Business name: HD Words
Office location: Camborne
When was the business founded: 2015
How many employees: Just the one – Hannah Danson, the HD of HD Words.
How is the business best described?
HD Words is a small copywriting, proofreading and editing business, specialising in writing for small businesses. Several of my clients are one-man-bands, artists or craftspeople, who would rather be in their studio or kitchen ‘doing their thing’, than writing about it for their website. Others are business owners who have run out of time to do everything, or know their limitations, and are outsourcing their writing.
I can create web content, blogs, product descriptions, press releases, newsletters, those horrible ’about me’ sections that craft fairs require to publicise their stall-holders… whatever you need writing, in a nutshell. I can also polish someone else’s writing, for instance in areas where I don’t have the technical expertise to write from scratch.
I can help business owners think about their social media and blogging, working together to create a plan to guide their communications – and I have been known to deliver one-to-one blogging training.
Why was the business founded?
I was made redundant, and found myself with a whole barrel of useful skills, which it turns out that other people are interested in. There was a little more to it than that, but that’s the short version. Outset Cornwall helped set me up with the knowhow to run a business in the first place.
For many businesses, their website, or publicity materials, are the first point of contact a customer has with them. Something badly written, with typos or grammar mistakes, will give a first impression of the business which is lower than it might have been. So customers will go elsewhere, and who can afford that? I truly enjoy helping businesses present themselves better to potential customers, using words to maximise their attractiveness to their chosen market.
How does the business compare to competitors in the industry?
There are certainly other copywriters locally and nationally, but I have made a focus of the crafts and artwork markets, as well as small food-producers, where my competitors are maybe looking more at professional trades, and larger organisations. I think it’s a nice niche to be in; from one day to the next I could be trying on hats, tasting chocolate, or playing with lovely jewellery!
What are the business’s plans both short-term and long-term?
My short term plan is to grow the business – I’m very new still, and am marketing myself wherever I can. Having come through my first winter, it will be a priority in the run up to next winter to sign up some clients for whom the approach to Christmas isn’t their busiest time of the year. A lot of people said to me, ‘yes, I’m really interested but call me in January’. I’m looking at expanding into other areas, still maintaining my focus on small businesses – for instance the wedding industry, where there is so much competition that having the right words on your site can be vitally important.
Longer term, in five years I hope to be large enough that I can employ someone, perhaps an apprentice, to take over the basic admin tasks, and learn some writing skills, so that I can concentrate on writing, and marketing.
How does the business define success?
For me, success will be in the small things. I’ve hit a couple already – my first word-of-mouth referral, and being taken on as a consultant by my former employers to work on projects that were mine before I left. Success will be when I speak to potential clients and they say, ‘ah yes, you did xyz’s website – it’s really good. I’d like you to work on my site too’. It’ll be when I need to move into an office, so I can take on another member of staff.
I’m not trying to take over the world; I’m not even trying to build a big copywriting agency. My clients know that I can relate to them because I’m a small business, just like them. My personal touch is critical to the success of the business, and it’s important to me to retain that, so that my clients can trust that they’re getting 100% of my focus and skills.  I love writing, and if I can help people with their businesses by doing something I love, that’s success for me.
Contact
Hannah Danson –Â 07941 632 285
