Natalie Gates is a website copywriter and brand messaging strategist based in Kelowna, BC.
This is an abridged version of our conversation. Listen to the full episode right here, or find it on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Tell us a little about what you do and who you do it for.
I’m a website copywriter and brand messaging strategist, and have been pretty much since my business started. I focus on service providers, usually solopreneurs or people with small teams — a lot of consultants, a lot of people in mental health or wellness. People who need help figuring out their voice and their message, and then bringing it to life in their core digital tool, their website.
So it’s a bit of brand voice stuff and a bit of UX stuff. That’s kind of how I like to describe it.
How did you first start getting clients?
I was young when my business started, and I’d recently been laid off from my PR job. I was like, you know what, this is my time to go freelance and try to make this work.
The very first thing I did was reach out to local businesses and pitch them. At the very beginning it was free stuff, just to get a portfolio together. But from there it was really about nurturing those connections. Even those little random free bits — some of them led to more work or to other people.
One of the things that helped me take off early was that I started publishing writing — blogs about what I knew and what I did. A friend who had a website and brand design studio that was already going well saw my blogs and said, “I’ve got to get Natalie in my studio to help my clients with their copy.” That was a big thing to start my business off. It gave me consistent work, built my skills, and made me realize how much potential there is in those designer partnerships.
You get a lot of your clients through SEO. Walk us through that.
My situation is a little bit of a weird one. I’m Canadian, in Kelowna, BC. When I was nailing down my SEO strategy, I landed on targeting Canadians — basically targeting “Canadian copywriter.”
If you’re American, that might sound strange, because “American copywriter” would be way too broad and competitive. But Canadian business owners want to hire people who charge Canadian dollars when possible. I’d also set up my website as a .ca site, which maybe seemed like a mistake in the beginning, but I think it’s actually helped, because it tells Google who I am.
So I’m targeting the whole country, and a very large portion of my clients now come from people searching for a Canadian copywriter.
Has that taken a lot of upkeep, or does it mostly run on its own?
I’ve done a little. I try to republish new pieces related to that semi-regularly, but not very regularly. The core of it has worked on autopilot quite a bit.
Over time I’ll create content showcasing other Canadian designers, or get other Canadian marketers and designers to mention me on their sites. But it’s not a constant thing. It’s pretty low lift, which I really enjoy.
What are some of the things you’re not doing in your marketing?
Social media is a big one. At the beginning I was very obsessed with it, especially Instagram, and I do think it helped me build a network and a bit of a reputation. These days it’s there, but it’s not something I really have a strategy about.
It’s been a matter of reconvincing myself that I don’t need to stress about it, because of what the data shows me. I still feel the guilt sometimes. But I level with myself: yes, I could probably do more if I put the time and strategy behind it — but the history shows I’ve been continuously improving without obsessing over it.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be someone who’s completely off it. I like having it to check in with people and put something up once in a while. But I don’t have a social media strategy. So I guess that’s something I don’t do.
You call yourself a marketer with mixed feelings about marketing. Where does that discomfort come from?
It just feels like there’s so much of it constantly in my face, and a lot of it is just noise to me. I get in my head about it — like, am I contributing to the noise if I keep putting stuff out there? Sometimes it feels like people are following the trends more than they’re following what they actually want to do. Like marketing is just regurgitating what the flow of the industry is telling you to say. And that doesn’t sit well with me.
But I do believe marketing is important — obviously, or I wouldn’t be here. So I try to reframe it. I think of it as helping people make better hiring and buying decisions. And it’s a form of representing yourself, especially if you’re more of a personal brand. It sounds kind of fluffy, but it’s almost like self-expression, combined with being helpful to the people who want to work with you.
When I see it through that lens, I feel a little less weird about it.
Brittany: I hate the word authenticity, because everybody uses it to try to be authentic without actually being authentic. But a lot of the ick I see is people showing up and putting on a show. And so many times it distracts people from doing what they actually want to do.
For me, I’m not on Instagram, and that’s intentional. When I’m on Instagram, I buy a lot more things, and I’m more discontent with what I don’t have. When I have a problem I need solved, I love it when people market to me so I know they exist. But I’ve also felt the effects of marketing myself into wanting more than I need to want.
So I don’t want to bring more of that clutter into the world. At the same time, people are offering genuinely helpful things, and you have to get those in front of people somehow. There’s no getting away from that.
Natalie: Exactly. When I already know I’m interested in something, I’m like, okay, please email me a few more times. Please do. But then I look at my inbox and I’m like, oh my God, shut up everyone.
I don’t know what the answer is. You take what you need and leave the rest. It’s such a cliché, but maybe it’s the only way. And then just try not to be gross and shame people through your messaging. If you know you have something helpful, you should talk about it, and accept that some people might not need to see it at that moment, but some people probably do.
And the thing is, people can close the computer if they want to. I know they’re all designed to suck us in and make us not want to leave. But we can.
Why do you love websites so much?
When someone comes to my website, for the most part they’re there because they want me to tell them why they should hire me. They say that to me on discovery calls.
I love helping people create a home base like that. The people who are there want you to show them why they should reach out or book a call. They don’t want you to be weird about it. And they came on their own terms — you’re not throwing something in front of their face while they’re trying to be present with their kids or wanting to go outside for a walk. It’s a little different.
Do you think it’s possible to build a business without being chronically online?
I think it is possible. The majority of the people I work with — maybe 70 or 80% — don’t like being online very much. Some are completely off it, others dibble-dabble like me.
The ones doing really well have a great website set up, and beyond that they’re doing what people talk about a lot now: having a genuine network and genuine relationships with collaborators. Not just potential clients, but people in your parallel industries.
I don’t think I’m chronically online, and I don’t think a lot of my clients are, and we’re all doing good. If anything we’re a little less worried about going out of business, because we’ve always been like that. Now all of a sudden everyone’s saying, “I want to be offline more, how do I do that?” Well — don’t be chronically online, and you’ll figure out a way.
Brittany: What I’m seeing is that people are overwhelmed by inauthentic content online, and they want to find somewhere else. The trend is going toward in-person relationships, especially locally or in interest-based groups.
In 2020, everybody was saying: get online, create a course, be on social media, email everyone all the time, and you’re going to make buckets of money. There might have been a bit of a boom of that for a little while. But the reality is that business is won by knowing individual people and forming real relationships with them, oftentimes not even around the business. Sometimes just friendships. And then doing the hard work of connecting in person.
Natalie: Yeah, exactly. If you have those ongoing relationships, then when someone says I do need that thing or that service, it’s already sold, almost.
That’s definitely how I’ve been doing it. The portion of work I get that isn’t through SEO is almost all from connections I made in private groups, or other friendly interactions that have blossomed over the years. I absolutely love that, and I think the same is true for a lot of my clients.
Building through real relationships means you have to know how to talk about what you do. Has that been a challenge?
I’ve definitely struggled with it. A couple of years ago people had less awareness — “the words on the website, what is that? Don’t you just design it?” And there was a stretch where I’d have in-person conversations and people would say, “AI can do that.”
Even now, when I say I focus on website copy, people locally will think that’s very specific and narrow. And I’m like, really? In my world that’s a whole thing — there are so many different elements, focuses, industries, styles. So you just have to meet people where they’re at, which is kind of marketing 101.
How do you get yourself energized to do your own marketing?
I love writing — that’s the reason I got into this — so I get really energized by writing a newsletter. Sometimes I treat it like a creative outlet, which draws me to the page. But the downside is, if I’m not feeling creative that day, it doesn’t get done. So I’m constantly striking a balance between having a tactical plan to fall back on and leaving room to just be my weird, creative, expressive self.
Sometimes when I’m really struggling to get the newsletter written, I ask myself: do I really need to do this? Or could I spend this hour reaching out to past clients or engaging in a private group I’m in — which is probably going to have a lot more direct benefit than me publishing a newsletter just because I said I’d publish one every two weeks?
Brittany: That calibration is so interesting. We often treat marketing like, if you follow this system or these to-do lists, you’ll be successful and get this result. But sometimes it’s so much more of a personal development problem than a marketing problem. You have to figure out how you work, how you function, and what’s the best way to get yourself to do the things you think will be best for your business. It’s not an exact science.
Natalie: Yes, totally. I can make a content calendar for a client and stick to it, but I can’t do that very well for myself. I can’t plan too far ahead. So I’m constantly relearning that.
Brittany: We think it’s supposed to look a certain way. We have all these shoulds that, especially for smaller businesses, don’t make as much sense. If you’re running a huge company, or doing SaaS marketing, there may be elements of yes, you’ve got to get these ads out, you’ve got to keep that consistent content calendar. But smaller businesses, or family-run businesses, don’t have to look like those huge enterprises.
Natalie: Exactly. What is the why here? Don’t hold yourself to the standards of the big agency on the other side of the world. It’s just shoulds, and it makes you feel crappy when you keep not meeting them.
If there’s something you really want to be consistent with, that might be a sign to outsource it. A couple of the clients I do regular content for have literally said it gives them room to play and fill in the blanks when they want to. Not everyone needs to do that. But we’re not machines, as much as people try to convince us we are.
Brittany: Not machines at all. And we’re not marketing machines either.
What does growth mean to you?
Obviously I enjoy making a little more money every year — who doesn’t. But growth to me is feeling better and better about the projects I take on. It’s continuing to work with clients I believe in, while giving myself enough space to figure out what it is I want to say and do.
I’ve had trouble putting aside the time that’s really needed to figure out some of those big questions. So as basic as it might be: I want to keep working with the same kind of people I work with now, but grow in a way that gives me more space for myself. That’s what’s top of mind for me these days.
Listen to the full conversation with Natalie Gates wherever you get your podcasts.
Natalie’s Website: https://nataliegates.ca/
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Natalie’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wordsbynatalie/