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37 Comments

Can I rewrite your website copy... for £49?

Hey all.

Gotta love Indie Hackers – I've been hooked.

It's inspired the hell out of me too. I'm on the cusp of launching my first productised service and I'd love to know what you think.

Essentially, something I've been doing for many, many years, but always 'part' of the service is landing page copy rewrites. Tweaking, adjusting + adding some excitement to copy.

So the idea:

  1. I review your URL carefully (+ report the current state)
  2. Do research on your industry and competitors (+ provide examples)
  3. Rewrite your webpage copy to be a lot more powerful!

All for £49.
https://talktoflank.com/rewrite-my-startup-website/

I see a lot of people doing this with design, UX, best practice audits – but it's never this advisory / specific.

I was looking for help:

Is it packaged well enough?
How do you formalise a process?
Is this too cheap? Can I be trusted ;)

My plan is to sell my first 3 products, work 10x longer than I should with those and work at formalising the process that way. Is that smart?

Any advice on when to stop calling it an MVP, and press go?

on April 23, 2020
  1. 5

    $49 sounds a bit cheap, to be honest. Although I'm not very familiar with the copywriting business. How many hours do you think you'll spend on one client? If that's 5 then your hourly wage is $10...

    1. 2

      Thanks so much @MrAtiebatie – the thought here is a lot of the time I'm doing this for free for clients (as part of a larger service), I'm certainly starting to agree with you though.

      I expect these will take me at least a few hours initially, though as I get more tuned in with the process, and how I work on them I'm sure it can be refined. I'd be lying if I said I expected this insane reaction – so given our other commitment, I may have to limit the number of these we do each week.

      Certainly got my work cut out!

  2. 3

    Really like this idea, definitely something that would be interesting for my startup. Pricing seems very reasonable and potentially enticing for Indie Hackers, who's strengths might not lie in sales/marketing copy.

    How do we become one of the first three customers?

    1. 2

      Thanks for the kind word Edward!

      Send an order through - I'd love to take a look at vreel.co, FLANK has a pretty popular YouTube channel, so we know all well how effective drone footage is ;)

  3. 2

    Out of interest, were you inspired by my project roastmylandingpage.com?

    1. 2

      Hey Olly, cool to hear from you + yes I was.

      Love the Roast concept on yours – that was one of those, "damn that's a cool way of wording it" moments. You're also where I found https://checkoutpage.co/, which I signed up to yesterday and has saved me a ton of time.

      Hope roastmylandingpage.com is going well, you've had some great feedback!

      1. 1

        Thank you. All the best.

  4. 2

    Very interesting! I've just signed up, looking forward to working with you. Here's the link to my business! www.pixeltrue.com

    1. 4

      What a coincidence. I've recently bought lifetime access on pixeltrue, amazing art there! :) Thanks.

      1. 1

        haha it's a small world! Thank you for the support :)

        1. 1

          www.pixeltrue.com looks awesome! I sent you a mail

    2. 2

      Totally didn't expect to wake up to ORDERS. Excited to get working on pixeltrue, I think there's some real scope here!

      I'll send out a quick email in the next hour + so I can get up to speed.

      Speak soon, Rufus

      1. 1

        haha, I'm glad I did the unexpected ;) I look forward to working with you Rufus! Super excited to supercharge my copy

  5. 2

    I think this is a really great idea, especially since I see a lot of early stage startups struggling with this. 49 GBP is definitely a good price for this service and I think your product offering is very clear, well done!

    Would you be able to do this for companies in any kind of industry? And could it also be a good service for a non-english business who might be struggling getting their english copy on point?

    1. 2

      Thanks Emelie!

      Love the point about getting English copy on point. This is something I've completely swept over. General answer is if I can understand it, then it's not a problem - but I agree, this should be part of the landing page.

      1. 2

        That's great! I def think there's a big market for that. Many small businesses might not be able to afford a full copy-project - but a small boost like this should be some well spent money. Being Swedish myself, I think this would be very appreciated in Sweden for example, where our level of english is quite good, but we might not be advanced enough to be able to write eye-catching or dynamic.

  6. 1

    For that price you could compete on fiverr as a native English speaking copywriter

  7. 1

    Hi Rufus, so I take it I'm too late for the 49 price point? How is it going?

    1. 1

      Hey @oronoa, haha I'm afraid so – I raised the price based on the really great feedback I received, and some really insightful advice through IH.

      It's v interesting to revisit this thread. I've learnt a lot over the last few weeks and I'm eager to post an update about it. It's been super refreshing to explore lots of great products + projects.

      Inbox looks awesome – I'll DM you and see what we can do.

  8. 1

    This is great Rufus. I'm not a native English speaker. Hence a service like this is super valuable. I have ordered it. My product link is https://blocksurvey.io. Looking forward to working with you.

    1. 1

      Wow, thanks Wilson.

      Excited to work with you on this!

  9. 1

    I'm ready to hit the buy button right now.

    The cost is so low that it's worth trying just to see how good you are.

    My thought stream is something like this:

    • that's a great deal
    • but wait... is he not that good?
    • maybe he's living somewhere with a very low cost of living
    • maybe he hasn't been doing this long enough and just has his prices low to get early customers and testimonials
    • I should probably try this out before he raises his price
    • is he going to be around for long?

    So all that to say I think you've hit a good price point, but it raises a lot of questions of quality/trustworthiness. All the copywriters I know are charging thousands.

    1. 2

      Thank you for this @dustinwstout, this is golden feedback. Not just because in between the lines = charge more ;)

      You've helped me understand how this looks to you which is great, here's how I see it (thinking about writing an article to develop on these points too):

      • I get to do something I love doing, rewording landing page copy. Huge difference between starting something from scratch and tweaking something.
      • Having worked as a service provider for SaaS for a minute, I know how I work well. In reality, that's as simple as working with people that need help, and believe in this approach to marketing. Clients that enjoy a bold writing style, how Flank is positioned, and disruptive marketing (i.e. they buy a service like a bold rewrite of their webpage) are great clients. That's because at this point, we can work quicker, 10x more effectively and achieve what we set out to (without compromise).
      • I get to work with some amazing startups that I wouldn't have been able to before.

      Of course, this is a working theory – but I'm very excited about today and getting started!

      Rufus

      1. 1

        Well I've just finished the checkout process on your site (before you decide to raise your rates 😂). Looking forward to seeing what you have to say.

  10. 1

    Nice service! Purchased.

    1. 1

      Wow, thanks! Email incoming :)

  11. 1

    This is definitely a service I'm willing to invest in as I struggle with copy

  12. 1

    Happy to give this a try, you have my £49 :) Look forward to hearing your thoughts.

    1. 1

      Amazing thanks @pkallberg, I'll be in touch shortly!

  13. 1

    Looking forward to work with you about my project https://remoteleaf.com

    1. 1

      Thanks so much! Just getting my ducks in a row. 🦆🦆🦆

  14. 1

    Hi,

    Is it packaged well enough?
    Not for me. Less is more imo. Too much copy & not compelling enough. Not a fan of expletives. But maybe I'm not your market.

    How do you formalise a process?
    Write it down.

    Is this too cheap?
    Too cheap to survive on long-term I would think, although I don't know your circumstances. I could see this idea working for establisheds wanting top copy and willing to pay for it, but you would need to build up a portfolio & trust to get there of course. In short term suggest you need a price to attract people who will put in time with you. Maybe $49 is an ok start.

    Can I be trusted ;)
    As much as the next guy; though he looks a bit dodgy tbf.

    Good luck!

    1. 2

      Thanks for being candid with this, it's really helpful.

      1. 1

        One of the things I like most about this site is people give & take constructive criticism well. Not sure what else is out there but perhaps a service to correct English copy for indie hackers could provide bread-and-butter income whilst you build up other side of business. $10 here, $20 there, for a job that wouldn't take much effort. Maybe a service exists? Also need to factor in cost of getting clients. That's the big kicker when fees are low.

  15. 1

    I would take you up on this for Ministry of Testing stuff, the team there are in the process of reworking copy/landing pages, I don't do day to day stuff, but I can put you in touch if it is an option.

    1. 1

      Thanks @rosiesherry, I'd love to take a look!

      Feel free to email directly – r@talktoflank.com

  16. 2

    This comment was deleted 4 years ago

    1. 1

      Thanks Primer, I love your comment.

      Would love to get that shout, you know where to find me!