedIn and let me know how it goes. Good luck!

Need more help?

Book a coaching call with me to grow your personal brand, and get my 30-day content strategy template to help you create epic content on LinkedIn.

Of all the niches you can write about, tech is where the money’s at. This is because tech companies are typically backed by venture capital, which means:

1. They have a lot of money to spend on marketing

2. They’re under pressure to grow quickly

This is good news for you, as it means there’s always demand for tech and SaaS writers and you can quickly raise your income.

Depending on how fast your writing quality improves, you can go from $200 per article (1,000 words) to as much as $2,500 per article. 

However, becoming a highly-paid tech writer isn’t as simple as changing the headline on your LinkedIn profile and hoping for the best.

You must first:

1. Decide which niches you enjoy writing for

2. Create a small portfolio of articles

3. Spruce up your online presence

4. Connect with potential clients

5. Showcase your expertise

6. Apply for jobs

Let’s dive in.

#1 Decide which niches you enjoy writing for (1 day)

If you enjoy writing about the topic, it’ll show in your work (and the size of your invoices). It’s important to pick a topic you have some interest in so you don’t get bored or burn out.

There are different sub-niches within the tech space, such as

1. SaaS: Software products, platforms, and services

2. Design: UX design, UI design, product design

3. AI: Artificial intelligence and machine learning

4. Cybersecurity: Networks, security solutions

5. Food: Food tech and AgTech (agriculture)

6. FinTech: Stocks, crypto, Defi, Bitcoin

7. Health: Healthtech and MedTech

You can explore different niches and settle on one or two later.

#2 Create a small portfolio of articles (7 days)

Clients want to see your previous work (also known as ‘clips’), so you’ll need to create 3-5 good pieces. If you write one short article daily, you should be done in a week.

Here’s a simple formula to get you started:

1. Topic 101: At a high level, what’s this topic all about? (This will also teach you about the niche)

2. Challenges: What do people struggle with when trying to accomplish goals in this niche?

3. Jobs: What job titles exist in this niche, and what does one need to attain them?

4. Tools: What are the must-have tools for practitioners in this niche?

5. Trends: What does the future look like for this niche?

These articles will help you stand out when applying for copywriting and content writing jobs in your chosen niche. You’ll also gain a broader understanding of the domain in the process.

To get started, read a few articles on the topic, summarize the main points as bullet points, and rewrite them in your own words. Your first drafts will be shite — that’s expected. Keep editing and polishing until they look good. 

Ask a writer friend of yours to edit your pieces before publication. Publish these articles to Medium (you can create a free account) for SEO traffic and exposure.

#3 Spruce up your online presence (1 day, ongoing)

With your portfolio in hand, it’s time to work on your online presence. Start with LinkedIn (job applications almost always demand a LinkedIn URL).

1. Upload a nice profile pic on LinkedIn

2. Amend your headline to reflect your new positioning (“Freelance AI & Web3 Content Writer For SaaS Brands”)

3. Add a link to your Calendly or website landing page just below your headline

4. In your bio, indicate who you write for (AI/cybersecurity/fintech startups), the problems you help them solve (traffic/leads/conversions?), and how to reach you (DM, email, or phone). Example: “I help SaaS brands attract more customers through SEO-focused content marketing. DM for more info or email me@email.com.”

5. Add the right skills to your profile (content writing, SEO, copywriting) and try to get some endorsements from previous coworkers and clients. See my LinkedIn guide on how to win on the platform.

6. Rinse and repeat for Twitter and any other platform you’re on.

You can complete all the core work in one day, but optimizing your LinkedIn profile is ongoing work.

Mo's Letter

The 14 Hidden Rules Of LinkedIn: How To Stand Out, Get Hired, And Win New Customers

LinkedIn is a goldmine, but most people don’t use it to its full potential. As of writing, I’ve got over 30k followers and connections (connect with me!) — but I didn’t get here overnight. It took lots of small interactions to build my audience — and with LinkedIn, you get out what you put in…

Read more

3 years ago · 3 likes · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

#4 Connect with potential clients (Ongoing)

Having a decent profile is a great first step, but you still need to connect and engage with people who can hire you. This means connecting with the right buyers of writing services, namely:

1. Content marketing leads

2. Marketing managers

3. Agency owners

4. Editorial leads

5. Founders

These people regularly hire writers, and if you’re in their network, it’s much easier for them to come across your work and request your services directly; or for you to come across their posts and pitch them first.

When you send connection requests on LinkedIn, always add a simple connection note:

“Hi [name], I’m expanding my network with more people in the [niche] space — good to connect with you.”

It’s a simple intro message that builds trust, sparks curiosity, and drives traffic to your profile.

#5 Showcase your expertise (30 days)

Your website, articles, and LinkedIn profile are great, but you still need to show up daily. Through your social media content, you’re trying to show that:

1. You understand the issues your ideal customers face

2. You have a proven method or process for your work

3. You’re an active writer, not just a passive freelancer

4. You’re tuned in to industry changes and news

5. You’re available for new work

Check out my guide on how to overcome sales objections through content. If you need a content template to help you beat writer’s block and plan out content a month in advance, grab my 30-day content calendar template.

#6 Apply for jobs (Daily)

Landing freelance gigs is a numbers game — the more you apply, the more likely you are to land a few.

Because of this, it’s important not to get too hung up on any one application. Apply quickly and move on to the next one. 

Here are five places to find freelance content writing jobs:

1. Content Writing Jobs

2. Sonia’s Newsletter

3. WeWorkRemotely

4. LinkedIn Jobs

5. Angel List

Track all your applications in a spreadsheet like this one, which I’ve used for many years.

Get paid to write today

If you can tweet, you can learn how to write. Writing is a highly transferable skill, and if you’ve worked in teaching, PR, journalism, or comms, you’re well-suited to the job.

If you don’t come from a writing background, that’s fine too — there are many courses you can take online to learn how to write better.

Need more help? Do these 3 things:

1. Book a coaching call with me for advice on breaking into writing

2. Follow me on Twitter for daily insights

3. Catch up on previous newsletters

LinkedIn is a goldmine, but most people don’t use it to its full potential.

As of writing, I’ve got over 12k followers — but I didn’t get here overnight. It took lots of small interactions to build my audience — and with LinkedIn, you get out what you put in.

The following information is not a LinkedIn 101 guide. I’ll assume you already know how to set up your profile, add photos, and list your accomplishments. If you don’t, many guides online can help you with this.

This post is a collection of my hard-won lessons on standing out from the sea of sameness and gaining connections and opportunities. My goal is to help you level up and get noticed faster.

On to the rules.

The 14 hidden rules of LinkedIn

The rules of LinkedIn are simple:

1. LinkedIn is not a job site — it’s a networking platform (big difference)

2. Commenting is more effective than writing your own content

3. A defined personal brand is better than a split personality

4. Endorse and recommend people to get more in return

5. Connection notes lower people’s defenses

6. Switch up your content topics and formats

7. You’ve always got something useful to say

8. ’Going viral’ is not a sustainable strategy

9. Keywords are your keys to success

10. DMs are where the magic happens

11. LinkedIn Premium is a cheat code

12. The search bar is your best friend

13. Use the Reach & Teach method

14. Be friendly and approachable

Let’s dive into each one.

#1 LinkedIn is not a job site - it’s a networking platform

If someone told you an iPhone was only good for calls and texts, you’d look at them funny.

Yes, an iPhone can do those things, but it also lets you tweet, calculate math problems, prepare monthly budgets, shoot films, take photos, and play games.

It’s the same with LinkedIn. You'll be disappointed if you only view LinkedIn as a job site. 

This is because while you can find jobs on the platform, you can get so much more out of it — such as new professional opportunities (like joining a board), new contacts (like meeting a mentor), and new clients for your book, course, or business.

Expand the definition of what you can do with LinkedIn and you’ll have a much better time on the platform.

#2 Commenting is more effective than writing your own content

On TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, there’s a difference between your feed content (what’s on your wall) and your engagement content (the comments, likes, and shares you leave on other people’s content). 

Those two content types aren’t always displayed together. For instance, if you comment on a hundred Instagram posts but never post your own photos, nobody on Instagram will ever know you’re active.

By contrast, your LinkedIn comments and content are given the same weight, and both appear as content on your profile. Because of this, engaging with other people’s comments is often more effective than creating your own content to drive visibility.

Here’s how to leverage this approach:

1. Find a few big accounts and set up a notification alert 🔔 for each one

2. Leave thoughtful comments under their posts that advance the conversation

3. People will see your comments and either follow you or send connection requests

4. Rinse and repeat for new accounts you come across

It’s easier and more effective to appear on Oprah’s show than to start your own talk show. Even better when you then go on to appear on Ellen, the Daily Show, Dr. Phil, and the Tonight Show.

Apply the same concept to LinkedIn.

#3 A defined personal brand is better than a split personality

Like you, I have lots of interests, so this truth took me a long time to accept.

Sure, you might be a social media manager, photographer, chef, and writer — but by emphasizing all those interests on your LinkedIn profile, you’re confusing people about the type and depth of content they’ll get.

On LinkedIn, pick one overarching persona and stick to it. It’s best to fold related skills, interests, and services into your main persona. Here are some examples:

• If you’re a writer, talk about copywriting, content marketing, and SEO

• If you're a photographer, focus on personal branding, visual design, and creativity

• If you’re a speaker, focus on thought leadership, running a speaking business, and motivation

A defined LinkedIn persona is more memorable than a chaotic one. If you truly want to indulge all your interests, sign up for different social media accounts and emphasize different personas on each one.

#4 Endorse and recommend people to get more in return

Your LinkedIn connections can ‘endorse’ different skills on your profile. Endorsements mean people think you’re good at a particular skill, which makes recruiters and prospects more likely to find and pick you over others.

Recommendations are written testimonials from people you’ve worked with or worked for. Having lots of recommendations means you’re trusted by other people.

Endorsements + Recommendations = Social proof.

Also, an endorsement by someone skilled in a particular area is worth more than someone who’s not so skilled (as measured by the number of endorsements they have for that skill.

For example, if Mark Zuckerberg endorses you for ‘social media,’ LinkedIn will highlight that endorsement to anybody who comes across your profile.

So, how do you get more endorsements and recommendations? Simple: by endorsing and recommending other people. When you give a lot, you get more in return.

Try it today: endorse any five skills on my LinkedIn profile, and I’ll endorse a few of yours in return. (Note: You must be connected on LinkedIn to endorse someone).

#5 Connection notes lower people’s defenses

Connection notes are messages you add when sending a connection request. They’re meant to help the other person understand why you’re connecting or where they might know you from.

Most LinkedIn users are skeptical of pitch slaps — getting added just to get pitched immediately (here’s how to pitch them back). Connection notes lower this defense and make people more likely to trust you

My standard connection note is simple: “Good to connect with a fellow [mutual role].”

Examples:

• Good to connect with a fellow social media manager

• Good to connect with a fellow talk show host

• Good to connect with a fellow photographer

• Good to connect with a fellow chef

Assuming you have a decent LinkedIn profile, this line works 99% of the time. People love to connect with others in their professional tribe.

I also use connection notes for people I’ve come across on other channels. For example, if I’m watching a Netflix documentary, I’ll often send LinkedIn requests to the people interviewed: “Loved your thoughts on the Netflix show. Good to connect on LinkedIn.”

Ditto with newsletters and articles: “Fully agreed with your take on [x]; good to connect with forward thinkers in that space.”

Everyone loves knowing that others value their thoughts and contributions. Use this to add influential people to your network.

#6 Switch up your content topics and formats

Yes, you can share educational content, but you can also share:

• Personal life updates (e.g., relocations, weddings, and newborns)

• New trends in your industry and how they affect you

• A funny story about a client you’ve worked with

• A case study about results you’re proud of

• The latest news from your industry

Every once in a while, zoom out of your work and share what’s happening around you. It’ll add flavor and context to your content.

Also, your content doesn’t have to be just text. You can upload videos, share audio clips, draw illustrations, post infographics, and create slides. Experiment with different content formats to see what resonates.

Still stuck on what to write? Grab my 30-day content calendar and beat writer’s block today. 

Mo's Letter

Your 30-Day Content Calendar Is Ready

When you're running a one-person business, you only have so much bandwidth for content marketing. And brainstorming content ideas is hard — not everyone is an expert copywriter. So I’ve distilled my 10 years of content marketing experience into a simple template you can use to generate oodles of content in one sitting…

Read more

4 years ago · 3 likes · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

#7 You’ve always got something useful to say

No matter your career level, there’s something you’ve learned that someone else would find useful:

• With twenty years of experience, you can help management teams execute strategy

• Ten years in, you can reflect on industry trends and how to avoid costly mistakes

• Five years in, you can advise new entrants on how to break into your industry

• Two years in, you can talk about your early mistakes and what you learned

• A recent graduate can teach other students useful hacks

You always have something useful to share — just talk to the younger you.

#8 ‘Going viral’ is not a sustainable strategy

My first newsletter post was about how to go viral on social media, and even back then I warned against seeking virality for its own sake.

It’s easy to see memes and selfies going viral and want to hop on the trend, but virality won’t necessarily bring you new business or land you your next job.

If your content doesn’t tie back to what you do, you might get your 15 minutes of fame — but you’ll start from scratch the next day, looking for your next hit.

Focus on creating good content consistently — so that even if you go viral, it’s merely icing on the cake.

#9 Keywords are your keys to success

All of life is SEO.

People are searching for stuff, and the more those keywords are on your profile or page, the more likely you’ll appear in their search results.

If you’re a content marketer, content writing, SEO, and copywriting should appear somewhere on your profile.

If you run a photography page, put photography, personal branding, and headshot in your bio or description.

Your LinkedIn profile is your online CV — and as we’ve seen in my previous post on CV design, the keywords you use can make or break your chances of landing the job.

#10 DMs are where the magic happens

The key to DM’ing people on LinkedIn is to be friendly, curious, and professional without being creepy, sales-y, or awkward. 

• Got a resource someone would like? Send them a link with a short note.

• Saw a post you enjoyed? DM the author and let them know why it resonated.

• Saw a job opening that intrigued you? DM the hiring manager for more clarity.

Reach new people on the feed and befriend them in the DMs.

#11 LinkedIn Premium is a cheat code

If you can afford it, go Premium. Here’s what you get when you upgrade:

1. Full access to LinkedIn Learning, which you can use to rack up certifications and boost your profile

2. Access to unlimited search results (limited on the free plan)

3. A gold badge on your profile that makes recruiters more likely to consider you and customers more likely to take you seriously.

There are many more reasons to go Premium — from getting salary estimates and more InMails to seeing company growth insights and finding more prospects for your business (through Sales Navigator). 

LinkedIn Premium is a worthy investment; I’ve used it for 5+ years.

Hint: When you upgrade to Premium, pay for the annual package — it’s significantly cheaper in the long run. Just close your eyes and swipe — it’ll only hurt once.

#12 The search bar is your best friend

You can find anybody on LinkedIn with a granular search. Most people don’t use the search bar as well as they could.

For example, you can find people who went to Wits, currently work in marketing, previously worked at Coke, and currently live in Johannesburg (exactly four people).

Or find engineers who live in London, previously worked at Investec, and went to the University of Cape Town (exactly three people).

LinkedIn's search feature is handy when you’re a solopreneur just starting out or a job seeker looking to connect with hiring managers.

From a targeting perspective, LinkedIn helps you find the right customers for your business. From a dating perspective, LinkedIn is probably more effective than Tinder.

Do with that information what you will.

#13 Use the Reach & Teach method

Business-centric posts are useful but don’t always get seen. Viral posts rack up engagement but don’t always lead to profit. What gives?

Many big accounts got famous on LinkedIn for sharing content with broad appeal — cute cat videos, gurgling babies, and epic skydiving videos.

There’s a place for such content, and if your job depends on keeping people glued to your page (e.g., you work in social media for a consumer brand or are a radio presenter or comedian), this is the way to go.

But if you sell financial products for Gen Z professionals or corporate cooking classes for blue chip companies, posting content with broad appeal does little to sell your offering.

You may get a bunch of likes and maybe even go viral, but when it’s time to pick a service provider, customers will choose a vendor who answers their core questions with educational content.

The most effective approach is the ‘Reach & Teach’ method — 80% ‘teach,’ 20% ‘reach.’ Share content with broad appeal to drive traffic to your profile, then serve educational content to those who stick around.

The cute videos are the hook. Your business content is the net. Use them both to fish. 🎣

#14 Be friendly and approachable

LinkedIn is a professional platform where image matters.

People want to work with and do business with those who look friendly, so smile in your profile picture, use conversational language when writing, and be helpful. 

Nobody can force you to smile in your profile picture, but don’t frown, scowl, or refuse to have a profile picture.

First impressions last, and people make snap decisions that affect your job or business prospects. Also, be careful what you post or comment. All your content is publicly visible.

LinkedIn is a game

The sooner you accept that LinkedIn is one big playground, the faster you can learn the rules to win. 

At its core, the game boils down to giving out more than you ask for, being cool to chat with, and having a great profile people can resonate with. 

Everything else is icing.

Need more help?

Book a coaching call with me to grow your brand, and get my 30-day content strategy template to help you create epic content on LinkedIn.

(P.S. All the digital art in this post was generated by AI.)

New business owners waste money on certain things that make them feel good but are ultimately meaningless — at least in the beginning.

If anything, these expenses eat into your capital, waste time, and distract you from the work of finding and serving customers.

In no particular order, these expenses are:

1. Business cards

2. Equipment

3. Branding

4. Software

5. Websites

6. Ads

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#1 Business cards

Yes, business cards look fancy with your name and number on them, but business cards only make sense if you often run into potential customers in person.

If you run a remote business, business cards are largely pointless. Ditto if you spend all day in your apartment and never meet people IRL.

If it makes you feel better, print 20 business cards and only get more if demand rises. Most likely, you’ll end up using your business cards as bookmarks.

#2 Equipment

You might think you need new lights, mics, machines, or gadgets to get your business off the ground, but you often don't.

If your old Macbook still works, use it. Dust off that old camera (or pull out your phone) and shoot.

Your kitchen equipment, garage, and microphone all work fine — and you can use them to make money before upgrading them.

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5 years ago · 3 likes · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

#3 Branding

Nobody cares about your logo initially. They want to know how your offering solves their problems and how much it’ll cost them.

Your content and online presence are probably more important than whatever logo you slapped together.

Fussing over your logo is like worrying about the air freshener flavor of a car you’re trying to sell.

A potential buyer doesn’t care about that — they want to know if the tire treads are decent, if the shocks work, and if the service record is complete.

Whether your car smells of vanilla or lavender is low on their priority list.

I typically slap the first letter of my business’s name on a random color. If you absolutely must, use a tool like Canva to generate a free logo and get to work. You can always change your brand identity later.

#4 Software

If your business needs specific software, find the cheapest one that does the job well. Don’t pay for a full Adobe subscription; use one of its alternatives or design your graphics in Canva. 

Skip Quickbooks and use Wave or Zipbooks for accounting (both have free plans as of writing). Google offers a free email address, online drive, spreadsheet tool, word processor, and presentation tool — all for free. 

Find a free or low-priced tier for each tool you need — and upgrade only after you’ve made your first sale.

#5 Websites

I’ve been guilty of this in the past — sinking hours into building websites and securing domains instead of validating the business model, finding customers, and selling. Don’t make the same mistake.

In the beginning, all you need are answers to your customer’s main questions: who, what, when, where, why, how, how much, and how long.

A simple one-page Carrd website is enough to answer these questions — especially if you sell a service.

You can even create a LinkedIn Article on your business page with more detail about your offering, or write a Note and pin a screenshot of it on your Twitter profile.

Your website itself doesn’t matter — the information on it does.

If you’re selling products, use an e-commerce platform like Yola or Wix to create a bare-bones online store. 

Whatever you do, don’t waste time or money on fancy web development. Once you’ve made your first few sales, there’ll be plenty of time for that.

#6 Ads

Done well, paid marketing puts your brand in front of new customers. Done wrong, it’s a money incinerator.

My advice? Start with the tiniest amount of money you can afford to lose and use Canva to create simple image ads (here are some templates).

Better yet, shoot a 60-second video of you explaining your service or showing off your product, then boost that video on social media.

Only use paid ads earnestly after you become profitable.

Start with sales

The message here is clear — start with sales and earn the right to invest in everything else.

Think of it as a game — “three more sales until I can hire that developer” or “one more sale till I get a new logo.”

When you put income before image, everything else follows.

Mo's Letter

Start With Sales

Welcome to Mo’s Letter, a weekly publication by Dr Mo about social media, business strategy and career development…

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6 years ago · 13 likes · 3 comments · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

Need more help? Do these 3 things:

1. Book a coaching call with me to grow your business

2. Follow me on Twitter for daily insights

3. Catch up on previous newsletters

When you're running a one-person business, you only have so much bandwidth for content marketing.

And brainstorming content ideas is hard — not everyone is an expert copywriter.

So I’ve distilled my 10 years of content marketing experience into a simple template you can use to generate oodles of content in one sitting... without spending money on a social media content strategist.

Avoid the mistakes I made and start creating content that drives clicks, conversations, and cash — and beat writer's block in the process.

See what’s inside the template here.

A common complaint from freelancers and consultants is clients don’t trust you with projects unless you have prior experience in the field.

This presents a classic chicken-and-egg problem. It’s hard to gain experience if nobody’s giving you work.

Fortunately, you can break out of this cycle using yourself, a friend, or a pro-bono client as case studies.

Here are three examples: 👇🏽

Example #1: Public Relations

You’re a PR specialist with no prior experience. You want clients to engage you to bring them publicity.

The solution: become your first case study. Get yourself into the papers, land a column in a magazine, and nab a radio interview on a decent station. Alternatively, gain publicity for one of your entertainer friends.

Then, put together a case study on how you did it, detailing:

1. What the goal was (objective)

2. How you went about it (approach)

3. What worked and what didn’t (execution)

4. What the results were (numbers)

5. How the client felt about it (testimonial)

Publish this case study on your website as a simple blog post. The next time a client asks for your previous experience, send them a link to the case study.

Example #2: Social media

You’re a social media manager with no prior clients. You want business owners to hire you to manage their socials.

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4 years ago · 4 likes · 2 comments · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

Your friend might be starting a catering business and needs help with marketing. Work on her brand as a case study:

1. Set up her social media channels

2. Craft and schedule some content

3. Run a few ads to generate views, engagement, and sales

Then, put together a case study as above.

Example #3: Personal training

You’re a personal trainer with no prior experience. You want people to hire you to help them get fit.

I’ll assume you have the body for it — it’s much easier when you’re fit yourself. But how do you get others to pay you for the same results?

Look around you — there’s probably someone in your life (a friend, partner, or parent) who needs to get fit. Use them as case studies:

1. Work on meal plans with them

2. Take ‘before’ and ‘after’ pics

3. Work out with them at the gym

Take photos and videos of everything. They are the only proof that you’ve worked with clients before, so prioritize documentation above all else.

Finally, write or shoot a video about their progress — what they were trying to achieve, what you suggested, how long it took, and what the results were. Even better — get video testimonials from your fitness clients.

Post these case studies on your socials or website and use them to land new clients.

Rinse and repeat

You can replicate this strategy for any type of business — singing, pastries, financial planning, content marketing, photography, technical services, styling, and filmmaking.

Do a free or low-paid gig, document it extensively, and use it to land paid gigs. Case studies are your weapon against joblessness.

“But I don’t want to work for free, I know my worth!” — Cool, stay jobless.

The secret is social proof

Case studies work because of social proof — the idea that if other people are doing or buying something, it must be good.

Nobody’s hiring you right now because they don’t see other people hiring you.

By breaking that perception with your first case study, you gain more business, which feeds your social proof, which leads to more business, ad infinitum.

It’s the same reason nobody wants you when you’re single, but everybody wants you when you’re taken. Dating and business are two sides of the same coin.

If nobody is blowing up your phone, do this: dress cute, go on a date, and take a few selfies with someone else’s hands and plates in the photo.

Thank me later.

Need help? Do these 3 things:

1. Book a coaching call with me to grow your business

2. Follow me on Twitter for daily insights

3. Catch up on previous newsletters

Most service providers think they simply need to send in the cheapest quote to secure the job, but they couldn’t be more wrong.

A request for a quote is a question, not an opportunity. The question is: "What would you charge for this?"

Your answer is judged on three factors:

1. Accuracy: Is your quote complete?

2. Detail: Is it comprehensive?

3. Value: Is it competitive?

When you fail to hit the mark on all of these aspects, you lower your chances of getting chosen drastically. Get it right and you’ll enjoy more responses from impressed clients.

Let’s dive in.

Accuracy: Is your quote complete?

Accuracy refers to whether you’ve quoted for everything they’ve requested, in addition to anything else they’ve left out.

Prospects don’t know what they don’t know. They’re relying on you, the professional, to fill in the blanks for them.

For example, a client may request a quote for half-day food photography with props. However, you know you can’t simply show up with a camera and start shooting.

You’ll need to think of (and quote for):

• A full prep day

• Warming plates

• Photo retouching

• Food storage containers

• Usage fees (if it’s a big enough campaign)

• Extra editing rounds (if you have a hard limit)

The client didn’t request all that stuff in the quote, but you know they’ll need them. Your answer to their question wouldn’t be complete otherwise.

On the flip side, too much accuracy creates more mental work for prospects — you don’t need to account for every single item they’d need. Know what to include in the quote and what to abstract away.

Detail: Is your quote comprehensive?

A bank once asked me to send them a quote for monthly social media management. My initial quote was pretty simple: “Manage up to four social media accounts + copywriting.” They replied with more questions:

1. Which platforms are included?

2. Will you source the stock images?

3. Does that include graphic design?

4. Will you create a content calendar?

5. We’d like monthly reports — are they included?

6. Do we need extra software for account monitoring?

I didn’t think they needed to know all this stuff, which is why I’d initially left it out of my quote.

I’d forgotten that a mid-level marketing manager reports to their own boss, who reports to the CFO, who reports to the CEO and ultimately to the board.

By leaving out crucial information on my quote, I’d made it extremely difficult for each of these people to justify buying my services to their managers.

So I responded immediately with a more detailed quote which they eventually accepted. Had I delayed or ignored that request, I’d have lost the gig to someone else.

The mark of a good quote is providing extra detail.

Continuing with our food photography example above, you might quote for food photography, retouching, and food containers — but:

• How many retouched photos will they get?

• How many food warmers will you bring along?

• Does the client get three editing rounds or five?

• What’s the usage length included in the contract?

Detail also includes the terms and conditions you stipulate in your quote. For example:

1. Does the quote expire? If so, when?

2. How do you expect to be paid, and by when?

3. Do you accept bank payments, PayPal, or just cash?

4. Is there a usage policy attached to the quote? Where can they view that policy?

5. Will you require a deposit, or do you only begin work after receiving full payment?

The more questions you answer in your initial quote, the faster your prospect can approve it. However, this doesn’t mean you should drown prospects in 10-page Ts & Cs. 

Adding too many terms can bloat your quote and make the selection process harder.

One trick is to create a service page (here’s an example) that lists your processes and prices, and link to it from your quote. This keeps your quote clean while still answering all the necessary questions.

Connect with me on Twitter

Value: Is your quote competitive?

Nobody sells in isolation. You’re always competing against a different solution, whether it’s a direct competitor, an indirect solution, or inaction.

Your quote’s value refers to how competitive your offer is against those three options.

For example, a corporate HR manager might ask you to quote them for wellness training for their team of 10 people. However, you’re also competing against:

• Team-building specialists in your area

• CBD brands that sell anti-anxiety products

• Out-of-town lodges that sell corporate retreats

• That independent yoga instructor on Instagram

• Every spa within 10 miles of the client’s location

All of you are fighting for the same limited budget. At any time, the prospect could allocate more budget toward a competing solution.

When preparing quotes, most people only focus on the value aspect — and even then, they focus entirely on price. 

They compare their quotes against other service providers, offer discounts and rebates, and try to become the cheapest option to get chosen.

This is a terrible approach for two reasons:

1. Value =/= price

2. Price psychology is key

Firstly, value doesn’t always equal price. In fact, here are 10 other ways a high-value prospect may define value:

1. Speed

2. Quality

3. Proximity

4. Specialty

5. Efficiency

6. Green rating

7. Brand recognition

8. Years of experience

9. Peer review and awards

10. Guarantees and warranties

This means:

• If you have 10 years of experience, a client may pick you over the cheaper graduate.

• If you’re a closer specialist, you may be more valuable than a remote generalist in India.

• Being able to deliver in 48 hours might be more valuable than whatever they’ll save with a cheaper provider.

This is why asking the right questions on a sales call or over email is so crucial. Without knowing what your prospect values, you’ll default to competing on price — which places you at a significant disadvantage.

Secondly, price psychology is key. A higher price may signal higher quality, which makes prospects more likely to take you seriously.

Conversely, a low price might indicate you’re not as good as the competition. Nobody (especially in corporate) wants to lose their job over a failed project because they tried to save a few bucks.

If anything, a pricier service provider allows them to request a bigger budget for the next fiscal year.

Mo's Letter

Luxury Marketing Strategy: How To Attract High Paying Clients

Cheap clients are the most expensive. But many businesses struggle to upgrade their clientele. This is because wealthy clients have a high bar for buying products and services. But there are 10 key ways to land and retain high-paying clients — and create the right content…

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4 years ago · 1 like · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

Is there such a thing as giving too much value?

Conventional wisdom says you should pile on as much business value as you can. That sounds good in theory, but too much of a good thing can also be bad. Like my father is fond of saying: “Everything in moderation.”

Let’s say the cost of doing a job is §1,000. If the market typically pays §10,000 for the service, you can comfortably charge §8,000 — both sides still get value.

However, if you charged §1,200 to undercut your competitors, you might win the contract — but you’ve just created two new problems:

1. You’ve made it exceedingly difficult to raise your prices in the future because the prospect is now anchored to a lower price. They will balk at paying you anything higher later — even if your cost of delivering the service rises.

2. You’ve just dropped the pricing power of every service provider in your market, which affects your entire profession in the long run. Clients are now less likely to pay more for good work due to their perception that your skills are inherently cheap. This is especially common in creative industries.

“But wait,” I hear you say, “isn’t it more ethical to charge the lowest price you can profitably get away with? Why inflate prices unnecessarily?”

I’d argue it’s more ethical to charge what the market is willing to bear. Here’s why:

If clients are happy to pay §10,000 for a §1,000 product, that means they derive enough value to justify paying the higher rate.

To use a more familiar example, it does not cost Apple US$2,500 per unit to make an iPhone, yet the market is willing to pay that price.

People might feel the iPhone’s photo quality or its temporary status boost justifies the price tag. Either way, Apple would be foolish to leave money on the table by charging less.

By charging what the market is willing to bear, you and other providers in your profession earn enough money sooner to invest in your businesses and grow.

Mo's Letter

11 Ways to Reinvest in Your Business for Long-Term Growth

That huge client payment just landed, and you can finally check your bank balance without seeing tumbleweeds. You might be tempted to blow that cash on treating yourself, but pump the brakes for a second. If you eat your seeds now, you’ll miss the harvest later…

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5 years ago · 3 likes · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

You also make more money working less, which is a healthier outcome than having to work multiple jobs just to make rent.

Balance the stool

Think of these 3 Cs — completeness, comprehensiveness, and competitiveness — as the three legs of a Quote Stool.

When one or more of the legs are broken, nobody can sit on the stool. Here are three different ways a broken leg can hobble progress:

#1 Accurate + Detailed, but not Valuable

An accurate and detailed quote may lack value for the client either because you overcharged them (in which case, raise the value) or you undercharged them (raise your rates). 

If you don’t fix this broken leg, the prospect may be forced to delay working with you till a later date when they have more budget.

Alternatively, you may end up resenting the gig because it costs you more to deliver than you charged.

#2 Accurate + Valuable, but not Detailed

An accurate and valuable quote that lacks detail merely causes the prospect to ask: “What exactly am I paying for?”

This manifests as additional calls and emails to gain clarity, which decreases your chances of getting the gig — and increases a competitor’s chances of getting it.

When projects get to the quoting stage, always assume they’re asking six other service providers for a quote. Time is of the essence.

#3 Detailed + Valuable, but not Accurate

A detailed and valuable quote may not be accurate because you failed to account for other crucial elements.

For example, a client might ask for a quote to shoot the next season of their talk show — but in your quote, you fail to account for the cost of stage soundproofing, crew transport, and a teleprompter.

This omission constrains the quality of service you can offer. The client also won’t be too happy down the line: “You knew we’d need crew transport, why are you only bringing this up now? We have no extra budget.”

Today's poll is brought to you by stools 🪑

Detailed quotes are more memorable

I recently asked a film production company to quote me on shooting S02 of The Mo Talk Show.

Their quote was just under US$100,000 — an eye-popping figure better suited to large commercial productions.

But what stood out to me was the comprehensiveness of their quote — down to the number of assistants and amount of catering they’d need.

And while their quote was far beyond what I’d budgeted for the next few seasons of the show, the quote now lives in my head rent-free. If I ever get to that level of production, I’ll know who to call.

An old boss once told me to write content that was “needlessly detailed.” That advice applies to quotes, too.

Detailed quotes lend an air of expertise, accuracy, and legitimacy. A detailed quote says “I’ve costed your project down to the last cent.”

Even if the prospect can’t afford you right now, their trust and willingness to work with you in the future goes up.

Detach from the outcome

Lastly, don’t worry about whether they’ll accept your quote or not.

Worrying creates unnecessary stress for you, so detach yourself completely from the outcome.

Even if they don’t accept your quote this time around, that’s ok: better will come.

Mo's Letter

And That's OK

Welcome to Mo’s Letter, a series of essays by Dr Mo on personal growth and professional success in a digital world. Today’s essay is about disappointment…

Read more

6 years ago · 17 likes · 2 comments · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

Focus instead on inputs — the quality of your answers to the question — and the outcomes will take care of themselves.

Go forth and sell. 💰

Need help? Do these 3 things:

1. Book a 20-minute call with me to clarify your strategy

2. Follow me on Twitter for daily insights

3. Catch up on previous newsletters

Social media is a vast field, but most people limit their career choices to just content creation.

Let’s go beyond that narrow niche and look at 9 ways to make money in social media:

1. Community management

2. Guides and courses

3. Content strategy

4. Profile audits

5. Coaching

6. Research

7. Paid ads

8. Training

9. Live PR

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#1 Community management

You manage brand audiences. This includes:

• Running surveys

• Running competitions

• Handling DM inquiries

• Responding to comments

• Running online communities (e.g., Slack, Discord, Facebook and LinkedIn Groups, Twitter Communities)

You’ll prepare monthly engagement reports so the brand can understand what people are talking about most often and how to improve its offerings.

This path is easier if you enjoy engaging with people.

How to get into this:

1. Set up your online accounts on social media

2. Join the types of communities you want to work in: parenting, gaming, web3, etc.

3. Establish relationships with marketing managers, community heads, and founders — most likely to hire you

4. Highlight community management experience on your CV

#2 Guides and courses

You create printed guides (e-books), slide decks, or video courses (online) to help people get better at social media management.

Your target market is largely founders and freelancers looking to get better at social media on a limited budget. 

A course is a great way for them to level up and for you to get paid asynchronously.

You can also upsell 1-on-1 coaching, content strategy, and profile audits (more on these in a bit).

You’ll need to know:

1. How to write, edit, and design compelling content

2. How to promote your courses and guides online

This path is easier if you enjoy teaching.

Steps:

1. For video courses: Create an account on any online course platform like Udemy, Teachable, or Kajabi.

2. Determine your course content: Will you focus on Profiles? Content? Ads? Pick one.

3. Create and upload the content. Add subtitles and a transcript to videos for accessibility and easier skimming.

4. Promote the guide or course through search, social, ads, affiliates, or partnerships (third-party websites, newsletters, and related podcasts).

5. Get paid daily, weekly, or monthly.

#3 Content strategy

You help brands create better content for launches, campaigns, and content publishing.

You can do this freelance or in-house. You can also consult on just strategy or create the content as well.

You’ll need to create separate strategies for different platforms. What works on one platform may not work on another.

This path is easier if you enjoy writing.

Skills you’ll need:

• Copywriting: Writing good captions

• Planning: Creating content calendars

• Graphic design: Using Canva or other tools

• Automation: Scheduling content with different tools, like Planoly for IG and Pinterest and Publer ($) for the rest

Charge anywhere from US$500/mo and up depending on the client and their needs (number of channels, type of content, etc.).

#4 Profile audits

You help people spruce up their social media profiles.

A bad profile can stand in the way of someone landing their next job or dream gig.

You can target executives, founders, and job seekers who want a better online presence.

Steps:

1. Optimize your own profiles across the platforms you’ll specialize in

2. Create content around profile optimization and the dangers of inaction

3. Add a simple link to book a Calendly call or purchase a profile audit (e.g. via Linktree)

4. Charge a commensurate fee: I’ve seen prices ranging from $50 - $200+

5. Just 3 audits each weekday at $50 per audit would net you $3,000/mo

This path is easier if you enjoy marketing, PR, or communications. Also great for former hiring managers.

#5 Coaching

You help other digital content creators grow their careers and businesses.

If you have lots of social media experience, you can sell consultations to your peers to help them avoid mistakes and grow their businesses faster.

This is easy to do online and can bring in easy income. You can also upsell tool sales as an affiliate (like I do with Publer) and guides.

This path is easier if you enjoy coaching and motivating people or have an HR background.

Steps:

1. Create a simple Calendly booking page and hook it up to your PayPal account

2. Share daily content around how to build a social media business on LinkedIn and Instagram

3. Connect and engage with other social media managers — DM them to understand their challenges

4. Drive traffic to your booking page and get paid (here’s mine)

5. Optional: Set up monthly coaching packages for recurring income, like I’ve done

#6 Research, insights, and analytics

You run large-scale surveys to determine how people feel about different topics and compile a report.

Your work will help (mostly large) companies to:

1. Understand user sentiment g (e.g., voter sentiment on taxes, consumer opinions on new tech)

2. Develop better products

3. Predict consumer behavior

4. Develop mystery shopper programs

5. Build better brand and GTM campaigns

This path is easier if you enjoy statistics, marketing, or academic research.

Steps:

1. Highlight your research, statistics, or marketing analytics background in your CV and your online profile

2. Apply to an insights firm or enterprise company — typically those in politics, consumer goods, or tech

3. It’s extra helpful if you’ve run a few online polls yourself and compiled the results into a report

#7 Paid ads

You help companies deploy their ad spend across social media platforms. 

Your job is to manage the money and ensure they get the most bang for their buck, measured in terms of reach, brand awareness, and conversions. 👇🏽

You’ll start off managing small budgets — $500/mo — and end up managing larger ones (up to $100,000/mo or more).

Companies are more willing to put you in charge of larger budgets when you have demonstrated experience.

You monetize from a percentage of the ad spend, a flat fee, or both. 

In short, you’re being paid (quite well) to spend money.

This path is easier if you enjoy budgeting or e-commerce.

Steps:

1. Deploy your own money on a few ads to figure out what works. Take courses and watch YouTube videos to learn best practices.

2. Run a few ads for a friend’s business to scale through paid ads. This will teach you how to handle other people’s money and give you a chance to create case studies.

3. Advertise your services online through your website (if needed) and social media (especially LinkedIn)

4. Create daily content around paid ads: How to deploy them, mistakes to avoid, etc. Share your learnings.

5. Apply for freelance gigs, in-house jobs, or cold DM founders to pitch your services.

#8 Training

You host workshops and training sessions for corporate and government teams looking to level up their social media game.

You’ll be training teams on:

• Community management

• Reputation management

• Social media analytics

• Content strategy

• Social selling

• Paid ads

These gigs usually pay more than one-off consultations with solopreneurs. 

You can upsell your services, books, and speaking engagements.

You’ll typically interface with marketing, PR, and HR leads who need to improve outcomes within their respective departments.

This path is easier if you enjoy teaching.

Steps:

1. Create a one-page website with your offering and prices

2. Add testimonials and case studies from previous clients if you have them

3. Do cold outreach to sales directors, PR heads, and marketing leads

4. Do warm outreach to PR/sales/marketing professionals in your network

5. Find out their needs and pitch your services

6. Set up a date and time for training and deliver

7. Always collect feedback for improvement

8. Create case studies after every training session

#9 Live PR and reputation management

Some clients need someone to handle their social media comms in real time. Think celebrities, politicians, and other high-profile figures and brands.

You’ll quickly translate whatever’s going on in real life into social media content. 

You’ll shoot and caption content on the go, and relate public feedback to the client as it comes in.

This is a fast-paced job and requires quick thinking and fast fingers, so ensure it’s suited to your personality.

You’ll be on call during odd hours, but the job can be deeply rewarding as you get to hobnob with high-profile clients and travel a lot.

This path is easier for former journalists and PR specialists.

Steps:

1. Practice live-posting — Twitter is a great platform for this, with IG a close second (through Stories)

2. Build case studies by managing the social media channels of celebrities in your network

3. Apply to work at a PR agency or offer the service as a freelancer

Connect with me on Twitter

Questions to ask

1. Do you have any examples of content we should emulate?

2. What platforms would you like to be active on?

3. Is there anything I should avoid when posting?

4. What’s your budget for the ads or campaign?

5. Will I edit photos or will you do it in-house?

6. How often am I expected to be on-call?

7. Will I take pics or will you supply them?

8. Do you have a social media policy?

9. What are your official hashtags?

10. How many posts do you need?

11. What equipment will I need?

12. How often will we post?

Final words

• Ask for briefs: Know their needs, brand guidelines, and tone of voice

• Stay updated on social media trends: read reports and case studies

• Invest in your business: Budget for tools, training, and promotion

• Stay active on social: Pos content, run surveys, and test ads

• Always sign contracts: Get everything in writing

• Work with a mentor or advanced professional

• Test new platforms: Get a feel for what works

• Curate your feeds: Your work speaks for you

• Network regularly and build relationships

• Take breaks often: This job can be taxing

• Ask for feedback from users and clients

• Niche down — it’ll make things easier

Today’s poll is brought to you by addiction 🤳🏽

Want more resources on creating great content?

1. Catch up on previous newsletters here

2. Follow me on Twitter for more

3. Get coaching for your business

Founders fear that niching down limits their revenue potential. Here’s why that’s false:

• There are ~8 billion of us on this planet (source)

• 10% is 800 million people

• 👉🏽 1% is 80 million people

• 0.1% is 8 million people

• 0.01% is 800 thousand people

• 0.001% is 80 thousand people

Let’s assume your product costs US$10. Even if you sold that product to just 1% of the planet, you’d earn US$800m+ from that product alone.

Convert that to your local currency and see if it’s still chump change.

Even at 0.01% of the planet, you’re looking at a potential payday of US$80m+ from just one product. Add more products to your suite of offerings and your market size increases significantly.

The smaller the niche, the faster you get rich.

Let’s take residence and citizenship planning — a service that helps wealthy people gain second passports and emigrate to tax-friendlier countries.

Most countries offering that option require you to have a minimum of $40,000 in the bank. The average is around $400,000 (source). 

Let’s conservatively take US$100,000 as our baseline.

Someone with US$100,000 in the bank has no problem paying 1% of that (US$1,000) for a second passport from a developed country. 

Remember: dual citizenship lets them make money in a bigger market, save money on taxes, grow their family in a better country, and in some cases, preserve their reputation by escaping persecution at home.

That’s 4 out of 8 boxes ticked from my customer targeting checklist. 👇🏽

Mo's Letter

Targeting: How To Find The Best Customers For Your Business

You can tell a first-time entrepreneur by how they describe their target market: “Everybody.” “I sell clothes for everybody” “I sell houses for everybody” “I sell food for everybody” “I sell cars for everybody” Rule #1: Your product is never for everybody…

Read more

4 years ago · 4 likes · 6 comments · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

As of writing, 11.1% of the global population owns at least US$100,000 in assets. That’s approximately 880 million people.

Let’s be even more conservative and assume only 1% of that wealthy population wants a second passport. That’s 8 million potential customers (or 0.1% of the global population).

8 million customers x US$1,000 = US$8 billion

Even if you served just 0.1% of the planet, you’d still make more money than you could spend in several lifetimes.

As I wrote in Your Own Little Corner, you can make billions in any direction you choose. 👇🏽

Mo's Letter

Your Own Little Corner

Welcome to Mo’s Letter, a series of essays by Dr Mo on personal growth and professional success in a digital world. Today’s essay is about niches…

Read more

6 years ago · 9 likes · Mohammed Shehu, PhD

Don’t be afraid to niche down. When in doubt, narrow it down even further. There are riches in niches.

Today’s poll is brought to you by population growth

Need help?

1. Jump on a 20-minute call with me to clarify your target market

2. Follow me on Twitter for daily insights

3. Catch up on previous newsletters

4. Book a coaching session

You can tell a first-time entrepreneur by how they describe their target market: “Everybody.”

• “I sell clothes for everybody”

• “I sell houses for everybody”

• “I sell food for everybody”

• “I sell cars for everybody”

Rule #1: Your product is never for everybody.

Even if you sell breathing oxygen, your target market is limited.

• For starters, people with normal lung function don’t need oxygen tanks — they can breathe just fine. You’re targeting people with impaired lungs caused by smoking, emphysema, or congenital defects.

• The young mostly don’t need oxygen tanks — it’s the elderly who might.

• Oxygen tanks and medical consultations aren’t cheap, so people covered by medical aid are ideal.

Your target market for oxygen tanks is thus limited to affluent elders under medical aid with impaired lungs.

And with that, you’ll know exactly how to approach your marketing.

It’s important to niche down on a specific audience. This makes selling easier and allows you to charge more.

8 questions to help you find your best customers

You can find your best customers by asking these 8 questions and working backward:

1. Who needs this product to make money? If you sell writing services, your best customers are those who need good writing to make money. This includes magazines, founders, and corporate companies. Likewise, startups pay for social media marketing services, and investors pay for stock market analysis.

2. Who needs this product to save money? Making money is attractive, but so is saving money. Condoms sell because people don’t want expensive pregnancies. Accountants make money because people want to reduce their tax bills. There are entire countries whose biggest value proposition is “Move here and pay less tax.” They sell pricey citizenship packages for affluent people.

3. Who needs this product to do their job better? If you sell massage oil, your local casanova may buy a bottle or two in a year — but your best customer is a spa professional who uses several bottles a month. You sell lapel mics to speakers and TV presenters. Chefs need kitchen equipment more urgently than stay-at-home moms, and every Uber driver needs a car.

4. Who needs this product by law? Some products and services are mandatory, thereby guaranteeing you customers. All students need a graduation certificate — printing these would make you a mint. All drivers need a license — driving schools will always profit.

5. Who needs this product to save their lives? Security services are popular with those who live in dangerous neighborhoods. Doctors make a killing saving people from death — as do pharmaceutical companies. Everyone needs food — so supermarkets will always profit.

6. Who needs this product to save their reputation? Some offerings are only useful when there’s reputational danger. You only call a lawyer when you’re in legal trouble. Companies retain PR services when a scandal breaks out. You don’t really think about either of these things when everything is fine.

7. Who needs this product to start, grow, or preserve their family? Family is a strong purchase factor for most people. Schooling is one such product — parents will always absorb fee increases no matter how much they complain. Fertility services are another — by 2026, couples will spend $46 billion for a chance to become parents. Life insurance, wills, and estate planning services are other examples — people want to protect their families after they die.

8. Who needs this product to escape reality? People want to forget about their problems. That’s why comedy shows sell out, why alcohol is a popular drug, and why escort services will never die out. It’s also why theme parks, camping sites, and travel agencies will always be in business.

Notice a trend here: the customers of these products and services are all desperate.

The best way to make money is by targeting people who urgently, desperately need your product or service — as soon as yesterday.

I’m not suggesting you take advantage of them — your business won’t last long if you do that — but rather pointing out that demand is already assured.

All you have to do is serve that demand profitably.

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Make more money at the intersections

You can make more money by serving audiences at the intersections of those 8 questions.

For example:

1. Truck driving certificates are useful for truck drivers because they need them to do their job. But such training and licensing services are even more useful for trucking companies. This is because experienced drivers make the company money. Having experienced drivers also results in fewer deaths, which enhances the company’s reputation and saves money it would otherwise spend on death benefits and insurance premiums. (3/8 boxes).

2. Media training is useful for executives to help save their reputations, but it’s even more useful for aspiring television presenters. This is because presenters need the training to do their job, make money, and enhance their reputations (3/8 boxes).

3. DNA testing is useful for all couples, but it’s especially useful for high-profile men who’ve been accused of having an affair — because they need it to preserve their families (i.e. avoid divorce), protect their reputations, and save money from an unwanted child (3/8 boxes).

Find the most desperate customer who ticks three or more boxes and serve them exclusively. The more boxes you tick, the more you can charge.

Today’s poll is brought to you by archery 🎯

Need help?

1. Jump on a 20-minute call with me to clarify your target market

2. Follow me on Twitter for daily insights

3. Catch up on previous newsletters

4. Book a coaching session

Last week’s AMA post generated some interesting questions related to growing an audience and building a business. Let’s tackle each one briefly.

1. “How should I build my content strategy?”

Craft your content strategy around overcoming sales objections.

This is one of the most effective approaches you can take.

From the linked article:

To stay in business, you need to uncover, affirm, and overcome people’s objections to buying your product or service.

We can sort sales objections into 13 categories: ROI, Pace, Need, Myths, Terms, Money, Timing, Options, Change, Distrust, Features, Authority, and Resources.

Trying to overcome each objection individually would take too much time. If you had to do that for dozens of clients, you’d quickly get tired.

Content works for you 24/7 across all channels, allowing you to answer customer questions at scale without repeatedly explaining yourself.

Craft 4 posts around each of the 13 sales objections. You’ll have enough content for a year, posted once a week (13 x 4 = 52).

This frees you up to run your business more effectively.

2. “How do I strike a balance between creating content consistently and managing my mental health?”

You don’t — you simply suffer in silence. I joke, of course, but this is a valid question creators don’t think about enough.

I’ve found two working solutions to this issue: documentation and automation.

Worrying about creating content leads to constant anxiety. Things get easier when you switch from crafting new content to simply documenting your journey.

Write for the younger you — she needs it now more than ever.

Secondly, automation takes a massive load off your back.

With your content on auto-pilot, you won’t have to worry about neglecting your social feeds or marketing your business.

You can rest easy knowing your content is working for you 24/7.

3. “How can I redirect my local market to shop more on websites?”

In certain markets, people trade more over WhatsApp, Facebook, and other mobile apps. Website traffic in those places tends to be spotty.

This can leave local founders frustrated at the lack of engagement they get compared to the time and money they’ve invested into a website.

My advice is simple: Flow with the river, not against it.

If your local market shops primarily on mobile apps and platforms, that’s where you should be. People buys on their terms, not yours.

Set up a WhatsApp Business account, Facebook Page, or Instagram storefront and place your products and prices there.

WhatsApp Business allows you to list your operating hours, prices, and product catalog. Ditto with Facebook Pages.

Here’s a guide to WhatsApp Business and a primer on Facebook Pages.

An Instagram Shop ties your content directly to your product so people can buy while consuming your content. Here’s how to Set up an Instagram Shop.

4. “Between branding and marketing a new clothing label, which one should I spend the most money and time on at the start?”

A few questions first:

1. Who is your target market? What do they care about?

2. What values does your clothing brand champion?

3. Has your audience tried on your clothes already?

4. What feedback did they give you?

Before wasting money on photoshoots, logo design, and websites, start with sales.

You can reinvest your profits in marketing and branding yourself better.

(Bonus question): “How can a small fashion business sell with a product video, and what are the best platforms to share it on?”

I’ll let you folks answer this one. The best answer gets retweeted.

That’s it for this week. If you’ve got any more questions, simply reply to this post and I’ll answer them in my next newsletter.

Whenever you’re ready, check out my guides, browse my services, or follow my Twitter account for more gold.

Hey,

Just returned from a small vacation and am currently working on a longer piece I plan to drop over the next few weeks.

In the meantime, I’d like to pass you the mic:

What would you like to know about content strategy, marketing, or sales?

Ask me your questions and I’ll answer them in my next email.

Chat soon,

— Mo

Selling is not simply promoting a product and hoping people buy it.

Sales requires understanding the conversations your customers are having in their heads — and meeting them where they are.

To stay in business, you need to uncover, affirm, and overcome people’s objections to buying your product or service.

We can sort sales objections into 13 categories:

1. ROI

2. Pace

3. Need

4. Myths

5. Terms

6. Money

7. Timing

8. Options

9. Change

10. Distrust

11. Features

12. Authority

13. Resources

Trying to overcome each objection individually would take too much time. If you had to do that for dozens of clients, you’d quickly get tired.

Content works for you 24/7 across all channels, allowing you to answer customer questions at scale without repeatedly explaining yourself.

For the purposes of this guide, I’ll assume you’re selling a useful product to a relevant audience.

I’ll briefly explain each sales objection and share content examples you can use to address it.

Let’s dive in.

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#1 ROI

• “I’m not sure how your product will improve our business”

• “I don’t see the ROI here”

As a business owner, you’re not selling a product — you’re selling improvement.

• Copywriters don’t sell words, they sell more leads

• Trainers don’t sell exercise, they sell better health

• DJs don’t sell music, they sell more tickets

Your customers want to know how buying your solution will lead to more revenue or longevity for them.

The best way to show this is through case studies. Talk about how you’ve helped previous clients improve their lives and businesses.

Content examples:

• “Did you know A/B testing your website copy can triple your conversion rates? Here’s how we helped First National Bank convert more loan clients through their website: [case study link]”

• “Three months of regular HIIT sessions can help you drop 20 pounds. With summer around the corner, now’s the best time to invest in reaching your body goals.”

#2 Pace

• “I need to learn more before I buy”

• “I just want a quote for now”

• “I’m just browsing”

Customers buy at their own pace, not yours. Sometimes your prospect isn’t ready to buy, and being pushy can be counterproductive.

Instead, give them all the information they need to make an informed decision.

You can craft and share:

• Detailed quotes

• Landing pages

• Video demos

• Testimonials

• Case studies

• Reports

• Guides

Content examples:

• “Remodeling your home is a huge endeavor. Planning in advance makes the whole process easier. Read our blog post on how to plan your next home redecoration: <link>”

• “What goes into a car repair quotation? We break down exactly what you pay for in our next newsletter — subscribe now to get it when it lands: [link]”

#3 Need

• “Our current tool already delivers results”

• “I’m satisfied with what I have”

• “I don’t see the need for this”

• “This isn’t a current priority”

Sometimes you’re up against inertia — the tendency of things (and situations) to remain as they are.

Inertia is powerful, but there are three ways to break through it:

1. Create discontent

2. Create FOMO

3. Sell change

Brands create discontent all the time. You could be happy with your iPhone [x] until Apple releases the iPhone [x+1]. Suddenly you feel pressure to upgrade.

It’s also easy to generate FOMO. Everyone now wants Bitcoin for fear of missing out on profits. The infamous Fyre Festival was largely driven by FOMO (and lies).

Lastly, the only constant in life is change — and people hate change.

By positioning your product or service as the thing that’ll help them navigate that change, you increase your chances of making a sale.

Zoom made a killing helping companies navigate remote work. McKinsey makes billions each year helping companies and governments navigate change.

Use all three triggers in your content.

Content examples:

• “Introducing the all-new Widget: bigger, stronger, and more powerful than ever. Here’s how Widget 2.0 wins over our previous product: [changelog]”

• “Don’t miss out on the conference of the year! We’ll be hosting Cee Iyo, B. Leonaire, and other thought leaders this week. Here’s a sneak peek of their upcoming talks: [list]”

#4 Myths

• “I heard [untrue statement] about…”

• “Is it true that…”

Misinformation is rife in any industry. For example, lots of people still think that:

• Weed is dangerous

• Website design is cheap

• Teaching isn’t profitable

• Dating apps are pointless

• English degrees are useless

You need to dispel the myths in your niche with hard evidence.

Content examples:

• “Teachers are widely underpaid — but did you know there’s a subset of teachers who make over $$$ a year? Here are 6 ways your teaching degree can make you more money: [thread]”

• “Is cannabis dangerous? We dug into over 37 studies over the last 3 years for answers — and here’s what science says: [thread]”

• “Most English majors earn a median salary of $ per year, but most of them are sleeping on gold. Here are 18 lucrative niches where your English degree can make you rich: [thread]”

#5 Terms

• “I don’t want a long contract”

• “I want to preserve flexibility”

If your product or service is contract-based, people might balk at the idea of committing to you long-term.

They might also object to the typical terms and conditions that come with such a contract.

Delete these objections by offering shorter, more flexible terms in the beginning.

Content examples:

• “Skip the annual contract and sign up at our gym with a month-to-month commitment. Cancel any time. Apply today: [link]”

• “Got a day job? Keep it and make money on the side consulting for global clients on product packaging. See who else we work with on our platform: [link]” 

#6 Money

• “We don’t pay suppliers 100% upfront”

• “We’ve already allocated our budget”

• “Your product is too expensive”

• “There’s no budget for this”

• “I can get this for cheaper”

Money lies at the heart of most sales objections. Interest can quickly evaporate once customers learn your price.

You can counter money-based objections in a few ways:

1. Justify your pricing — why do you charge that much? Highlight your processes, staff, expertise, convenience, security, and certifications through content — especially if you sell to high-end clients.

2. Prove ROI — how will this purchase help the customer? Talk up past customers and the results you’ve achieved for them. Create and link to solid case studies.

3. Sweeten the deal — what can you add or remove from the offer to make your price more palatable? Offer flexible payment plans or time-limited promotions.

4. Help them budget for it — how does your customer plan for such purchases? Anticipate their timelines and include your product or service in their budget.

5. Downplay cheaper alternatives — why should customers avoid paying for a cheaper version? Highlight the disadvantages of going that route.

Content examples:

• “Wedding photography is an investment in lifetime memories. You may be tempted to hire a cheaper photographer for your big day, but here’s why that almost always backfires: [thread]”

• “Counselling can improve marital happiness by [x]% within 6 months. Some medical aid funds cover counseling, including: [list]”

• “Heat up your house this winter and pay off your heating installation over 6 months. See if you qualify: [link]”

Whatever you do, don’t show fear or shame when posting your prices online.

You’re helping people solve a pressing problem, and you deserve to be paid for your efforts.

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#7 Timing

• “I’m too busy for this right now”

• Maybe next month/quarter/year”

Timing objections pit you against other priorities.

Your job is to show that what you sell either:

1. Speeds things up

2. Lightens their load

3. Saves them future pain

Content examples:

• “A busy schedule makes it hard to exercise regularly. Working out for 30 minutes every morning can clear your head and make you more productive. Here are 5 ways to get in shape at home: [thread]”

• “December is here, and everyone’s busy with holiday plans — but Januworry is just around the corner. Good budgeting today keeps your fridge full tomorrow. Here’s how to plan your December budget through our app: [thread]”

#8 Options

• “We’re considering Competitor X”

• “We’re still looking at other options”

Your business doesn’t operate in a vacuum.

Your prospects are always comparing you to another competitor or alternative solution.

There’s a subtle difference between those two phrases.

If you sell fast food, your competitors are McDonald’s and KFC.

But you’re also competing against chocolate bars at the grocery store — alternative solutions to hunger.

You’re also competing against that chef who sells healthy meal preps on social media.

To get ahead, you’ll need to highlight why you’re a better option than every other solution out there.

Content examples:

• “Looking to lose weight? Slimming teas and waistbands might seem like cheaper, faster alternatives, but here’s why they’re ineffective: [thread]”

• “Planning your next event in Sandton? Here are the 10 best event planners to use and how they stack up against each other: [link]”

#9 Change

• “We’re acquiring/merging with another company”

• “We’re revamping our systems at the moment”

• “There’s a hiring freeze right now”

Your customers’ lives and businesses aren’t static.

There’s always stuff happening behind the scenes you may not be aware of.

With enough research, you can uncover the changes happening and slot your offering into the new paradigm.

Content examples:

• “As you ramp up hiring, your internal processes can quickly get chaotic. Learn how Jobbio eases the screening and interview processes in our latest blog post: [link]”

• “Switching companies? Here are 5 things to keep in mind — plus 3 ways career coaching can ease your transition: [list]”

See more on Twitter

#10 Distrust

• “You don’t understand my situation”

• “I’ve heard too many complaints”

• “I’ve never heard of you before”

• “I don’t trust such products”

• “This is just a fad”

People are more hesitant to spend money on a new company with an unproven track record.

They’re also less likely to do business with you if you have a negative reputation or don’t understand their context.

If you’re new to the market, your best bet is to:

1. Offer a better product, service, or experience

2. Understand the customer more deeply

3. Price your offering more competitively

4. Bring your prospects into the future

If you have a negative reputation, fix your reputation issues first before touting your brand through content — else you’ll bleed credibility.

If customers don’t trust your solution, highlight why it works and the results it has gotten for other people.

If your product is a fad, please throw away those fidget spinners and find something better to sell.

Content examples:

• “As a new agency, we’ve spent a lot of time reimagining what social media marketing could look like. Here are 6 ways small businesses can benefit from social media: [thread]”

• “You spoke, and we listened. Your feedback is valuable to us, and we’ve made the following changes to our business as a result: [list]”

• “We’re new to the market, but our team is deeply experienced in the field. With over 10 years of corporate experience each, meet your new leadership advisory team: [carousel]”

#11 Features

• “This key feature is missing from your product/service”

• “I’m not sure I need that feature/add-on”

Your prospects are always appraising and comparing your solution to others in the market.

If you’re planning to add new features or services, tease that in your content.

Highlight the role of each feature or add-on and what benefits they bring.

If you deliberately don’t offer certain features or add-ons, explain why their absence makes your product better.

Content examples:

• Our most requested feature is now underway! We’ll be releasing the Magic Genie feature for all our kettle 🫖 products next month — stay tuned for more updates.”

• “Lots of clients have asked why we don’t do paid ads on top of organic content creation. There are three reasons for this: [thread]”

• “Is cellphone insurance an unnecessary expense? Quite the opposite. Here are 3 ways it protects your purchase: [list]”

#12 Authority

• “I need to speak to my boss/spouse/business partner first”

• “I don’t have the authority to buy”

• “I don’t control the budget”

Complex products and services are usually bought by committees.

Examples include cars, houses, and enterprise software.

Your job is to give prospects the tools, words, and data to convince their buying committees you’re the best option.

Content examples:

• Safety is important when choosing your next car. Here are 6 ways the Folfo XC70 protects your family while driving: [list]”

• Customer service training is important, but how do you build a successful business case internally? Here’s the latest data on how better customer service impacts revenue: [link]”

#13 Resources

• “We don’t have the capacity to implement that right now”

• “I’m not sure I can afford the maintenance”

Prospects might want your solution but lack the means to implement it themselves.

For example, you might offer content coaching services for busy founders, but some of your clients might lack the time to write the content themselves.

Your options here are to:

1. Implement the service yourself (e.g., by offering content writing services)

2. Recommend other tools or service providers (e.g., using copy.ai to generate content)

Content examples:

• “A pool needs regular maintenance. If you’re thinking of installing a pool at your place, here are 6 pool cleaning tools you’ll need: [thread]”

• “In addition to leadership training, we also offer executive recruitment services. Learn how we source the right leaders for your business: [link]”

3 tips for better sales calls

Overcome sales objections through content

At the heart of every sales objection is a lack of urgency. 

People spend money on what they feel they need ASAP.

Your job is to understand where the customer’s priorities lie and meet them halfway, then steer them toward your solution.

Content marketing is a fantastic way to overcome sales objections at scale.

Best of all, your content works for you 24/7 — so you don’t have to make calls or send emails all day.

Infuse the above tips into your content strategy and enjoy better results.

Medical professionals may want to monetize their skills for various reasons. These include:

1. Wanting to expand their private practice and gain more clients

2. Wanting to transition out of day-to-day work

3. Seeking a move into medical administration

4. Needing new income streams

5. Looking to wean off referrals

However, as a medical professional, your reason for making money should ideally:

• Fit in with your lifestyle, not the other way around

• Not be in direct conflict with your clinical practice

• Require minimal outsourcing to keep costs down

• Be digitally run and manageable from anywhere

• Not take up too much of your time

• Align with your goals and values

• Rely largely on automation

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13 ways to make more money as a medical professional

The key to success in monetizing medical expertise comes from combining your knowledge with another skill.

When you splice medicine with a different domain, you create entirely new categories of revenue.

For example:

• Medicine + Marketing = Medical marketing

• Medicine + Sales = Medical equipment sales

• Medicine + Law = Medico-legal consulting

• Medicine + Content = Medical publishing

• Medicine + Tech = Healthcare apps

• Medicine + Data = Healthcare research

• Medicine + Games = Health-based games and apps

• Medicine + Teaching = Healthcare education

The opportunities are endless, but there are 13 concrete examples we’ll walk through:

1. Launch a medical marketing agency

2. Coach other medical professionals

3. Publish members-only content

4. Become a medical influencer

5. Do medical assessments

6. Treat foreign patients

7. Become a speaker

8. Create courses

9. Consult for TV

10. Sell research

11. Build an app

12. Write a book

13. Teach classes

#1 Launch a medical marketing agency

Nobody understands medicine like a doctor, and therein lies your advantage from a marketing perspective.

New healthcare startups and pharmaceutical companies may retain your services to help them introduce new products into untapped markets.

By joining forces with marketing experts (or getting a marketing degree yourself), you can create a full-fledged healthcare marketing venture and start taking on clients.

#2 Coach other medical professionals

With your wealth of experience, you can help bring out the best in other medical professionals through coaching and mentorship.

This means you can help other practitioners:

1. Build systems for better productivity

2. Market themselves better

3. Build their practices

4. Manage their time

5. Beat depression

6. Avoid burnout

#3 Publish members-only content

As a medical practitioner, you’re deeply knowledgeable about a specific area of medicine — and lots of people are willing to pay for that expertise.

By publishing paywalled content, you can slowly build an audience and a second income stream that is infinitely scalable.

For example, publishing a diabetes newsletter allows you to share regular content with readers who either live with diabetes or care for people with the condition.

These readers can pay a monthly fee to access your insights via various platforms like Substack or Revue.

For a deeper dive into this approach, check out my three-part series on how to launch and monetize a newsletter.)

You can publish insightful videos every month, too, via sites like Patreon. Simply set your monthly membership tiers and start creating and promoting your content.

#4 Become a medical influencer

You become an influencer by being known for a specific type of content. 

As a medical professional, share threads, videos, posts, and graphics about your specialty on social media.

As you engage your audience and expand your network, you’ll eventually catch the eye of brands looking to reach those audiences.

Use my tips on influencer pricing to arrange profitable partnerships and leverage your audience.

#5 Do medical assessments (for lawyers and insurance companies)

As a physician, you can offer independent medical assessments for insurance companies and court cases.

Appearing as an expert witness on personal injury cases or worker’s compensation cases bolsters your income while helping justice get served.

#6 Treat foreign patients

Medical tourism is alive and well. You can boost your billings by expanding the scope of your practice beyond your borders.

You’ll need to build up a reputation as a specialist in a certain niche. You can do this through in-person networks or online content.

A website and social media can help you establish your services and build credibility with international patients.

#7 Become a speaker

As a medical practitioner, you possess a wealth of knowledge and credibility on your side.

You can offer keynotes and panel moderation to corporate companies, government agencies, and public events.

Work your contacts within corporate circles to learn of upcoming events where you can speak about your specialty.

And put yourself out there online and build an audience on various topics.

#8 Create courses

Video courses are excellent ways to impart general information about a specific health problem and show people how to prevent or treat it.

Sites like Kajabi, Udemy, and Teachable allow you to upload videos and create full-fledged courses you can charge for.

And while the information in your videos won’t be considered medical advice, it can act as a powerful audience-building tool that drives traffic to your live appointment page.

#9 Consult for TV

There’s money in consulting for film sets, TV shows, news channels, and publishing houses.

Whenever they make a medical series or film, they need an expert on the team to advice on how each scene should look and what’s plausible or not.

You can be that expert.

While such opportunities are more prevalent in filming hubs like Hollywood, you can consult remotely from anywhere in the world with the right online branding.

#10 Sell research

Healthcare data can help governments and private companies build better solutions for the public.

If you’ve got research chops and can run anonymized studies on prevalence rates for certain conditions, you can package and sell the results as research reports.

Of course, you’d need to ensure you don’t fall afoul of any healthcare privacy laws in your country.

#11 Build an app

Work with a developer or web agency to build an app that improves health outcomes in your niche.

You can provide the direction and funding while they code the platform itself.

For example, if you specialize in diabetes, could you create a blood sugar tracking device and corresponding app?

If you’re a pediatrician, could you develop a baby monitor app?

Your first clients will be your patients, and they can give you valuable feedback to improve your app.

Your expertise will also drive the development and marketing of the app.

You can monetize the app through in-app purchases, ads, and subscriptions.

#12 Write a book

A book confers credibility and authority on a topic and can bring in a modest sum in royalties each year.

You can write the book alone or co-write it with a medical colleague or journalist.

You can also hire a ghostwriter to write the book for you.

The book can augment your speaking career, provide social media content for years, and transform your industry’s practices.

#13 Teach classes

As a doctor, you can teach patients after hours in learning clubs, or teach part-time at colleges and universities.

This exposes you to new audiences, current research, and a network of healthcare-focused colleagues in academia.

From a credibility perspective, teaching burnishes your credentials and lends more weight to your books and research reports.

Content positioning for medical professionals

Once you’ve decided how you’ll monetize your healthcare knowledge, it’s time to establish yourself online through content. This is what we term content positioning.

In essence, you’ll organize your content along the following lines:

1. Niche

2. Audience

3. Education

4. Engagement

5. Personal story

6. Unique selling proposition

7. Sales and bookings information

Niche

What do you want to be known for? This can be organized along:

• Specialty: Such as cardiology, podiatry, pediatrics, women’s health, etc.

• Process: How you heal and what tools you use

• Location: Where in the world you heal clients

Audience

Who are you speaking to? This can be:

• Academic researchers

• Medical practitioners

• Government workers

• Students, and

• Patients

Education

What guides can you share around specific health problems? Depending on your niche, you could write about:

• Reducing stigma around taboo topics such as STDs, cancer, and body weight

• Guides to sexual health, mental health, or baby health, for instance

• Drugs to avoid taking or mixing for certain health problems

• Where to find doctors who offer a certain service, and

• Health data and trends and what they mean

Engagement

Which other medical professionals can you connect with?

For example, an orthopedic surgeon might need to connect with other orthopedic surgeons but also fitness instructors, kinesiologists, and rheumatologists.

Personal story

What problems did you face two, five, or ten years ago in your career?

Build rapport with others in the same position by speaking about who you were and the problems you faced.

Unique selling proposition

What makes you different from other medical practitioners? This can be:

• Client engagement — How you work with clients

• Data — The types of datasets you use for your research

• Pricing — How you charge for your work (e.g. cash or insurance)

Sales and booking information

How can people get in touch with you? You can do this by availing your:

• Website

• Calendly links

• Email address

• Phone number

Monetize your medical expertise

As a medical practitioner, you’re in a prime position to capitalize on your expertise to create new income streams.

Follow the above tips to monetize your medical knowledge and solve pressing problems for people around the world.

Cheap clients are the most expensive. But many businesses struggle to upgrade their clientele.

This is because wealthy clients have a high bar for buying products and services.

But there are 10 key ways to land and retain high-paying clients — and create the right content for them.

Use these 10 Ps to attract and keep them for good:

1. Personalization

2. Public figures

3. Performance

4. Placement

5. Pedigree

6. Persona

7. Paucity

8. Pricing

9. Paint

10. PR

#1 Personalization

High-paying clients expect you to customize their experience. This can include your:

• Delivery timelines and methods

• Payment methods

• Work approach

• Final output

• Pricing

While you might have to bend to the preferences of high-paying clients, such deep personalization means you can charge more.

For example, if you’re used to PayPal payments for remote work, you might need to use Wise or Deel to get paid.

If you usually deliver work in a week, they might need it in 3 days.

For either of these requirements, charge an express fee. They expect it and are usually happy to pay.

You can address personalization in your content by talking about your:

• Flexible payment methods

• Express delivery times

• Customer service level

• Customized pricing

#2 Public figures

A premium good or service benefits from other famous people using, wearing, or interacting with it.

Wealthy clients want to associate with products or services loved by other wealthy, well-known people. So, use lots of social proof.

• In your content, highlight relevant clients you’ve worked with and any case studies you have.

• For premium photography services, shoot a few influencers or celebrities for your portfolio.

• Ensure your fashion items are worn by famous people.

• Invite a few VIPs to your event.

#3 Performance

Luxury marketing demands high performance from your goods and services.

This applies whether you sell premium coaching, high-end jewelry, or upscale food.

Your materials, processes, finishes, and results should be top of the range.

• If you’re a creative freelancer, high performance means delivering outstanding work.

• If you sell luxury products, your goods should withstand wear and tear for a long time.

• If you're an e-commerce brand, remove friction from the shopping, buying, unboxing, and usage process.

The higher the quality of your offering, the more you can charge for it.

To highlight your superior offering, share content about:

• How efficient your processes are

• How well your services perform

• Your product’s lifetime value

• Durability and strength

• Etc.

Here are some ways you can highlight product performance in your content:

• “Our cars go through a 300-point check.”

• “Our whiskey is five times distilled.”

• “Our steaks are aged for 45 days.”

#4 Placement

Luxury marketing means being picky about where you place or advertise your product.

Where your product is sold also affects its perception. For example, you don’t see Bentleys being advertised in dodgy dealerships.

This means:

• If you have a website or social media channels, showcase only your best work.

• If you're a media personality, don't just be seen at every event.

• If you’re an influencer, don’t just work for any brand.

Be selective.

#5 Pedigree

Luxury products usually allude to their origins, materials, or laborious processes:

• German engineering

• Belgian chocolates

• Handmade shoes

• Crocodile leather

• Swiss watches

This is because a product’s pedigree matters in luxury marketing.

For example, wines always emphasize their history:

• A long line of winemakers

• Aged in certain barrels

• Bottles decades old

• Etc.

They know you're not just buying the wine — you're buying its history.

So ask yourself: what pedigree or prestige can you use to advertise your goods and services?

Dig deep. Look into your history, materials, production processes, or clientele to find something to share in your content.

For example, these traits all form part of your pedigree.:

• Historic neighborhood location

• Specialized university degree

• Decades of experience

• Illustrious awards

#6 Persona

Luxury marketing requires an in-depth knowledge of your customer persona.

This ensures you sell them the right story of who they want to be.

At all times, the customer is the center of attention — the hero of the story.

And your brand is their secret weapon.

• Apple doesn’t sell Macbooks. They sell the idea of a cooler, more creative individual.

• High-end resorts don’t sell you rooms. They sell you rest, relaxation, and tranquility.

You’re buying the dream, not the product.

To attract high-end clients, elevate your language:

• It’s not just far away, it’s “Tucked away in the mountains of…”

• It’s not just a quiet engine, it’s “The quietest cabin in a car yet.”

• It’s not just a digital agency, it’s “Uncommonly clear writing and design.”

Words matter.

#7 Paucity

Paucity means scarcity. In luxury marketing, less is always more. This applies to your:

• Time

• Product

• Audience

• Availability

E.g. Bugatti only sells a few cars each year — by design. If everyone could have one, it'd lose its value.

To apply paucity to your business, simply limit your number of:

• Fashion pieces produced

• Membership slots open

• Event tickets sold

• Clients served

• Etc.

It'll send the message that you're not for everybody and that you won't be available for long.

In your content, you can emphasize paucity by highlighting your:

• Looming deadline

• Packed calendar

• Long waitlist

• Etc.

Offer less to earn more.

#8 Pricing

Don’t rush to offer discounts when dealing with high-paying clients.

Cost isn’t always a big factor — quality is. Offering low prices and discounts implies:

• Zero exclusivity

• Low self-worth

• Low-quality

Not everyone should be able to afford you.

State your prices confidently. This saves everyone time. People will either:

• Qualify themselves and work with you; or

• Disqualify themselves and move on

Clients can always sense when you’re trying too hard to justify your prices.

It implies you’re not sure about your value, which is a red flag.

#9 Paint

Your ‘paint’ is how your product or service looks externally.

This includes your:

• Packaging

• Layouts

• Colors

• Fonts

• Voice

• Logo

To attract high-end clients, your 'paint' should evoke a sense of prestige, abundance, or exclusivity.

Image matters.

Luxury marketing design means using the right color combinations and fonts consistently.

It also means using uncluttered design layouts to advertise your products.

Look at the brand identities of expensive wines, perfumes, watches, and cars. They all signal, “We’re expensive.”

From a content perspective, remain consistent with your branding and add your:

• Brand colors on all graphics

• Stamp on all documents

• Name on all write-ups

• Logo on all visuals

• Voice on all audio

These all form part of your ‘paint.’

Good packaging is crucial, as wealthy clients judge you on it.

There’s a reason high-end restaurants invest in premium cutlery, and why premium perfumes come in designer boxes.

Pay extra attention to what your product arrives in, and invest in your visuals and branding.

#10 PR

It’s not a luxury product or service if nobody wants it. The whole point of luxury marketing is to generate FOMO:

"Everyone knows it, but not everyone has it."

You know what a Ferarri is, but you might never own one in your life. That’s the point.

The goal of luxury marketing is to generate desire. You can do this through:

• Experiences

• Content

• Events

• Ads

The power of your brand’s FOMO is directly pegged to how many people know about it.

So, get your brand in front of as many eyes and ears as possible.

From a content perspective, highlight every instance where your brand gets mentioned or included in an:

• News article

• Event lineup

• Testimonial

• Award list

• Etc.

In short: talk about other people talking about your brand.

Summary of Luxury marketing content tips

• Highlight awards and mentions

• Sell benefits and results

• Show personalization

• Showcase expertise

• Share case studies

• Drive urgency

• Offer less

Share content where your clients are most likely to be.

And don’t just be everywhere.

Implement your luxury marketing strategy today

High-paying clients have a high bar — but that doesn’t mean you can’t reach it.

By using the 10 Ps in your marketing strategy, you too can upgrade your clientele and earn more money going forward.