Welcome to the second blog in the You do You Girl Series!
Next to be featured in our series is Sarah-Joy Pierce of Joyful Communications. Sarah-Joy is an amazing copywriter (and in my humble opinion, the best copywriter in CQ… probably Queensland, who am I kidding?!) who not only runs her own business, has an employee AND works part-time… she’s also a brand new mum! SJP and I go way back, having worked together for years at a PR studio in Rockhampton and have since kept our business relationship and friendship alive, continuing to work together in our respective businesses despite living seven hours apart (technology, eh?!).
To learn about Sarah-Joy’s business / new mum juggle, her affinity for shoes, about what inspires and motivates her, read on!
Tell us a little about yourself.
I’m a 28-year-old business owner, word-nerd and very recent mum – I love a good sunset, a good cup of coffee and a good pair of shoes.
Tell us a little about your business.
Joyful Communications is a copywriting and PR business based in sunny Rockhampton, Queensland. I work with clients across the full spectrum of business…to name a few, there’s accountants, funeral homes, a facilities management contractor, engineers, builders, allied health professionals and local government. I’ve found that service-based businesses are the clients I enjoy working with the most, and that was a real lightbulb moment for me. Public relations and communications (anything words-related, really!) comes easily for me, so to specialise in service-based businesses means that I can stay on top of relevant trends that could make my clients’ lives easier.
What inspired you to start your business?
I started Joyful Communications because I saw a gap in the market for public relations practitioners (and in general, freelance copywriters) in Rockhampton and regional Queensland. You might not think that businesses in regional areas would use PR but ever since I started, I’ve been busy!
I believe that every business can use public relations to help build their brand. At its core, public relations is about building relationships between an organisation and the groups of people on whom its success depends…and what business doesn’t need that? I also love the different things that we can do to help a business out – no two days (and no two clients) are ever the same!
What’s the dream? What’s the end game?
I think I’m already there – all I wanted from business was to allow me to balance family and work, keeping my brain active while kid-wrangling. This year as we welcomed our beautiful daughter Taya, I’ve started to see how that balance works in practice. It’s not as easy as I thought it would be (first time mum optimism, anyone?!) but I love that I can work from home but still get to meet with clients and wear my ‘professional’ hat when I want to.
How did you make the move from part time to full time?
I started Joyful as a side hustle while working part-time for a local university – and truth be told, I’m still working for that university part-time (although now I’ve made the shift to being a lecturer in PR and communications!).
I think I’m the kind of person who thrives on variety – I don’t see ‘going full-time’ in my business as the ultimate measure of success. I love the balance of teaching and practice that I’ve got at the moment – I get to shape the communicators of the future while remaining relevant by working in the industry from day-to-day. Having said that, I have brought on an extra employee this year to help maintain my client workload while I‘ve taken a step back to work out this whole mum gig, and my clients have been really good about that (clear communication is a must!).
Who inspires you and why?
Fictional? Olivia Pope (I’m re-watching the first few seasons of Scandal at the moment!). I’d love to think I could be that kick-ass all the time!
Real-life? I’ve been watching my friend Sophia Arthur really kill it at the copywriting game lately, and she’s given me a kick up the proverbial to be better at marketing myself.
Best piece of advice?
Don’t tell clients to do things that you won’t do yourself. I picked up this gem at CopyCon19 a few weeks ago – I’m really bad for beating myself up over doing what I think is a terrible job on social media in terms of consistency. And then I realised – I always recommend to clients that they should go where their audience is and focus their attention there. Turns out my audience isn’t actually on social, I meet them at networking events and in-person, and I am really disciplined about getting out and meeting people! Turns out I was beating myself up for no reason at all.
5 things biz owners should use in their website content?
1. Excellent copy that catches attention (I had to say that!)
2. Pictures of you
3. SEO-optimised copy
4. Real-life case studies of how you can help clients
5. Clear calls-to-action – what do you want people to do after they get to the bottom of a page?
Quick Questions:
Podcast you’re currently listening to?
The Hot Copy podcast – always a great source of inspiration for copywriters!
Last book you read?
I’ve been trying to read Truly Madly Guilty by Liane Moriarty for 10 weeks now…how do I know it’s 10 weeks? That’s how long my baby has been distracting me from it! Before that I think I managed to read Air Kisses by Zoe Foster Blake in my last days pre-baby.
Last movie you watched?
It was my husband’s pick – a retelling of Beauty and the Beast called Beastly. Not terrible! Also proves the point that nothing is original…I’m blaming baby brain for the fact that I only realised it was a retelling of Beauty and the Beast after watching it for a whole hour.
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