A (0:00)

My name is Nicholas Cole. I'm one of the highest paid ghostwriters in the world. And today I'm going to walk you through how to become a LinkedIn ghostwriter. So maybe you've heard of this career path or you've heard of this job that people are doing. It's where you ghostwrite for people's personal brands, specifically on LinkedIn. And there's really only a couple steps that you need to understand if you want to get started ghostwriting. Okay, this also works if you want to get started ghostwriting for people on X, if you want to ghostwrite articles for people on Medium or Quora, if you want to ghostwrite anything. A lot of these steps are the same. But I'm going to talk about it in the context of the becoming specifically a LinkedIn ghostwriter. And just so that you have a little bit of proof, this is a screenshot from my ghostwriting P and L. Here you can see we did $3,755,972.11 in revenue. So I know what I'm talking about. I've made a lot of money as a ghostwriter, and today I want to tell you how to get started. So the first step is, how do you become a LinkedIn ghostwriter? You literally tell people, I am a LinkedIn ghostwriter. It is so simple and yet you'd be shocked how many writers don't do this. And a lot of times writer's bios are the epitome of a clever bio. So you go to their bio and it's like, Marvel fanatic and love long nights with my cat. It's like, okay, well, I have no idea what you do, right? And when someone doesn't know what you do, they're not going to sit there and try and figure it out. So my whole philosophy around writing a bio, specifically a one sentence bio, is you should just use this template. I ghostwrite specific asset you want to specialize for target client. Okay, this does a couple things. First of all, the asset, I ghostwrite educational email courses, or I ghostwrite weekly newsletters, or I ghostwrite social content. Right. When you specialize in an asset, that immediately increases your perceived value. This is much better than a freelance writer who goes, hey, I charge $30 an hour. Let me know what you need. And right. This is something writers don't understand. When you do that, you are putting the burden on the client. So when you say, I charge $30, let me know what you need, you think you're being helpful. You're actually Being the opposite of helpful. You are being deliberately unhelpful. Because now the client needs to sit there and go, all right, this person charges 30 bucks an hour. What do I need them to do? And they have to figure it out. So you're putting the burden on them. That's a problem. You will make 10 times more money if you sell a productized service, meaning it's something that you specialize in and something that you can repeat over and over and over again. So here you would put I ghostwrite LinkedIn content for. And then here's the next piece. Target client. So you want to name an industry or a specific person in that industry for a couple reasons. One is it's going to naturally help you attract those people. Right? If I say I go straight for fintech entrepreneurs, guess who I'm probably going to attract? Fintech entrepreneurs. That's a good thing. It's not a bad thing. Second is that when you name the client, this is super subtle and people don't understand this. When you name the industry or you name the client, those keywords are now attached to your profile, which means they have the potential to show up in some of those searches. Okay? So again, way better to be specific than to be broad. So you want to put that specific client in your bio, because then when that person sees you, they immediately assume they're like, oh, I'm a fintech entrepreneur and I'm looking for a newsletter. Well, if they see I go strike weekly newsletters for fintech entrepreneurs, guess what? They're going to assume that you're the best possible person for that job. Okay, so here you would put I ghostwrite LinkedIn content for. And then either an industry, a specific industry, or a specific person within that industry. Okay? So that's the first step. And it is so basic and so many writers don't do it. Do that. You will probably attract more clients. It's very simple. All right, Second step. Two, you want to be your own case study. Okay. Everyone is so obsessed with collecting testimonials. And this is a stat that I love sharing with people. When I was building my ghostwriting agency, it was called Digital Press. We worked with over 300 different clients. We generated millions of dollars in revenue. I did not use a single testimonial ever. We just didn't need it. And the reason we didn't need it is because we were very good at two things. One, educating the client on the problem that they had and how we could help them, how we could help solve it. And two, I was my own case study. So whenever someone would say, how do I know that this is going to work? How do I know that this is going to generate an outcome? I would point to myself and I would go, well, what did you do before we got on this call? They'd be like, well, I looked you up. Like, did I look like a real person? They're like, yeah, I saw, you know, a bunch of your writing on Quora. I'm like, okay, that's the roi. The ROI is that you're not playing the game. And I'm going to help you play the game because you're judging me the same way right now. And so when you are your own case study, you are literally living the benefits of the that you are pitching to someone else. So if you want to offer educational email courses as a service, you better have an educational email course built for yourself. If you want to offer a weekly newsletter to other people, you should probably have a weekly newsletter. And you should use that as a testing ground for you to learn what works and what doesn't. It's going to make you better. If you want to become a LinkedIn ghostwriter, you better be creating content on LinkedIn consistently yourself. Don't even think about it like, I need to build an audience. Think about it like you need a vehicle to practice your skills. Okay? So whatever service that you're going to provide, you should also be practicing on yourself. You want to be your own case study. I promise, nothing is going to make the sales process easier than being your own case study. Step three. You make a list of leaks and faucets. So what is this? There are two different types of people that you can reach out to that will help you get clients. I like to think of them, and I name them this way for a reason, as leaks and faucets. A leak is someone that you can help directly, right? You're walking through the neighborhood. You see someone's front yard has flooded. You walk up, you knock on their door, you're like, hey, I think you're leaking water from your guest bathroom over there. I can help you. So a leak is someone that you can help directly. It is a potential client. A faucet is someone that might not need your help directly, but knows other people who would need your help. And one really valuable faucet. I'll tell you a quick story. When I was building my agency, we had a faucet. We had a client that was responsible for sending us so much business. They literally sent us, like, two or three clients a month that we ended up just providing our service to them for free because they sent us, like, hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of clients. So a faucet can be extremely valuable for you and your business. Okay? And so what you want to do is you want to start by making a list of leaks and faucets. Now, here's where people go wrong. Most people, when they think about their network or they think about people in their life, they just sit there and go, I don't know anyone. Okay, well, first of all, you do. You do know people. And second, even if all of the people that you know don't need a LinkedIn ghostwriter, for example, they probably know someone who does. So when I was first getting started ghostwriting, you want to know how I got my first handful of clients? I was not doing, like, oh, I'm going to go send a hundred DMS to random people on X or LinkedIn or whatever the kids are doing these days. Okay. What I did is I looked through my network. I looked at every single possible person I'd ever met. Everyone from I've known you since third grade to, you know, my former boss after I quit my job, to former coworkers, to cousins, to my friends, to friends of their friends, family members of friends. I just looked at everyone that I had one or two deviations of connection with. Okay? And then I just started asking, and I just said, hey, do you know anyone that's looking for a ghostwriter? And one of my first clients was it was an entrepreneurial friend who knew another person who was entrepreneurial who knew another person who was entrepreneurial who knew a client who needed a ghostwriter. So I had to go through four different people before I found the person that I could actually help and who needed my help. And this is one of those steps that is so basic, but everyone skips it. And I'm not really sure why. The logical place to start when you're first beginning as a ghostwriter is not to go. I'm going to go pitch the person with 2 million followers that I've never met before on the Internet. That's probably the worst person to go pitch. And yet that's where everyone's brain goes, okay? It is so much easier to find your first client by going, you know, my uncle keeps telling me about this friend of theirs that has this small business and how they're struggling to get leads. Well, you should probably ask your uncle for an introduction to that person. Okay. And I find, you know, I've trained. I can't tell You. How many ghostwriters at this point? A thousand plus. So I know all the faulty beliefs and I know the book, Cole. Right. I know what you're probably thinking. It's probably some version of. Well, but I don't want to ask my uncle for an introduction because, you know, what if, what if I let that client down? Or what if I'm not good enough? Or what if they say no? Like all of these made up things. And the reality is, I always love reminding people of this. Most of the world can't write above a third grade reading level. Most people don't know how to write anything. Okay, so that's the default. That's the bar. So if you can write something on a platform, congratulations, you're probably in the top, like 20%. Okay, so a lot of the things that you come up with are just self inflicted and they're faulty beliefs and they're not real. And the way that you start, everyone starts the same. I started at zero. Everyone starts at zero. Okay. It's not like when I decided to become a ghostwriter. I woke up one day and I was like, wow, what a great day to become a ghostwriter. I guess the universe is just magically going to give me all of these things. No, I started at zero. No one knew what I did. I didn't even know if I was any good at it yet. And I just started. Right. And so this is me giving you permission to do the same thing. So start with a list of leaks and faucets. Who are people in your life that you feel like you could help? Anyone. Even if it's a friend who's making no money, but has an interesting side hustle. A lot of my first clients I did for free. They were just other entrepreneurial friends that were trying to start their own thing. And I was like, you know what, I want to get some reps in. Why don't I help you? And I'll write this thing for you for free. I just want to get better. But all that work is what allowed me to then start working with higher and higher profile clients till eventually I went from being a beginner to ghostwriting for billionaires in 18 months. Okay. Absolute beginner. Had never done this before. Go trading for some of the biggest, most well known VC firms in the world. It's not impossible. It's just a matter of going through the process. Okay, step four, and this is assuming that you've done steps one, two, and three. Step four is once you've exhausted your list of leaks and faucets a really interesting way of attracting potential clients is what I like to call pitching in public. So what this means is that whatever service you're providing. So here, this would be LinkedIn ghostwriting. You find people on LinkedIn who either A, aren't doing the thing that you're offering yet, so they're not creating content on LinkedIn, but they should be. Right? Maybe it's someone who has like a huge YouTube channel, but they're just doing nothing on LinkedIn. That's an opportunity. Maybe it's a CEO who has a bit of a presence on X but isn't doing anything on LinkedIn. That's an opportunity. Right? So you're looking for people that aren't doing the thing yet, or you're looking for people that are currently doing the thing they're already writing on LinkedIn, but they're not doing it very well. They're not doing it consistently. Okay, Those are the two archetypes. And you basically go find as many relevant people as possible, ideally in a specific industry. So if you're like, I ghostwrite LinkedIn content for personal trainers. You go find personal trainers who aren't on LinkedIn yet or are on LinkedIn, but they're not doing it very well and they're not consistent. And then what you do is you pitch in public. And what this means is you create a piece of content about them. So you, let's use the hypothetical example. You go find a personal trainer with a great Instagram and YouTube presence, but they're not doing anything on LinkedIn and you write a long form post that's basically like an audit. It's what you would do if you were to pitch them directly, but you're going to do it in public. And you go, you know, here's this really great personal trainer. They have an awesome audience on YouTube and LinkedIn. But I think they're. Or YouTube and Instagram. But I think they have a huge missed opportunity by not creating content on LinkedIn. So in this post, I'm going to walk through the different things that they could do. How to repurpose their content from YouTube and Instagram over on LinkedIn, and why I think it would have such a big impact on their business. Everything that you would tell them in your pitch, you're just going to do it publicly. Now, this might sound weird or uncomfortable, but, you know, again, I can hear the objection or faulty belief like, won't that person get mad? No, that person is going to see that and go, wow, that's actually really Smart. Why aren't I creating content on LinkedIn? And that is what's going to make them reach out to you. But then even still, if they don't reach out to you, what do you think is going to happen when all the other people like them see your post? Because they might not. You might not get their attention, but you might get the attention of 10 other personal trainers who go, you know, you didn't use me as the example, but I can see myself in the example. And that's actually really smart. And I have a, you know, a growing Instagram audience. But you're totally right, I should be creating on LinkedIn. Why don't we talk? So pitching in public is. It's basically the same thing as pitching someone directly, but you're turning it into an asset that lives forever, becomes part of your library, and has the potential to reach other potential clients. So why would you not do it? This is one of the biggest strategies that I train ghostwriters on because I think it's so incredibly effective. And then step five, and I think this is probably the most common missed opportunity that I see with ghostwriters, is they might do step one, they might do step two, they might do step three, they might even do step four. But then they don't follow up. And they pitch someone once, or they ask their uncle for that introduction once, and they never follow up. The uncle forgets, they got busy, you know, they got a couple young kids, oh, I forgot to send that text and introduce you. And they never follow up. And a lot of times the reason that people don't follow up is insert, you know, 100 faulty beliefs. They're like, I don't want to come off as annoying or pushy. I don't want to be, quote, unquote, salesy. I bet my uncle didn't want to introduce me because he secretly thinks that I'm awful and you know, he doesn't want to attach his name to introducing me to this person. Like, people make up all these faulty narratives that aren't real. None of them are real. They're self inflicted and they're ways of you giving yourself permission to not take action. Okay, all of the money is in the follow up. All of it. Sometimes every once in a while, you'll pitch someone, you'll reach out, someone will make an intro, and then immediately the person will become a client. I would say that happens 10% or less of the time, 90% of the time, people need to be reminded, people need to be pinged over and over and over again. And it's not because they don't want to work with you. It's not because they don't like you. It's nothing that you did. It's that they are busy. I was literally before I recorded this video, I was just thinking about this earlier today and I'm thinking, you know, put yourself in my shoes for a second. I'm a business owner now. You know, we run this really large ghostwriting training program called Premium Ghost Training Academy. We employ 30 full time people at this point. I was just driving home from the dentist. You know, I want to check on my wife, see how her day is going. Our dog needs to be let out. I'm getting blown up with Slack notifications, right? And in my email, I've got a handful of people who have reached out to me cold. I've never met them before, but they have interesting services and I might be interested in working with them, but I have so much going on in my life that I don't remember to respond to them. And so if they never follow up with me, it's actually not that I wasn't interested. In many cases, I am interested. I just have too much going on and I need to be reminded over and over and over again. And this is the part that every ghostwriter doesn't understand. And this is why they don't make very much money. Because the whole game is in the follow up, okay? And you have to get out of your own way and not sit there and make up some narrative about how the person hates you or doesn't want to work with you. None of that is real, all right? Grow up. It's not real. Instead, you need to be the one to go. Hey, I'm sure you've been really busy. Just wanted to bump this up in your inbox. Hey, by the way, I just saw you put out this amazing piece of content. Would love to turn that into a LinkedIn carousel for you. Let me know if I can be helpful. Hey, by the way, you know, I'm sure it's been busy, holidays, you know, I just wanted to follow up again. If you can build that skill, you will make so much money as a writer because this is the thing that nobody does. And all those writers that are sitting on upwork just waiting for someone to hire them, this is why they don't make very much money, because they're not taking control of the relationship. The vast majority of clients that I landed and the reason why our agency grew so quickly and how I was able to generate millions of dollars as a ghostwriter is because we followed up with people for literally 12 months in a row and not even once a month. Like once a week or once every three days, just relentlessly. And, yeah, maybe like 3% of people would be like, no, I don't want to work with you. Just stop emailing me. But that's why I say you follow up until they call the cops. Like, literally until someone says, no, I have made the definitive decision that I am never going to work with you. And if you email me again, I'm gonna block your email and call the authorities until they say that to you, it is fair game. Follow up. And this is where all the money is. So if you want to become a LinkedIn ghostwriter, the path is actually not that complicated. The things that you do are fairly simple. But you should. You know, where people go wrong is that they just don't do them. Like, I can't tell you how many writers that I say just change your bio to, I ghostwrite specific asset for specific target client. And they don't do it. And it's like, well, there's five steps here. Go execute the five steps, and you can get into LinkedIn ghostwriting, which can be incredibly lucrative. So I wanted to put together this video for you. This is a very easy way to get started, and I hope this helps you land your first LinkedIn ghostwriting client.