What Is Premium Ghostwriting? (Free 5-Step Crash Course)

Are you a freelance writer struggling to land high ticket clients? Or maybe you enjoy writing and want to turn your passion into a lucrative career path or side hustle. Well then let me tell you about ghostwriting. Because ghostwriting completely changed my life. Over the past eight years, I have ghostwritten for over 300 Silicon Valley founders, C level executives, venture capitalists, New York Times best selling authors, you name it. And do you want to know a secret? I landed most of these clients in my 20s with no portfolio, no testimonials and no job giant social media audience. Just me in my studio apartment in Chicago with this heater from the 1970s and this 15 desk I got from Goodwill. I went from being an underpaid, overworked freelance writer to a premium ghostwriter landing five thousand dollar clients hand over fist, eventually starting the first ghostwriting agency for founders and executives and making millions of dollars as a ghostwriter. So whenever people say it's so hard to make a living as a writer, I get a little upset because I learned, no it's not. There's actually a very clear road anyone can use to land $5,000. Go training clients. And the steps aren't as hard as you think. So in this video I want to give you the exact roadmap that I follow. But real quick, I just want to know why you're not subscribed to my YouTube channel yet. I've been writing on the Internet for over 10 years. I've ghostwritten for all these people. I've acquired all of these frameworks. I just want to be your mentor. So hit subscribe. I publish videos like this every week and let me know if you have any questions in the comments. I'm always happy to pay it forward and share what I've learned. First, here's why I believe ghostwriting is the single best career pat for writers to monetize their talents, especially early on. And why ghostwriting is one of the greatest side hustles on planet Earth. Because ghostwriting doesn't just pay you in cash. As a ghostwriter, you actually get paid in six other ways. You get paid to learn. You get paid to practice your craft. You get paid to build your network. My phone is full of founders and executives. I could call at any time. You get paid to know about trends early. Fun fact. One of my first clients in 2016 was a cryptocurrency executive and through writing for him, he was the one who put me onto Ethereum, which I bought at $80. So how's that for ROI? You get paid to experience different lives. Every person that you go straight for is going to teach you something. And you get paid to write about subjects you might be passionate about, but don't actually have the credibility or experience to write about on your own. But Cole, how do I get started? Patience, young grasshopper. Here are the five steps to land your first $5,000 ghostwriting client. Step 1. Do not, under any circumstances call yourself a freelance writer. When you hear the term freelance writer, what comes to mind? Maybe someone in their mid-20s. They're sitting at a coffee shop, their eyes are darting back and forth between their laptop and their phone. There's dry spit droplets all over their laptop screen. Fingers furiously typing away on another blog post, probably about liposuction or health insurance. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Words matter. And so when you call yourself a freelance writer, you're immediately associating yourself with the millions of writers on upwork or fiverr, who all say they can do whatever you need for cheaper than the next person. Which is why they are all in a race to the bottom, charging as low as $3 an hour or a penny per word. Not where you want to be. Do not call yourself a freelance writer. Instead, call yourself something people associate with higher quality, higher value, higher paying work. Call yourself a ghostwriter. Step two. Premium positioning. Let me save you a decade. The biggest mistake writers make is they say they can do anything for anyone. Oh, you own a beauty salon and you need a weekly newsletter. Sure, I can help you. Oh, you run a fintech startup and you need someone to write your Facebook ads. Sure, I can help you. And in the beginning this seems like a good idea because you just want to get paid. But when you do this, you create two different products problems. First, you co create a power dynamic where the client can ask you for anything they want and you just have to say yes and take whatever they're willing to pay you. But second is every time you say yes to a different sort of writing, your switching cost goes up and your efficiencies go down. Which means you're essentially working harder and harder for less and less money. So what's the solution? Step three. You need a premium offer. The goal and how you start making tons of money as a writer is when you solve a one problem for one specific person in one specific way. So for example, how we train ghostwriters in our premium ghostwriting academy on how to do this is by showing them how to build 5 day educational email courses for clients in an industry they're passionate about. One problem the client probably doesn't have a good opt in, and if they do, it probably isn't very good for one specific person. So targeting people in an industry the writer is passionate about and has some sort of information advantage in one specific way. So not just creating any opt in, but an educational email course that educates readers and potential customers on autopilot. This is a premium offer because you're no longer in a power dynamic where you're reacting to the client. Instead, you are educating them on what you know they need, which makes them see you less as a vendor and more as a trusted consultant. Something we say in PGA all the time is you don't really want to be just a writer. You want to be a business consultant who just happens to know how to solve those problems with writing. Step 4 Premium Outreach. Do you want to know why so many freelance writers struggle to make ends meet? It's because here's their outreach strategy. Beep boop, beep boop. All right, my portfolio is on upward. Let's land some clients. Okay, now go. Give me the clients. Somebody please pay me, please. I'll take anything. Writers who struggle to make money usually don't have a talent problem. They have an outreach problem. Their strategy is to literally sit there and wait for someone to show up. And that is not what you should be doing. Instead of waiting for someone to hire you, you need to go find someone you can help educate them, make them aware of a problem they probably don't know they have in their business, and then show them how you can help them fix it. So in PGA we call this free consulting. The idea is you give away the consulting part for free and then you monetize the implementation of that consulting with a service. All of which leads to step five, the 10x choice. So when you start calling yourself a ghostwriter, when you stop saying you'll do anything for anyone, when you niche down, specialize and get to a place where you solve one specific problem for one specific person in one specific way, and you start taking this free consulting approach to finding clients. Congratulations, because you have now separated yourself from 99% of writers out there. There are over 30 million small businesses and over 50,000 venture backed startups just in the US and they all in some way, shape or form, need help with writing and are desperately trying to find someone to help them. But let me say the quiet part out loud. And I know because I've written for hundreds of these types of decision makers. They don't want to go looking on upwork or fiverr they want someone they can trust. They want someone who does more than just write. They want someone to come to them and educate them on what they they need, not what they think they want. And that someone should be you. So if you take this blueprint and you start implementing it, I promise eventually you will be faced with what we like to call the 10x choice. Once you now have your roster of high paying clients and you've grown your income to probably around 15 or $20,000 per month, you will have to decide. Do you want to scale yourself into a small agency? Do you want to start hiring contractors, ramping sales? Do you want to make 10 times more money? Or do you want to keep your earnings and workload about the same, but focus on building efficiencies so you can work one tenth the amount of time and whichever road you want to take? I'm here to help. Back when I first started out as a writer and I had to pay my bills, I didn't think any of this was possible. I was just taking whatever I could get. But sure enough, one client led to two, two clients led to four. Until all of a sudden I found myself going through and learning the hard way each of the five steps I've laid out here for you. So no, I'm not just sharing something I think will work. In theory. I have lived this journey and I've mentored hundreds and hundreds of other writers on how to do the same. So if you have any questions, please feel free to drop them in the comments. I'm really passionate about paying it forward and sharing what I've learned with other writers, and I'm here to be your digital writing and ghostwriting mentor. So hit subscribe for more videos like this and I'll see you next time.