How to Choose Between Content Writing, Copywriting and Ghostwriting?

A small guide if you want to make money from writing, but still not sure which path to follow, this might help you.

In the normal world, a copywriter would be the salesman everyone hates.

Makes you a cold call in the morning, shows up at your door driving the car company, knocks with a fancy suit and recite a scripted tale to make you believe that signing that 3-year-contract paying a monthly fee of almost nothing for the thousand TV channels you’ll watch 5 at most, is the best thing you can do in your life, and if you say no,

You’ll feel bad.

Because for sure, the neighbor will party every weekend with his friends, watching live matches all day long while drinking beers, and in high definition!

In the internet world,

They are backstage maniacs which can run the entire show, most companies still haven’t realized they should have one working for them, and the biggest part of customers don’t even know they exist.

But for sure, if you ever stopped infinite scrolling by clicking on a title which got your attention, and ended up going all the way to click purchase on a product,

It was the work of a copywriter.

Content writers are the guys who keep the web running, on the internet, you’re either consuming, or producing.

They are the ones who produce.

After all, every website, page, blog, book, company, course or etc., survives on one thing only:

Content.

And written content is the base of every single thing out there.

• A Book is a story told through writing.
• A Course is nothing else than a “written guide” which a Teacher uses to pass down knowledge.
• A Movie/ Video, Is nothing else than a “written script” which gains form through camera lenses.

But guess what?

Most people don’t have the patience or skill to actually sit their asses down, and transform all the chaotic running mess which goes through their head,

Onto something palpable for people to see.

That’s what content writers do.

And the Ghostwriters probably have all the skills to be a content writer, copywriter, book writer, or any of the others “subclasses” we’ll discuss in further articles,

But with one difference only:

• They can’t have, don’t want, or maybe don’t care about their name being attached to stuff.

Their work exists, but they don’t.

Aside from what I thought in the beginning, a ghostwriter is not someone who is very good at writing horror ghost novels,

I mean, he can be, but his name won’t be in the final product.

Ghostwriters are writers who produce content, under someone else’s name, be it a company, a person, YouTube channel, or any other thing,

They don’t take credit.

You would actually be surprised if you knew how much of those famous YouTube channels, articles, songs and even books have nothing to do with the people who are actually putting their names out there.

Or do you think the president writes their own speeches?

Definitions

Anyone who ever thought about making money with their writing skills, at some moment, sure was confused by these definitions and titles.

Especially nowadays where everything needs to have a name or definition, for sure It can get pretty crazy out there.

I guess everyone who’ve learned to write, be it self-taught or school attending, can make it, but if they write, do they automatically become a writer?

Like, what defines a writer?

• Is it having a published book which makes you a lot of money or fame, and you retire from it?
• Is it popping nonsense words which very few people aside from him will be able to see, only to be found and understood after his death?
• Is it showing up everyday on the internet and social networks, putting some words out there?

Damn, it looks like a crazy world, but I don’t know, can’t answer that.

And sure gets even more complicated once you start to deal with all those professional definitions.

I mean, not being a native English speaker, I even used to mess copywriting with copyright,

Does the word copyrighter even exist? Is it a person who sells rights?

I actually think that would be a cool nickname for a slave trader in some fantasy, I don’t know,

probably would.

Independently of which path you choose to take,

You need to have one thing in mind:

All of them are writers.

According to our all father Wikipedia:

Which means what makes a writer is “Communicate Ideas”.

You can inspire feelings and emotions, or even choose to become an entertainer, but all of those things honestly are based on communicating ideas,

If a writer can’t communicate ideas, it doesn’t matter how good are their grammar skills, how deep is his knowledge on a subject, or how much he writes,

His manuscripts will never be read and mainly won’t be understood, no one will get it.

The individual skills

Aside from communicating Ideas, what makes the difference between all of the writing kinds are their skills, how they choose to communicate.

And I’m the kind of person who prefer focusing on what we have to become unstoppable, instead of trying to improve on what we don’t have, and become average.

For a copywriter, I believe the most important skill it can have is Empathy.

Put it into a simple way:

a Copywriter is a salesperson who sells by writing.

Everything you need to know about a copywriter’s job is defined in these 3 lines:

• Get attention.
• Keep attention.
• Make people act.

They are the persuasion lords of written stuff.

A copywriter needs to be a master in creating compelling and persuasive written content, mostly for advertising, marketing and promotional purposes.

If their work is to grab attention, pass some information and make people act,

To do this, you need to understand people and potential customers,

You need to know who they are, where they are, how they think, which language they use, what struggles or emotions they go through,

only then you’ll be able to speak with potential customers directly in “their language”.

Becoming a master of empathy and psychology, understanding the customer needs, behaviors, pain points, is what makes a good copywriter,

and they can even be the guy who makes or breaks a business.

Even if you’re not a good salesman, you can learn all the techniques necessary for it, as Evgeny Schwartz, one of the biggest copywriters ever said:

“Copy is not written. Copy is assembled”- Evgeny Schwartz

Which means all the “hard-skills” for a copywriter can be learned from techniques, books, and studies, but the soft ones such as understanding people are pretty hard to get.

On the other hand, for the content writers, I would say the most important skill is Story-Telling.

Honestly, it doesn’t matter how catchy your title is, how deep, knowledgeable and meaningful what you’re writing can get, or how info-packed your text is.

If your content is poorly written and doesn’t follow a “you’re following a story and wants to get to the end to know what happens” style of writing, nothing will keep the audience in there for long.

For me,

a content writer, is a storyteller who does it by writing,

Because even if they don’t want to sell anything, make people take any action, or even give any useful information,

They can still entertain their audience.

They can still give a good story to the public, which in the end they will feel sad because it’s over, even a very bad story, can become something magical if told in the right way and will make people think and reflect on what just “passed by their mind”

The ability to get into people’s minds and connect to them, get into their emotions, make them feel, cry, laugh, anger, feel understood, identify with the character and have someone who relate to, is what makes a good Content Writer.

Some people are natural storytellers, they can do it without any effort, don’t you have that friend the moment he starts speaking everyone gets hooked instantly?

But for those who don’t seem so easy, Storytelling is also a craft, and there are thousands of different techniques, per example, one of the most famous, “The Hero’s Journey from Campbell”, it literally teaches you how to tell a story which people will love.

And for the Ghostwriters,

The most important skill is Discretion,

After all, as the name say, is a ghost who writes.

I even believe ghost writers are probably the most skilled ones, but they are in for the money only, not for the fame, or name,

they like to write and they love money.

Get paid to write something, and that’s it, give the rights for the person who hired them, and “my job here is done”.

Cash in, Get out.

One of the most famous “unconfirmed cases” of Ghostwriting is “Becoming by Michelle Obama”, according to her husband Mr Barack, which you probably know him, since he was the 1st black president of US, (African American, for the political correctness), told she used a ghostwriter on that.

Another very common reason for people being ghostwriters, can be sometimes they are known for a specific kind of book, such as fiction, non-fiction, medical, or whatever, and they don’t want their name connected to a different kind.

I consider discretion the most important skill because imagine you writing a book for someone else, and then it becomes an all-time bestseller? or a song which hit the top 1 billboard and makes a person millionaire from it.

Would be pretty hard to accept that you’ve only made a few bucks from it, right?

Independently of which path you choose or which you believe aligns the best for you,

If you focus on constantly improving, putting stuff out there, and sharpening your skills, it will work.

Just keep hitting publish!

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Thanks for reading up to here guys, I hope you appreciated and took something useful from this, and have an amazing day!

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With All Regards,

–DGaspar.

*poof* Disappear in magic smoke.