TCC Podcast #434: Building a Business Fast with Jon Morrow

Everyone starts from scratch. But what if you had to earn six figures a year from the very first day you were in business? That's the challenge Jon Morrow had. He's my guest for the 434th episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast. I asked him about how he did it. We also talked about how he is using A.I. in his business (his approach is pretty good, which is what you'd expect given he's been using it for more than ten years). We also talked about what he would do if he had to start over... he suggested a strategy I'd never heard before. Click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript. Stuff to check out: SmartBlogger The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground Full Transcript: Rob Marsh:  Would you be willing to work for free—for two full years—in exchange for a simple favor? This is The Copywriter Club Podcast. You already know this but succeeding as a content writer or a copywriter is not easy. And building a reputation when you’re just starting out is a huge challenge. But what if you knew that you needed to earn six figures a year, beginning on the day you launch your business. No time to ramp up. No time to figure out client acquisition. No time to create and test the products and services you offer. You have no choice but to succeed at a high-level from day one. What would you do? That’s the challenge Content Strategist and founder of SmartBlogger, Jon Morrow, faced. But he did it. He succeeded in creating a six-figure business from day one. Jon shares how he did it and why it was necessary in the first few minutes of our interview. And once you hear what he says, you may find yourself without an excuse for accomplishing big things in your business. Because if Jon can do it with the limitations he faced, you can almost certainly do it even if the world is conspiring against you. I didn’t expect this when we set up the interview, but what Jon shares about how he uses A.I. in his business, to write sales letters, create courses, and run his businesses will either frighten you or inspire you to step up your writing game. His approach is impressive. As you listen to this episode, ask yourself these questions: What are you willing to give up in order to get what you really want? How are you diversifying and changing your business in the face of A.I.? What can you do differently to make sure your approach to email actually makes money for your business or your clients? And what can you do to create more connection and community with the people you want to work with? But before we get to all that, this episode is brought to you by The Copywriter Underground. we’ve been rebuilding our content vault and adding a ton of additional workshops to it. These new workshops are jammed full of practical ideas for building your writing business, creating new products like VIP days, lead magnets and more, getting attention and building your authority, showing up on social media with the right content to attract your ideal clients and lots more. The more templates and training we add to The Underground, the more I realize there is a crazy amount of valuable resources, in addition to monthly coaching and regular copy critiques ready for you to use. And you can get immediate access for less than you spend on a dinner out with your family. Learn more at thecopywriterclub.com/tcu. And now, my interview with Jon Morrow… Jon, welcome to the podcast. As I mentioned just before we started recording, you've been on my list for a long time to have as a guest. I think I've followed you or known of you for close to 15, maybe even more years than that. We'd like to start with your story. So I'm guessing that there might be one or two people in our audience who don't know who you are. So tell us how you got to where you are. Jon Morrow: So yeah, my story has many chapters. So the thing about me that's unusual is that I have muscular dystrophy and I can't really move any part of my body except my face. I use Dragon, naturally speaking to type. I have people that take care of me around the clock. Despite that, I mean, I've built several successful businesses. I've written tons and tons of copies. And it hasn't really held me back at all. So that's the first piece that if you're listening to the audio, you wouldn't be able to hear me being nervous probably, except for my voice is a little scratchy. That's one of the symptoms. But yeah, that's a big part of my life. And then my career really got started when I went to work with a blog called CopyBlogger. That used to be huge. When I left Copyblogger, it was 35 million pages a month. A lot of the best writers in the world worked there. And I started out as a writer, eventually worked as an editor. and then started also learning and mastering copy while I was there. My first mentor was Brian Clark. My mentor after that was Neil Patel for a little while. After that, Frank Kern for a little while. I've worked with a lot of people and really been blessed to learn from the best of the best. Rob Marsh: One of the things that I love about your story is how you actually launched your own business. You know, as copywriters, we're always thinking about offers and how to sell them. And you made an offer to Brian Clark at Copyblogger that to me is off the charts valuable for him. Would you mind just sharing that story? Because I think a lot of people don't get started. They have excuses, you know, all of the reasons why they can't do something. Obviously, that doesn't work here, you know, if you've succeeded, obviously, you know, excuses aren't enough, but you did something pretty original that made Brian take you on and then really launched your career. Jon Morrow: Yes, I was in the bad spot where I was dependent on Medicaid to pay my medical bills. It was about at the time 150 grand a year of medical bills that they were paying. But the limitation was they limited your income. You have to be in poverty to receive the service. So I couldn't earn more than $800 a month. So I had to figure out a way out of that trap. What it meant was I couldn't gradually scale up my income. I had to go from $800 a month and then immediately flip to $600 a month. And how do you do that? So I made a brand new deal that I would work with them and edit, hopefully, full-time for two years. And at the end of it, I would ask him for a favor, and he did not say no. And that was the deal. And the favor that I asked was that I wanted to email all of the subscribers to Copyblogger and tell them I was launching an agency and to endorse it. And that was it. That's all I wanted for two years of work. And Brian did it. It was the only time he ever endorsed anyone. And I had my 500 clients overnight. I literally couldn't help everyone who was coming to me. Rob Marsh: Did you know you were going to make that request when you started, you know, the two years? Or was it, hey, there's just this favor I'm going to ask later? Jon Morrow: I didn't know. Yeah. Rob Marsh: That, yeah, to me, that story is, I mean, in one instance, it's great faith in your ability to, you know, figure something out and just knowing that you had the time to do it, but also in having Brian there to make good on that promise, which, yeah, I mean, sending you out to the entire client list of Copyblogger, I can't think of a writer who wouldn't want that kind of a thing. Jon Morrow: Yeah. And I mean, I guess there was, he had enough confidence in me to say, okay, I accept the deal. And I had enough trust in him because he always, everyone around him—he treated them well. So it wasn't, I wasn't really worried about, is he going to screw me over? because he never screwed anybody over. Everyone around him was happy to work with him. And because of that, we made a deal. And it really, one thing I would point out to anyone who's just getting started, do you know that your reputation is infinitely more valuable than getting paid on a contract? I'm not saying you shouldn't do both, but if you had to choose between accelerating your reputation and accelerating your bank account, choose your reputation over that. Rob Marsh: Yeah, really, really good advice. Did you launch SmartBlogger? Did you launch that at that time or had that been already going while you were writing for Brian? Jon Morrow: So, the order was I worked for Brian, then I did consulting and agency work for about a year. And I worked for him until he was one of my clients from my email. I helped Neil launch a blog called Kissmetrics. And we went from zero to a quarter million views a month in 16 days. And when I did that, I just looked at myself and I was like, why do you do this for other people and not yourself? You're obviously going to do it. So I launched Smartblogger. Neil promoted it. Brian promoted it. And I had 13,000 email subscribers before I even started the business. Rob Marsh: Wow. Again, reputation and relationships. Yeah. So what does your business look like today? Jon Morrow: So, it's been through several stages. For a long time, it was my only business, and it grew up to 16 employees at its peak. There is a murder there. And we monetized by teaching classes on freelance writing of all types. And we had 70,000 or more students go through our programs. And it was the dominant writing brand and still is today. for a long time. Nowadays freelance writing is changing because of AI. And because of that, I've diversified into other businesses, other offers. Now I work a lot with course creators because I've made over $15 million from selling out on courses. So that's another business that I have. I'm also an active investor. But SmartBlogger still exists. Now we have four employees. And it's really just passive income for me at this point. Everything is automated. Rob Marsh: The other businesses are less passive. That's where you're spending all of your time. Yeah.