John Carlton is a professional copywriter that charges $2,500.00 for his one-on-one consulting calls. In this 30+ minute interview, he decided to lay out some of his best advice for carving out a career in the writing trade. And he decided to give it up at no charge . Part 1 of this interview went over well last week. Make sure you don't miss it. If you write persuasive copy )and content( as a freelancer, or for your own business,

There are days )not the good days, the other ones( when social media marketing feels a lot like high school. There are the cool kids everyone wants to be like. They have a ton of friends )in this case, hundreds of thousands(. Of course those aren't real friends, but still, from the outside it looks like it would be pretty awesome. On the not-so-great days, we get carried back to those painful high school memories when we were the geeks, the dorks , the outcasts.

You've probably noticed that about 80% of your blog's success comes from "ass in chair" time. That's the time you spend writing posts, editing posts, finding images, pitching guest posts, answering comments, shaping up your SEO , and all the other tasks we teach you about here on Copyblogger. You've got to get that stuff right. But great blogs are not built by "ass in chair" time alone.

When anyone wants to quickly and easily create, test, and optimize landing pages with WordPress, our Premise software is the way to go. No doubt. And the one-time fee, bundled optimization education, copywriting advice )from within WordPress(, and included custom graphics have made Premise the go-to WordPress plugin for thousands of online marketers and small businesses. But what if you're looking for more? What if you want to: Build a membership site?

Pop quiz, hotshot: What's the most important skill you must have in order to be successful as an entrepreneur, especially in an online business? Is it salesmanship? Is it social media savvy, or SEO knowledge? Is it writing and content marketing? )Because I know a great blog about that.( Or is it tech stuff, like the ability to set up and manage a functional website, capture leads, manage an email list, and so on? If you answered any of these, important as they might be,

I'd like to tell you about a powerful but elusive emotion that you can trigger to increase traffic, click-throughs, and conversions. Used properly, it can entice your reader to give you their full attention and follow your call to action. But there's a catch. Despite its intensity, this emotion is fickle . And it's often mishandled in copywriting. Make a mistake and your reader's interest can disappear with the smallest of distractions.

This week on The Lede: How Lists )and List Posts( Make Sense of the World How to say No . . . Especially to Things You Want to Do 85+ Copywriting Resources The Best Content Marketing Infographics on the Planet 8 Principles of Product Naming If you want more useful links than the seven we highlight here every week, follow @copyblogger on Twitter .

John Carlton is a force of nature. He's that rare breed who can write fascinating copy, and is just as fascinating to listen to. Every story ends up a great story. Through the lens of his remarkable journey to and through the copywriting trade , John delivers practical business tips and killer copywriting advice in this first half of a two-part interview I did with him. Whether you're a veteran writer, or just starting to learn your craft,

I get three questions a lot: Why aren't you writing more? When are you putting out a book? What's with referring to yourself in the third person in the headline? I have no good answer for the third one. Let's move on. For the other two, the answers can be found at the site of my new multimedia email newsletter, Entreproducer . I'll be writing there weekly about the business of independent new media content, and why every smart startup is a digital media company.

Picture three men racing through a tall hedge maze. The first man runs off and begins following paths randomly, hoping to stumble upon the exit. The second man is more methodical. He puts one hand on a wall of the maze and resolves to keep moving forward slowly, never taking his hand off the wall. Eventually, thanks to the rules of topology, he knows he'll find the outside. The third man pushes and shoves directly through the hedges in a straight line,

Yep, we're introducing the first-ever Copyblogger infographic. It's about our favorite topic " creating great content. And, as has been our style since the beginning, we're practicing what we preach. This infographic demonstrates how to repurpose existing content in a different media format, get more bang from your archives, and reach new and different audiences in the process.

Every content marketer needs to build relationships with readers . To have a chance at achieving your marketing goals, you need readers who love what you do. What if there were a blueprint for telling irresistible stories, for making almost everything you write have an impact in the hearts and minds of your readers? Look no further than Downton Abbey for that blueprint. What can a once-obscure period television drama teach us about effective writing, content marketing,

This week on The Lede: David Ogilvy on writing A 7-step social media marketing strategy David Mamet's legendary "storytelling 101″ memo What to do when you don't feel like working If you want more useful links than the seven we highlight here every week, follow @copyblogger on Twitter . // How to Write, by David Ogilvy On September 7, 1982, Mr. Ogilvy distributed this short and powerful list to the employees of Ogilvy & Mather.

What's one of the most reliable ways to earn an income online? If done right, Affiliate Marketing is a hard model to beat. Problem is, there's a lot of bad )and unethical( advice out there on how to approach it. So, I've invited Sonia Simone and Jessica Commins to jump on the line today to counter that bad advice, and offer their best strategies for effective, ethical, and profitable Affiliate Marketing. Where do you begin? How do you attract customers?

Does thinking about it make you stumble and sweat? Have you put it off, because you're worried it will suck? You're not alone " lots of website owners have an easier time proposing marriage than they do writing a solid About Page . If that's you, you're probably overcomplicating things. A good About Page is simple, straightforward, and it communicates just a few key things. But just because they're simple doesn't mean people don't screw them up.

Ever hear two people arguing and then someone dismisses their differences like this: "Well, that's just semantics"? What the person means by that is the difference boils down to "just" a difference in the meaning of the words. In other words, the meaning of a word isn't all that important. Really ? For serious SEO professionals )and marketers(, the specific shades of meaning of a word can make a world of difference.

In case you've been living in a mountain cave in Bhutan for the past couple of months, Pinterest is a relatively new social networking site that allows users to create online image collages, then quickly and easily share those collages " called "pinboards" " with other Pinterest users. It's fun, easy, and catching on like wildfire right now. Part of Pinterest's appeal is that it's beautiful. Enter the lovely world of Pinterest,

Raise your hand if this sounds familiar ' You meet someone and they say all the right things. They're full of compliments and accolades. Except , something bugs you about them. Their words don't quite match their actions. They can be forgetful, and even mean . Eventually, the glow wears off, and you see them for who they really are. It's not what people say , it's what they do that makes a relationship work . And that's how it is with your WordPress website,

This week on The Lede ' How George Lucas Would Write a Blog Post Mark Zuckerberg's 6 Ingredients of Success How to Make Your Content Go Viral The Difference Between Good and Great Content Marketing If you want more links you can use than the seven we highlight here every week, follow @copyblogger on Twitter . // The Difference Between Good Content Marketing and Great Content Marketing Mr. Pulizzi offers a compelling short history of content marketing,

We know that online marketing works when selling digital products. When's the last time you thought about selling physical products online? Of course, the business of physical widgets is booming, even though Internet types tend to shy away from it. Online marketing doesn't necessarily mean an exclusively online business. Ben Settle jumped on the line with me this week to talk about his old school physical information product business.