Copywriter and Writer in Hertfordshire and London

Copy built on experience and research

At school I was called thick, lazy and stupid, and told I wasn't trying hard enough. I wasn't any of those things. I'm dyslexic.

These days people pay me to write for them, which would surprise a few people at my school.

Dyslexia shapes the way I write. I see the whole picture before the details, so I start with who'll be reading and what the piece has to do for them. I think in images and stories. I draft out of order, and often out loud, because some things are easier to say than to type. The meaning goes down first, and the spelling gets fixed afterwards.

I know how it feels to lose the thread halfway down a page, so I don't make readers do it.

A lot of what's online now was written to hit a keyword, not to help anyone. Readers notice, and so does Google. I'd rather write something worth reading.

• Research before writing. I find out what your readers are actually searching for, and what your competitors have missed.

• Complicated made clear. I can take a difficult subject, from workplace psychology to technical systems, and explain it so anyone can follow.

• Pictures and words together. I'm a photographer as well as a writer, so I plan pages where the photographs and the writing do the job together.

There's no agency and no team. You deal with me from the first email to the last full stop.

Before you get in touch, have a look at my writing portfolio to see the kind of work I do.

What I write

Websites and landing pages

Service pages, About pages, landing pages and anything else that has to persuade a stranger to get in touch.

Good copy answers the question the reader is too polite to ask. On my event photography page, that question is why an hour costs £200, so the page gives it a whole section. A price is easier to accept when you can see where it goes.

Blog posts and articles

Features, reviews and how-to pieces for your website or blog, short or long.

Articles need facts, and facts need checking. For something short and loud, there's my review of Ghost at Wembley. You'll find plenty more in my writing portfolio, from product reviews to essays.

White papers, case studies and reports

Long, well-sourced pieces that explain a subject properly. I keep a note of every source as I go and reference it as I write, so you can see where each fact came from, and the piece will withstand the test of scrutiny. The lies series on this site is that kind of writing: eight essays built on the research, with every source listed.

A case study tells one customer's story, with the facts and figures to back it up.

Product descriptions

Descriptions that tell a buyer what they need to know and why it's worth having, written for people first and search engines second.

Press releases

News written the way journalists need it: the story first, the facts checked, and quotes that sound like a person actually said them.

Email campaigns

Newsletters, launches and welcome emails for new customers, written so people open them and read to the end.

Social media posts

Posts that sound like you, sized for each platform, and written to send people somewhere useful rather than just fill a feed.

Ad copy

Short, sharp copy for Google Ads and other paid adverts, where every word has to earn its place.

Photography and write-up packages

I'm also an event photographer, so I can cover your event in pictures and words: the photographs, plus a write-up or press release to go with them, ready for your website and the press.

Editing and proofreading

If you've written it yourself, I can make it clearer and tighter without making it sound like somebody else wrote it.

I know a dyslexic proofreader sounds like the start of a joke. The punchline is that I don't trust a single read-through, so I never do one.

I edit in separate passes, structure first and spelling last, with checking tools alongside. Then I listen to the whole thing read back to me, because the ear catches what the eye skips.

Search research and competitor analysis

If it's going online, I can write it to be found. I research the words people actually type into Google, using Google's own search data and Semrush, and use them where they read naturally. I also look at your competitors: which search terms are working for them, and what they've left out that your page could cover. I'll write the page title and the description that appear in the search results too.

SEO for whole websites

If the whole site needs work, I'll go through it page by page: titles and descriptions, alt text for your pictures, links between your pages, and the structured data (schema) that helps Google understand what each page is about. I do the work on the site itself, not just hand you a report.

Nobody can promise you the top spot on Google, and I'd be wary of anyone who does.

How I work, including the AI

Every job starts with research, then structure, then writing, then checking.

I use AI, and I'd rather tell you now than have you wonder.

Everyone has AI now, and it will write you a blog post in less time than it takes to make a cup of tea. A lot of people ask it for one, skim what comes back and publish it. You can usually tell. The AI knew nothing about them, so it guessed, and the result reads like every other blog post on the internet.

I use it differently. Before AI goes anywhere near your piece, I find out what it can't guess:

• the subject, well enough to know what to leave out

• what your competitors are saying, and how they're saying it

• who you are and how you sound, whether you're a business or one person

• who'll be reading it, and what they already know

• what you want them to do when they finish, whether that's subscribing to your newsletter or picking up the phone

• where it sits in your sales funnel, because a blog post that finds strangers on Google has a different job from an email to someone who's already asked for a price

• where it will be published, and whether it should fit in there or stand out

None of that is new. Good copywriters asked those questions long before AI. The difference is that AI will happily write without the answers.

Then I use AI for what it's good at. I brief it with everything I've found out, and it helps me organise the material and put it in the right order. How I brief it is the part I keep to myself.

What AI gives me is never the finished piece. I rewrite it until it sounds like you, and nothing stays unless I've chosen it. Then I check every fact, because AI is at its most confident when it's wrong.

AI saves me time on the organising. Knowing what to say, and whether it's true, is what you're paying me for.

This page was written the same way.

Who I've written for

Most copywriting is invisible. When it works, readers assume the business wrote it.

I can't name the clients I've written for, so the best evidence is what you can read on this site.

I've also written for employers, from training materials to newsletters.

I've written agreements too, including device loan agreements and contracts between businesses and their staff and clients. I'm not a lawyer, though, so anything that has to stand up in court should go past one.

What it costs

Website copy is £300 a page, and articles and blog posts are £250 a page. A page is up to 500 words, about what fits on a sheet of A4 in 12-point type. That's a page of text, not a page of your website: a short home page might fit on one, and a detailed service page might need two.

Editing and proofreading are £35 an hour.

Everything else, from white papers and press releases to photography packages and whole-site SEO, is priced by the job, because no two are the same. Tell me what you have in mind and I'll send you a quote. Asking costs nothing.

Search research is included in the price of anything I write for the web.

If I can say it in fewer pages, I will, and you'll pay for fewer. You'll know how many pages I expect the job to need before I start.

Reviews

I don't put reviews on my own website, because they're too easy to invent. You'll find genuine ones on Google, where I can't edit them.

Questions

Can you write in our voice?

Yes. Sounding like you is most of the job.

Which AI do you use, and what happens to my material?

Claude. I've found it the best at structuring writing and putting facts and information in the right order. Before I start, I set its privacy settings to match your data protection policy.

If you'd rather I didn't use AI at all, I can write without it. As at school, I'll need extra time.

How long does it take?

It depends on the job and how big it is. You'll get a date when you get the price.