May 25, 2022 • 43 mins
Jonathan’s pursuit of an MFA was “totally mercenary.” After making little headway in his career or with his oil paintings post college, he realized his penchant for writing could be lucrative (and creative).
Several years later, with his master’s finished, Jonathan was at a work party when his boss made an offhand remark that sparked another epiphany: If he kept working for others, he’d likely never get a larger piece of the proverbial pie. Within a few months, Kranz Communications was born.
The early years demanded learning the ins and outs of copywriting, networking, and marketing his own business while taking whatever work he could get — and often at low rates. But his tenacity paid off.
Jonathan’s income tripled between his first and second year solo. And he has earned a solid reputation in his space, landing big-name accounts, speaking at marketing events, and leading workshops at conferences and for clients.
Twenty-five years on, the deliverables and technology have changed. But Jonathan’s preference for charting his own path has remained.
Books & other resources mentioned
Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples
Ogilvy on Advertising by David Ogilvy
Where to find Jonathan’s content and creative works
Writing Copies for Dummies by Jonathan Kranz
Our Brothers at the Bottom of the Bottom of the Sea (YA novel) by Jonathan Kranz
Check out more from The Work Seminar
Visit theworkseminar.com or find @TheWorkSeminar on social media.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jesse Butts (00:24):
Hey everyone.
Thanks for joining mefor another episode.
I'm your host, Jesse Butts.
Today, I'm talking withJonathan Kranz, an MFA in
creative writing turnedmarketing writer and trainer.
Jonathan and I met at amarketing conference in 2019.
Jonathan is now the principalat Kranz Communications,
a business to businesscontent and copywriting firm.
(00:47):
And he's also a workshopand training leader
for numerous clients.
Jonathan, welcome to the show.
Delighted to have you on.
Jonathan (00:54):
Delighted to be here.
Ever since you invited me, I'vebeen looking forward to this.
Jesse Butts (00:58):
Excellent.
So Jonathan, can wetalk a little bit about
what you're doing now?
What type of projectsare you focusing on?
What type of clientsare you working with?
Jonathan Kranz (01:09):
Well, first of all, in terms of clients, it
tends to be mostly a business tobusiness, not so much a B to C.
So for everyone to knowI'm a marketing copywriter,
which means that I writethe anonymous stuff that
you may find annoying.
It could be a commercialinterrupt something
you watching, lesslikely that junk mail.
But today, most of that workis really web-related just like
(01:29):
everything else in marketinghas changed through digital.
So I would say that the bulkof my work has to do with
digital one way or another.
Website copy, content that is,you know, stuff that you can
download from the web, includingeBooks and white papers, scripts
for videos, email, email blasts,email campaigns, articles,
(01:53):
occasional blog posts...
just about anything thata B2B marketer would
need to get the word out.
My clients tend to fall intothese categories, high-tech,
healthcare, financialservices, business services
and higher education.
That, that's thecore of my business.
Jesse Butts (02:10):
And is any of that work on social media or are you
pretty dedicated to web work?
Jonathan Kranz (02:17):
You know, very little of it is directly
tied to social media.
What typically happens isI'll create content that'll
then be supported with acampaign that may or may not
be conducted on social media.
Very often it'll be morelike a banner ads that may
appear with a, a socialmedia post, et cetera.
What I have found, I knowthis will be controversial
(02:37):
at least in the B2B space,social media is not really
a significant player inmarketing and sales for B2B.
Some will argue differently,but I would say to
them, show me the proof.
I just don't see it.
Jesse Butts (02:51):
All right.
If there is a guest outthere that has that proof,
I welcome you onto the show.
Maybe we could have a, alittle, a three-way discussion.
Jonathan Kranz (02:58):
I would love it.
Jesse Butts (03:00):
Uh, so, but, uh, Jonathan, I'm curious, when did
you found Kranz Communications?
Jonathan Kranz (03:04):
That was 1996, January of 1996.
In August of 95, my firstdaughter, Rebecca was born.
I was working as a paralegalin downtown Boston and one
day at a company event, inwhich the boss invited the
family to come over, youknow, our families to join us.
(03:24):
I remember the boss met mydaughter for the first time.
She was only like two, threemonths old at this event.
And a boss put his arm aroundmy shoulder, and he says,
Jonathan, I love it whenmy employees either buy a
house, get married or havea baby because then I know
they're my wage slave forever.
And he didn't, hewasn't being mean.
(03:45):
He was a good man.
But what I recognized inthat moment was that, he
was absolutely correct.
That if I didn't takecharge of my life, if I
didn't seize it, yeah, thenI would be a wage slave.
And that was the inspirationfor me to find a new
direction that ultimatelyculminated in starting my
business in January of 96.
Jesse Butts (04:06):
Great.
So if we could go backa little bit to...
Jonathan Kranz (04:10):
Sure.
Jesse Butts (04:11):
...more of your educational background.
I'm curious, you know, what,what was the reason you
enrolled in grad school?
What made you want to go beyondundergrad with your studies?
Jonathan Kranz (04:21):
Well, you know, I graduated from
Rutgers with a degree in art.
Not art history.
But making art.
Oil painting, specifically,was my big concentration.
And my initial thingwas, you know, was going
to be a visual artist.
And that just didn't workout for any number of reasons.
I, I think my original planwas, I'd work whatever job I
(04:44):
could find, and then I wouldpaint at nights and weekends.
And then what I would findis that the evenings I'd
be exhausted because by thetime I made the commute home,
prepared a meal, I mean,there was like an hour or two,
and I was ready to go to bedand get up for the next day.
And then the weekends wouldcome and I was so drained
that it was just hardto get anything moving.
So long story short thatdidn't, the art itself,
(05:07):
didn't go anywhere.
And so I spent a number ofyears wandering around the
wilderness thinking, you know,What am I going to do to make
a living , much less, youknow, have a meaningful career?
And it occurred to me, youknow, I wasn't a bad writer.
A lot of my teachers hadcomplimented me for my
writing and I thought, Well,is there something I do
with, I could do with that?
And at this point, my originalintention was totally mercenary.
(05:27):
I thought, How canI make money writing?
And I thought abouttechnical writing.
I didn't know much about it.
Commercial writing,didn't know much about it.
So I thought I'd go to school.
And as I started studyingwhat options would be for a
graduate degree in writing,I was highly encouraged
to skip any program thatconcentrated in tech writing
and go directly to the MFA.
(05:47):
The thinking was that that wouldgive, you know, the greatest
flexibility for any kind ofwriting I might want to do.
Plus, the MFA is regarded asa terminal degree, which means
it can qualify me to teach at ainstitution of higher learning,
a college or university.
So I said, What the hell?
And in preparation for the MFA,I got into fiction writing.
I started writing on my own, andthen that's what I concentrated
(06:10):
on when I got my MFA.
And I finished that, Ithink around early 95.
Jesse Butts (06:18):
Did the dream of painting on the nights and
weekends turn into a dreamof writing fiction on the
nights and weekends, onceyou secured a better job?
Jonathan Kranz (06:28):
Well, here's the thing.
What happened was I got my,finished my MFA, and as I
was working as a paralegal,as I said earlier, and
then I had that epiphanythat I described to you.
And my initial thought was,If I could work for myself, I
could work on my fiction for acouple of hours in the morning
and then dedicate myself to,to the business um, throughout
(06:51):
the remainder of the day.
And, and then what reallyhappened, and this is also
kind of an interesting storyis that, you know, a couple
of years in, and I realizedthat there were two things.
One is that it was harderand harder for me to get
myself motivated to writefiction in the mornings.
And a lot of that was, youknow, when you're thinking
about an impending deadlineahead, my thought was, You
know, I'd rather just do theclient work and get this done.
(07:13):
And get the money.
And I also realized, too,that, to really build
the business would takea complete commitment.
So I gave myself permission toquit writing fiction and to just
focus on building the business.
I now, at this point, I havetwo children, a first home, a
mortgage, and all the thingsthat go with that, that I'm
sure everyone who's listeningto this, or many of the
(07:34):
people listening to this willunderstand or appreciate.
Ironically, as it turnsout, years later, leaping
ahead to 2009, I got theinspiration to write a novel.
And after a six year torturousprocess of writing, looking
for an agent, looking for apublisher, I did indeed get
that novel published in 2015.
Jesse Butts (07:54):
Oh, congratulations.
So you're at this point where,you finished grad school and
you had, as you mentioned...
I'm not sure how to phraseit, if it was career
ambitions, but you wentinto it fairly practically.
You liked the flexibilitythe degree would offer you.
Jonathan Kranz (08:13):
Yes.
And at that point tomy mind had changed.
I thought, yes, I'mgoing to do this.
I'm going to becomea fiction writer.
So I had turned.
My initial motivation was,figure out some kind of
commercial application.
Then I got into fiction,got the degree, and then
I changed yet again.
Back and forth, back andforth kind of quality.
And I hope that's also usefulto your, your audience.
That not everything is linear.
(08:36):
There can be a cyclicalor iterative quality
to our journeys.
In fact, most of the timethat, that's the way they
actually really do evolve.
Jesse Butts (08:44):
So you were a paralegal and then you left
that in, I believe you said96 to start your own firm.
I, I personally would feelso intimidated going from a
paralegal to a solo marketer.
What was that transition like?
Jonathan Kranz (09:03):
I'd like to say that I went into it, you
know, with just complete 100%confidence and, you know,
just damn the torpedoes.
But the truth was I recognizedthat there was risk here.
I had never done anything likethis and no one in my family had
ever done anything like this.
So, it was risky.
I recognize that becauseeven if the wage work I was
(09:24):
doing wasn't that wasn'tparticularly rewarding or even
renumerative, it was at leaststable and reliable, you know,
you do the work and every twoweeks there's a check, right?
Or, or was somethingsimilar to that.
And I remember even, my,again, my, my baby Becca
she's, you know, wakes up inthe middle night and I get
up to, to walk her, you know,to get her back to sleep.
(09:46):
And I'm walking up anddown the hallway, just
doing the math in my headand thinking, Am I crazy?
Is this the right thing to do?
Am I nuts?
Here I am.
I'm a husband.
I'm a father.
Does this make sense?
Is this self-indulgent?
And this went on for weeks.
But I held to my initialdeal with myself and that
deal was, Look, I would findthree clients, three pieces
of business, and then Iwould commit fully full-time.
(10:07):
And let me just explain,there was a little
bit of a transition.
So I, toward the end of 95, as Iwas still a paralegal, I managed
to pick up some pieces of work.
I did my first freelance work.
In fact, it was for a,the very first commercial
writing I did was for a videocatalog, a little digest
size video catalog, where myjob was literally to write
little descriptions of themovies that people would
(10:29):
order from the catalog.
This is pre-internet.
And then after that, I managedto pick up some work with a
former studio mate of mine,Glen Wish, who left art
school to found his own graphicdesign studio and business.
And he gave me a break and hadgave me some assignments and
included a catalog called SoundExchange by Warner Bros., which
(10:50):
sold kind of a pop culturerelated merchandise, kind of
music related merchandise.
So in addition to CDs andDVDs, it would have things
like, you know, t-shirts andwall hangings and all kinds
of, you know, gimcrack andcrapola, you know, you name it.
And then I did a lot of, alsofor him, I did stuff with
Publishers Clearing House.
(11:10):
So I had that.
And then I said, Ineed two other things.
And I got two othergigs, and I said, Okay.
I gave my resignationnotice and I dived in.
Jesse Butts (11:19):
Wow.
So it sounds like acritical part of that...
I'm not sure if you want tocall it networking or just
simply stating your intentions,but I mean, you, you built
before you launched, right.
Jonathan Kranz (11:37):
Yes a bit.
And the other thing toconsider is that at first,
my first inclination was tocontinue being a low wage
slave by finding another wageslave thing, but in writing.
And I started doingall the things, a job
seeker is supposed to do.
You know, those informationalinterviews you conduct
(11:58):
with people, et cetera.
And it was during the courseof that, those interviews
that I had a kind of insight.
So the year is 1995, andmy brother Christopher was
generous enough to buy memy first real computer.
This was a Pentium 75 woo-hoo.
At the time, that wasa big freaking deal.
Right.
And that would have been,you know, one, a version of
(12:18):
Windows 3, I think at that time.
But one day I'm sitting inmy room with this computer
that, you know, probablybetween games of Doom and,
and I realize, hold it.
The modern computeris an office in a box.
It's a place tocreate your work.
It's a place to store your work.
(12:39):
It's a place to communicate,you know, via fax or email.
You could do yourbooks on that computer.
In fact, everything thatyou would need from an
employer is in the computer.
As long as you're willing,in this case, I'm willing,
to go out and hunt.
That is, to go out andget the business itself.
(12:59):
When I realized the technologywas available to enable the
independence, it also occurredto me that, You know what?
Starting out my own wouldbe no more difficult
than trying to find a jobwith a regular employer.
Because either way I hadto build a portfolio.
And I said, you know, if I'mgoing to develop a portfolio
of sample work, why notjust do that for myself?
Jesse Butts (13:23):
Well, now I'm, I'm waxing nostalgic slightly for
my Pentium 166 Packard Bell.
It, it wasn't toofar after yours.
So, I want to talk a bitabout building the business.
After you, you got some clientsand you put the work into it.
You know, I hate to embarrassyou, but I mean, you're a
(13:44):
fairly well-established writer.
You know, you're involvedin Content Marketing World.
You're at a lot of conferences,you've worked with pretty
prestigious clients.
What were those early dayslike once you, you really
started getting full time, tobecoming a pretty well-known
voice in your field.
Jonathan Kranz (14:04):
So I'm going to tell you the truth.
That first year I made awhopping $18,000, more or less.
18,000.
Jesse Butts (14:13):
Like in 1996?
Jonathan Kranz (14:14):
Yes, in 1996.
Jesse Butts (14:17):
Okay.
Jonathan Kranz (14:17):
And I spent that year aggressively networking.
At that time, again, still,this is very early internet.
The internet existed, but itreally wasn't a useful tool yet.
You have to remember very early.
I don't even know...
the first browser may havecome out by this time, but
it was still a novelty.
It was not what it is today,which is just like the glue
(14:39):
for our entire society.
At that time itwas still novelty.
So, any networking wasmeant face-to-face.
And I would actually, Isubscribed to a paper, the
Boston Business Journal.
Every town, every city,I think has one of these.
There's a MilwaukeeBusiness Journal.
New York.
Whatever.
So Boston Business Journal,the reason I subscribed most
of all was because it wouldhave an events calendar.
And so there are things like theAmerican Marketing Association,
(15:01):
the Business MarketingAssociation, the New England
Direct Marketing Association,the New England Society for
Healthcare Communicators.
The Society ofIndependent Consultants.
New England Editorial Society.
I mean one group after another.
So I would say I was doingevents like two or three a week
to network, network and network.
(15:22):
And, it panned out.
And here's, here'sthe thing about it.
If I took the attitude oneby one, you know, go to an
event and then that nightevaluate, was it worth it?
Most of the time wewould've said, No.
I mean, you get a few businesscards, you follow up with,
you know, some correspondence.
And most of the time nothingwould come out of it.
But you do it for the few timeswhen it hits, because that's
(15:42):
it, that's your traction.
That's where you start.
And through that networking,I was able to develop some
contacts that did lead to work.
And, and that goes to part two.
Well, how do yougrow a business?
Well, one opportunitycame to itself was
from a local hospital.
Local hospital hada PR department and
they needed articles.
They just contracted witha local paper where they
(16:04):
would do an article a weekallegedly from one of their
providers, one of the doctors.
So my job was to ghost write.
The payment forthese was ridiculous.
It was like a buck 25,a buck 50 an article.
I mean, I mean 150, ofcourse, but still really low.
But at the time I wasthrilled because again, you
know, I needed the money andit also gave me a toehold.
(16:25):
So what I did nextis what's important.
Is that once I did one ortwo articles, I said, you
know what I'm going to do?
I'm going to start markingmyself as a healthcare writer.
And what I did was I joined awhole bunch of organizations
that were about healthcaremarketing, largely just to
get their mailing lists.
And I literally built adatabase through WordPerfect.
(16:47):
Because WordPerfecthad that capability.
We could develop a basedirectly from the program for
mail merge, and I compiledthe list, you know, from
multiple groups of, you know,hundreds of persons long.
And I would do bulk mailings.
You know, myself with justa regular, then my Pentium
75, that Hewlett-Packard,you know, laser jet printer.
(17:09):
And a bunch of envelopesand just a lot of licking
of stamps, et cetera.
And, you know, the responserates were of course
low, but because theynaturally are ,right.
You know, 3% was considereda very good, but imagine that
means if you do a hundred piecesof mail, maybe three responses.
So the truth was I do morethan a hundred, maybe 300, 350.
Maybe I get four responses.
(17:31):
But of those four, youshould convert one.
That's all I needed.
That's all I needed.
And I would just keep doing it.
So it was a pattern of that.
I would just keep doing that.
And over time theportfolio just grew.
I had more and more healthcare,but I began to diversify.
I made an important contact atan agency that no longer exists
called CPS Direct Mail outfit.
(17:51):
And that was phenomenal.
I worked with a brilliantcreative director
named Evan Stone.
Wonderful man.
Learned the ropes from himabout the essentials of
direct marketing copywriting.
And from there, I was ableto build on that experience.
Again, with the similarprocess of developing mailing
lists, doing those mailings,continuing the networking and
(18:12):
gradually little bit by littlebit, building up a business.
In fact, so much so that thesecond year of my business,
I more than tripled whatI made the first year.
So the second year I madearound 66,000 I think.
97.
Now in today's dollarsthat...yeah, exactly 1997.
That, that ain't hay.
That's not bad.
(18:33):
And for me, it was the firsttime in my professional career
that I was really successful.
Because after college ... youknow, I'd worked a
number of crummy jobs.
Like so many, youknow, the kind of...
I did picture framing.
I waited tables, you know,all kinds of different stuff.
But this was it.
I was like, Holy shit.
I've made this happen.
I'm, it's for real now.
I'm a success, you know, I'm,I'm actually making it happen.
(18:54):
And that's reallythe story, you know.
I think the other thing I wantto say about this is not only
the sense of, you know, getthat initial traction, then
expand, exploit it to expandit and get more business.
But also I would say topeople, Expect that career
to change over time.
For example, I did a lot ofhealthcare writing back then.
Today, not so much.
(19:14):
I do it occasionally, butnot the way I used to do it.
Another thing that's changed is,I used to do a lot of junk mail.
A lot of direct mail packages.
Loved doing that.
You'd have to write theenvelope, you'd have to, you
know, with a teaser, thenyou'd have the letter, the
push note, the brochure.
The, a lift note I mean.
Everything.
And it was fun to create thosepackages, but then as you,
as you know, in the early2000s, with the rise of the
(19:36):
internet, direct mail responserates just bottomed out.
I mean, I watched itliterally year over year.
So I'd see 1999 peoplesaying, Whoa, 3% is great.
2000, if you can get 2%.
2001, one and a half percent.
By 2002, it was like,if you could get 0.75%
response, you're doing great.
(19:57):
But, that isn't great.
The business was collapsingand even my own direct
mail efforts that I justdescribed were failing.
I would send out 700letters and get nothing.
Zip.
Silence.
And that was really scary.
And, and again, Imorphed my career.
Obviously, I turneda more digital turn.
The webpage, my websitebecame more important.
(20:20):
But also it became moreimportant to write for the
web at that, at that point.
It became about the web pagesplus content that people
could access via the web.
And it's been likethat ever since.
Jesse Butts (20:33):
Sending the letters, I mean, people
call it outbound marketingor push marketing.
But then in the early 2000s,you know, there is that
switch of, Why should I waitfor someone to contact me?
I'll just go onlineand find what I need.
And that, you know,became inbound marketing
or pull marketing.
So that's when you adapted, likeyou were talking about earlier,
(20:55):
to create content that whenpeople were looking for someone
like you, that's how they findyou versus you putting more
effort into finding people.
Jonat (21:05):
Absolutely Jesse, that's a stone-cold truth.
So for me now marketingbecomes less pushing stuff
out and hoping people respondto really create, for my own
purposes, creating content.
And that kind of contentcould be, for instance, the
stuff on my blog, it couldbe ... I had an e-newsletter
newsletter for awhile.
It could be the newsletter.
It could also be writingarticles that would
(21:25):
appear either in print.
Like I.
Eventually, I did articlesfor the Boston Business
Journal, for example.
And then increasinglyonline publications.
Like I, I did a lot ofstuff for Marketing P rofs.
Did a lot of articlesfor them, and that was
incredibly productive.
And of course, speaking,public speaking.
So a little hint for people.
If you can do speaking, ifthat's something that doesn't
(21:48):
scare you, do it, because mostof your competitors won't.
So you get an instantadvantage right there.
So I'd say that my apperanceat Content Marketing World,
speaking and public speakingis a large part of what
draws the leads in today.
Jesse Butts (22:05):
I do really want to talk about speaking
and workshops, leadingseminars, that type of thing.
But before we get intothat, there's something
I'm curious about.
You've also spent a lot oftime talking about networking
and pounding the pavement.
As you were going throughthis, were you frustrated that
you weren't spending all yourtime working on client work?
(22:26):
Or did you kind of get thislittle entrepreneurial itch
of, you know, making dealsand, and building a business?
Jonathan Kranz (22:33):
Well, you brought up an essential thing.
If you go out on yourown, as a consultant or
a service provider, youinstantly have two jobs.
One job is whateverit is you do.
For instance, I writecopy for clients.
But then there's the second job.
And that job is marketingmy own business,
promoting Jonathan Kranz.
And I think that that's thedifference between people
(22:56):
who do well freelancingand those who don't is...
I think that the, the ones whounderstand that they have that
second job of self promotionare going to, are going to be
much more likely to make it.
When I see freelancersfail, it typically follows
a model like this...
You find someone who's workingfor a company, finds that
(23:18):
the clients love him or her.
And maybe one of the clientseven makes a pass, saying,
Hey, if you leave this place,you know, we got plenty of
work for you, et cetera.
And so you, you leave, intendingto coast on the contacts you
already made when you werepreviously a full-time employee.
And that typically worksmaybe two to three years.
(23:38):
And then what happens is,is that there's a life cycle
to any client engagement.
You don't get clients forever.
Maybe it only lasts one project.
Maybe it's a series of projects.
Maybe you get a couple of years.
But it's rare to get morethan a few years out of
a client relationship.
Client business changes.
They take a new path.
Another agency comes in.
There's so many reasons whythey may change their talent.
(24:00):
So what that means is ifyou're not continually
refilling that funnel withprospects, eventually you're
going to run out of clientsand run out of business.
So it's really critical,critical for anyone who
wants to go independent toconsider that independence
means having to invest inyour own self promotion.
Jesse Butts (24:19):
And speaking of self promotion,
just like you mentionedearlier, public speaking.
Can you talk a littlebit about maybe...
I don't know if it'sspecifically that first
opportunity or some of thoseearly ones and how you, you
started that and what you sawfrom, from those experiences?
Jonathan Kranz (24:37):
Yes, I can.
So, as, as I saidearlier, I attend a lot
of networking events.
And at many of these events,they follow a similar format.
You know, there's like acocktail hour for, you know,
and schmoozing for aboutan hour, hour and a half.
Then maybe there's ameal and a speaker, Q&A,
and everyone goes home.
And at first I wasreally intimidated.
I thought to be a speaker,you have to just know so
(24:59):
much about your topic.
You, you have to be an expertin order to get up in front
of all these people, right.
And then after attending anumber of these events and
realizing that the level ofquality was often marginal.
Every once in a whileyou'd hit, you, you'd
find a fantastic speakerand you'd be so grateful.
You'd learn so much.
(25:20):
You'd be inspired.
You'd get practicalinformation you could use.
But unfortunately, thatwas kind of the exception.
Most of the time, itwas pretty mediocre.
And I recognized acouple of things.
One, the bar is low.
So good news everyone whois thinking about speaking.
The bar is really low.
That's kind of good for you.
The second thing I realizedis that you don't have
(25:41):
to know everything.
Even if you know a smallthing that has value for
your audience, a littlething, that's enough.
Talk about that for 40 minutes.
And you can.
You don't have to havethe answers to the
secrets of the universe.
Do you know something that wouldbe useful to your audience?
Yes?
Good.
Go for it.
Do it.
Run with it.
(26:02):
So a little piece of adviceis, if you're stuck for
an idea, think about waysthat you would challenge
the conventional wisdomin your industry or field.
And talk about that.
Saying, everyone says, Do zig.
But I'm tellingyou, You should zag.
Here's why.
There's a speaking topic.
Jesse Butts (26:20):
I'm guessing we're kind of in the 2000s now.
you you're, you'repretty well established.
You've done some speaking.
At least from what I've seenfrom people's listings on
websites, like, workshopscan be kind of, I don't
know if goldmine is reallythe right term, but they
can be pretty lucrative.
I know this is somethingthat you've done as well.
Are workshops somethingthat, in your experience,
(26:42):
a lot of speaking led to?
Or how did you get tothat position to be able to
do those types of things?
Jonathan Kranz (26:49):
Well, it was a combination of feeling
comfortable with speaking, andthen also in 2004, I published
Writing Copy for Dummies.
So, you know, those yellowand black Dummies books.
So I wrote one, I wrotethe one on copywriting.
So that experiencewas interesting.
No one ever picked upthe book and then called
me to give me business.
(27:10):
That never happened.
So that did not happen.
I have gotten the calls,of course, from other
writers saying, Gee, howdid you get the book deal?
Can you tell mewhat the secret is?
Or, Gee, I'd like tostart as a copywriter.
Can you help me?
And usually I do help . Butwhat it really did, the virtue
of that book was that it openedup speaking opportunities and
article writing opportunities.
(27:31):
You know, it was the strengthof the Writing Copy for
Dummies that I had credibilitywith Marketing Profs.
So I published a bunchof articles for Marketing
Profs, and then I havecredibility to organizations
that have conferences,you know, host conferences
and looking for speakers.
The workshop, I'm trying toremember, I think I started
that about ... 14 years ago?
(27:52):
And I really did itas an experiment.
I just said, I now offer this.
And seeing would...youknow, run up the flag and
see if anyone would salute.
What made my workshopdistinctive is that I
said, One, we would developthe curriculum together.
There is no pre-made curriculum.
We would have a conversation,talk about the outcome
that you desired.
And then I would customizea curriculum to the
(28:15):
outcomes you want.
It's all, exercise-based.
And I got some bites.
And a couple of things happened.
One, I found that they arelucrative, or they can be.
And number two is that I reallyenjoy doing them, and find that
a very rewarding, meaningfulexperience helping other people
become better at what theydo or discover talents that
(28:37):
they did not know they had.
So that's always been anexciting part of my business.
Not always, but it has becomean exciting part of my business.
Jesse Butts (28:46):
What were you doing to, to learn the ropes
of copywriting and marketing,especially since you, you
didn't work somewhere fulltime for a couple of years
to, to learn the ropes?
Jonathan Kranz (28:58):
That's right.
So you made aninteresting point.
I learned after I launcheda business that I had
done it the wrong way.
The thing I was supposed to dowas get some years of experience
either in-house, that is workingfor a, for a company, right, on
their in-house marketing team.
Or for an agency.
And I had done neither.
I just started freelancing.
And I didn't know thatwas novel until after I
(29:21):
did fulfill the novelty.
This audience, the temptationwill be to go back to school
to learn something new.
And think about it.
If you're a person that youfinished undergraduate, then
you're, you're able to actuallyget into a grad school, which
is not necessarily that easy.
You have to, you know, the,the application process can
(29:41):
be a real pain in the butt.
You go to grad school.
And now you're, you mayhave debt from undergrad.
Debt from grad school.
And you realize I want a change.
You know, whatever,whatever reason, whatever
you studied in grad schoolis not going to be it.
So the thing is you'll saythat, I need something else.
You may think, OK I'll goto school again, or I'll go
through a certificate program.
I would discourage that.
I would say, do somethingdifferent this time.
(30:03):
And that is, find a wayto learn independently
or learn on the job.
And if there is a certificate oranother graduate degree involved
that's necessary, let theemployer pay for it if you can.
So what I did specifically in mycase is that no, I did not get
into a certificate program formarketing or marketing copy.
(30:25):
I did two things.
I did that networkingI told you about.
And also that networking alsoincluded some events that
were instructive in nature.
That became very importantto me, like this is a
program on copywriting.
Great.
I attended those.
I also read some books.
People forget that booksare still a major resource,
even with the web.
And in fact, that could beyour secret weapon, is that
(30:45):
you're willing to sit down andinvest the time to actually
read a book, or many books,cover to cover, which a
lot of people reluctant to.
I found, especially how helpful,for those of you interested
in copywriting, John Caples'Tested Advertising Methods is
a classic from back in the DarkAges, I think of the 40s or 50s.
But it's still a masterpiece,still relevant today.
(31:06):
Another book I liked isOgilvy on Advertising.
That book is as informative asit is fun and enjoyable to read.
Ogilvy has a lot ofwisdom to share and I
learned a lot from him.
And then you just pick up thingslike, you know, if you could
attend conferences, you couldpick up things through osmosis.
Not just through the sessions,but in your networking, your
BS-ing with other people,you learn this stuff.
(31:28):
And then finally, you know, you,the ultimate way you learn is
you learn by doing it, right.
Trial and error andthat kind of thing.
But I really would encouragepeople to say your next step,
see what measures you cantake to learn without having
to acquire any more debt.
Or absorb more of yourtime because that's
really burdensome.
Jesse Butts (31:50):
So with all of these experiences and with all
of these things, your businessoffers, what have you found
most enjoyable about your work?
Jonathan Kranz (31:58):
It's the satisfaction of knowing that
I helped other people do theirjobs and reach their goals.
That I actually contributedsomething meaningful that
moved things forward,especially if it's challenging.
I like the challenging stuff,not the sexy, easy stuff.
I like the difficult stuff.
And I find it really excitingtoo, to in the hard work,
(32:19):
the hard thinking, you know,consider what avenues are of
attack are really available.
Pursue them aseffectively as you can.
And then you'd get the sharein the satisfaction that just
have a job well done, buta job well done with other
people who are counting on you.
And together you'vecollectively made something
meaningful happen.
And I think that's the singlemost, in general, gratifying.
(32:42):
When I do the training, it'sreally the, the contact
with other human beings.
It's incredibly exciting whenyou realize someone's gotten it.
When you see that lightbulb go off over their head,
when they put up their handsand like, Oh, I get it.
You know, that is just sucha rewarding experience when
you're a teacher and one ofyour students, one of the
(33:03):
people that you're working with,suddenly has that insight, that
breakthrough, and they got it.
That's incredibly satisfying.
Jesse Butts (33:09):
Would you say you love your job?
Do you like your job?
How important is job fit to you?
Jonathan Kranz (33:15):
I'm going to say this.
I'm going to contradicteverything that, most everything
you've heard from everyjob seeking guru out there.
Don't follow your passion.
What I mean is you go on toLinkedIn, you read people's
profiles, guaranteed 99% ofthem will have the words,
I have a passion for....
Jesse Butts (33:35):
Industrial waste management.
Jonathan Kranz (33:36):
Whatever it is.
Right.
Exactly.
You know?
And no one cares whatyou have a passion for.
First of all.
It doesn't matter.
I'm not gonna hire someonebecause you have a passion.
Like industrialwaste management.
If I needed an industrialwaste manager, I don't care
if you're passionate about it.
All I care about isthat you're good at it.
That's it.
And conversely, from the otherside, the actual practitioner.
(33:58):
You don't have to bepassionate about something
to be good at something.
I read a wonderful book yearsago, it was a non-fiction book
that was profiling differentlaw enforcement officers.
And there was one officer whowas an expert in ballistics.
And he was an interestingguy because unlike almost
every single one of hiscolleagues in ballistics,
(34:18):
he was not a gun enthusiast.
He only had two guns,his service revolver,
or pistol, whatever itwas, his service firearm.
And then a firearm thathad been his grandfather's
many years before thathe kept as an heirloom.
That's it.
He wasn't a collector.
He didn't, he didn't love guns.
However, he was acknowledgedas one of the best ballistics
experts in the country.
(34:38):
He was excellent at what he did.
And so it wasn't about, hewas passionate about guns.
He was passionate aboutbeing a conscientious,
dedicated professional.
And so he did fantastic work.
And the way I feel, too,is you'll often hear
someone say, you know,people say, Never run from
something, run to something.
Have an aspiration to run to.
(35:00):
And I would say, well,that's a privilege.
You know, if you're in aposition where you can run to
something, that's a wonderfulthing, mazel tov to you.
But for many of us, we doneed to run from something.
For me, I wanted toget out of wage labor.
I wanted to have,to be independent.
I wanted the greater flexibilityto be, spend more time with
my kids during the day, ratherthan being tied to a desk.
(35:22):
And so, yes, I was running fromwage labor to something that
would give me independence.
So, I approach marketing,marketing copywriter, not
because I fell in love withmarketing copy, but because
I recognized that copywritingwas a way, a means for me
to achieve independence.
And it, you know, my passionis really more for freedom
than for writing per se.
Jesse Butts (35:45):
I'm interested in what you were
mentioning about passion.
You were an art major, you havean MFA in creative writing.
You, you mentioned that,you, you scratched the itch
and, and got a novel out.
Do you sometimes feel like,I really want to spend
you know, some eveningsand weekends painting?
Or, or writing storiesor what have you?
(36:06):
What is yourrelationship to that now?
Jonathan Kranz (36:08):
It's a, it's complicated.
You know, I do get thatimpulse now and again.
But I gotta tell you, it'sreally hard to sustain that
kind of disciplined commitmentto really succeed in, in
either of those things.
You know, becausethat's what it takes.
It takes that kind ofdisciplined, systematic
dedication to really succeed.
So, you know, I vacillate.
Sometimes I go, it's, I'm fine.
I'm happy with theway things are.
(36:29):
And I have hobbies andinterests that I pursue
and that's good enough.
And there are other timeswhen I go, Gosh, you know,
I wish I could make agreater mark on the world.
You know, do I havea story to tell?
Do I have somethingbeautiful to show?
And, and, and, and, and theanswer is eh, not that I
can think of at the moment.
So I would say, I'd say Jesse,that the doors aren't closed,
(36:50):
but, you know, I don't see anyimmediate plans for a creative
venture in either directionnecessarily, but, who knows.
I could be taken by surprisetomorrow, find inspiration,
develop the discipline and,and be back on, you know,
back active in somethingagain, it could happen.
Jesse Butts (37:06):
I remember from a previous conversation, I
mean, you mentioned you wereinto architecture and art.
And I mean, you, you'vementioned reading, you know,
a number of books that weremore on the practical side.
It sounds like you'restill if not creating.
Jonathan Kranz (37:21):
Oh, absolutely.
If you saw like the, themagazines I subscribe to and,
you know, and the things I,you know, like for instance,
one of my favorite magazines,it's called Ugly Things.
And three times ayear, they come out.
Basically it's noteven a magazine.
I'd call it a book.
It's like 250 pages, eightand a half by 11 or 12.
And it's dedicated to obscuremusic in the period 65 to 75.
(37:45):
So a lot of psychedelia,garage rock, all that, uh,
especially the forgotten stuff.
You know, the localhometown heroes that maybe
cut one seven inch andthen disappeared forever.
This is what UglyThings concentrates on.
And, and that's part ofmy hobby, part of the
records is, you know,exploring obscure music.
And so, yeah, I love getting,you know, reading about that.
I also subscribe to amagazine called Fungi.
(38:07):
Yes, fungus.
You know, so I'minterested in mycology.
I'm excited that spring isbeginning because that means
in a few more months, mushroomseason is beginning, and
I can go back outdoors andhunt for mushrooms, which
is a hobby that I love.
And that is a passion.
It's just somethingI love to do.
And I also, you know,I have other things.
I just, I'm learning moreabout natural history.
(38:28):
I'm spending more time outdoors.
And I still have a love of art.
Love going to museums.
If I come to a conferencein your city, yeah, I'm
probably gonna play hooky,skip the talks, and go
to your local art museum.
That's probably what'sgoing to happen in reality.
So yeah, those passions,those loves are still there,
but I don't know that I'mnecessarily a contributor.
Jesse Butts (38:48):
And just for listeners behind Jonathan is
what I'm guessing is probablyfour to 500 LPs behind you?
Jonathan Kranz (38:56):
Well, yeah, there's at least that.
And I have a totalof around 4,500.
So this is, you know, wouldthat time I spent hunting
for these records, be betterspent building my business?
Probably.
But those are the choicesI made, and, you know,
I'm okay with that.
Jesse Butts (39:13):
So this has been great, and I'm just kind of
wondering as we wrap thingsup, What questions should
someone in grad school, maybea few years out, or maybe at
any stage really, be askingthemselves if they really
think that their disciplineisn't going to work out and
they're considering somethingoutside their field of study?
Jonathan Kranz (39:35):
I would say a couple of questions.
One question I would ask myselfis, What skills or areas of
knowledge have I acquiredalong the way, and either,
or both my undergraduateand graduate careers, that
could have applicability andmeaning and other contexts?
For instance, in thesciences, you may have become
really adept at researchor statistical analysis.
(39:57):
Well, guess what?
Those are skills that arevalued in multiple contexts
beyond pure science.
Right.
In my case, it was obviouslycommunications, writing.
So where could I apply that ina way that would be, that would
enable me to have a living?
So I think you want to lookat, kind of do an inventory
of the things that you areable to do and say, Where
(40:18):
else would that be valuable?
I think that that wouldbe extremely useful.
And then apply on topof that some filters.
So first filter might be,OK of all the things where
I could apply myself that'soutside my specific field,
what would I find satisfyingor at least interesting?
And even if you're notpassionate about it, would
(40:38):
at least find doing...
like I find doing thework very satisfying.
I like succeeding.
I like beingsuccessful as a writer.
I enjoy doing goodwork for my clients.
You want to say, What else couldyou imagine yourself doing that,
even if it's not your dream,still would be satisfying labor.
I think you would ask abouttoo ,obviously, is, Who else
(41:00):
needs those kinds of skills?
Where else are those needed?
That's really the same question,just spinning it 180 degrees.
But those are thequestions I'd start with.
And then I'd go, ina very practical way,
What are the realisticopportunities available to me?
So that would depend onwhere you're located.
(41:21):
Who you know.
Networking contacts,for example.
You really do want to thinkwhere are those opportunities?
And I'm not talkingpie in the sky stuff.
I'm talking about realground level stuff that you
could actually get into.
Sometimes those practicalitiesare that there's a job you
could actually get to, youknow, that's not an hour and a
half commute, but something youcould say, yes, I could do this.
I could have whatever thecontext of my personal life is.
(41:43):
This is a doable vocation.
So those are thequestions you want to ask.
Where else are my skillsand expertise applicable?
Who needs those kindsof skills and expertise?
What would I find satisfying?
And what practical opportunitiesexist adjacent to me?
Jesse Butts (42:01):
All right.
If people want to check out yourbusiness, where should they go?
And if they're curiousabout your novel...
Jonathan Kranz (42:10):
So first off, to learn more about
my business, just Googlemy name, Jonathan Krantz.
K-R-A-N-Z.
And you'll end up atKrantz Communications.
I think the websiteis www.kranzcom.com.
And there's a bunch of,there's an outdated blog that
I haven't updated in I'membarrassed to say how long.
But there's a lot ofgood, useful content
out there, especiallyif you're a copywriter.
(42:31):
There are actually good howto articles and some stuff
that are free to download.
You don't have to giveme your email address.
It's totally anonymous.
It really is absolutely free.
There's information out there.
My novel is a, a young adultnovel called Our Brothers at the
Bottom of the Bottom of the Sea.
Jesse Butts (42:48):
Well, thank you, Jonathan.
This was a great conversation.
Jonathan Kran (42:51):
Thank you, Jesse.
It was a great pleasure.
And I wish you the bestof luck and the best of
luck is anyone listening?
Hey everyone.
Thanks for joining mefor another episode.
I'm your host, Jesse Butts.
Today, I'm talking withJonathan Kranz, an MFA in
creative writing turnedmarketing writer and trainer.
Jonathan and I met at amarketing conference in 2019.
Jonathan is now the principalat Kranz Communications,
a business to businesscontent and copywriting firm.
(00:47):
And he's also a workshopand training leader
for numerous clients.
Jonathan, welcome to the show.
Delighted to have you on.
Jonathan (00:54):
Delighted to be here.
Ever since you invited me, I'vebeen looking forward to this.
Jesse Butts (00:58):
Excellent.
So Jonathan, can wetalk a little bit about
what you're doing now?
What type of projectsare you focusing on?
What type of clientsare you working with?
Jonathan Kranz (01:09):
Well, first of all, in terms of clients, it
tends to be mostly a business tobusiness, not so much a B to C.
So for everyone to knowI'm a marketing copywriter,
which means that I writethe anonymous stuff that
you may find annoying.
It could be a commercialinterrupt something
you watching, lesslikely that junk mail.
But today, most of that workis really web-related just like
(01:29):
everything else in marketinghas changed through digital.
So I would say that the bulkof my work has to do with
digital one way or another.
Website copy, content that is,you know, stuff that you can
download from the web, includingeBooks and white papers, scripts
for videos, email, email blasts,email campaigns, articles,
(01:53):
occasional blog posts...
just about anything thata B2B marketer would
need to get the word out.
My clients tend to fall intothese categories, high-tech,
healthcare, financialservices, business services
and higher education.
That, that's thecore of my business.
Jesse Butts (02:10):
And is any of that work on social media or are you
pretty dedicated to web work?
Jonathan Kranz (02:17):
You know, very little of it is directly
tied to social media.
What typically happens isI'll create content that'll
then be supported with acampaign that may or may not
be conducted on social media.
Very often it'll be morelike a banner ads that may
appear with a, a socialmedia post, et cetera.
What I have found, I knowthis will be controversial
(02:37):
at least in the B2B space,social media is not really
a significant player inmarketing and sales for B2B.
Some will argue differently,but I would say to
them, show me the proof.
I just don't see it.
Jesse Butts (02:51):
All right.
If there is a guest outthere that has that proof,
I welcome you onto the show.
Maybe we could have a, alittle, a three-way discussion.
Jonathan Kranz (02:58):
I would love it.
Jesse Butts (03:00):
Uh, so, but, uh, Jonathan, I'm curious, when did
you found Kranz Communications?
Jonathan Kranz (03:04):
That was 1996, January of 1996.
In August of 95, my firstdaughter, Rebecca was born.
I was working as a paralegalin downtown Boston and one
day at a company event, inwhich the boss invited the
family to come over, youknow, our families to join us.
(03:24):
I remember the boss met mydaughter for the first time.
She was only like two, threemonths old at this event.
And a boss put his arm aroundmy shoulder, and he says,
Jonathan, I love it whenmy employees either buy a
house, get married or havea baby because then I know
they're my wage slave forever.
And he didn't, hewasn't being mean.
(03:45):
He was a good man.
But what I recognized inthat moment was that, he
was absolutely correct.
That if I didn't takecharge of my life, if I
didn't seize it, yeah, thenI would be a wage slave.
And that was the inspirationfor me to find a new
direction that ultimatelyculminated in starting my
business in January of 96.
Jesse Butts (04:06):
Great.
So if we could go backa little bit to...
Jonathan Kranz (04:10):
Sure.
Jesse Butts (04:11):
...more of your educational background.
I'm curious, you know, what,what was the reason you
enrolled in grad school?
What made you want to go beyondundergrad with your studies?
Jonathan Kranz (04:21):
Well, you know, I graduated from
Rutgers with a degree in art.
Not art history.
But making art.
Oil painting, specifically,was my big concentration.
And my initial thingwas, you know, was going
to be a visual artist.
And that just didn't workout for any number of reasons.
I, I think my original planwas, I'd work whatever job I
(04:44):
could find, and then I wouldpaint at nights and weekends.
And then what I would findis that the evenings I'd
be exhausted because by thetime I made the commute home,
prepared a meal, I mean,there was like an hour or two,
and I was ready to go to bedand get up for the next day.
And then the weekends wouldcome and I was so drained
that it was just hardto get anything moving.
So long story short thatdidn't, the art itself,
(05:07):
didn't go anywhere.
And so I spent a number ofyears wandering around the
wilderness thinking, you know,What am I going to do to make
a living , much less, youknow, have a meaningful career?
And it occurred to me, youknow, I wasn't a bad writer.
A lot of my teachers hadcomplimented me for my
writing and I thought, Well,is there something I do
with, I could do with that?
And at this point, my originalintention was totally mercenary.
(05:27):
I thought, How canI make money writing?
And I thought abouttechnical writing.
I didn't know much about it.
Commercial writing,didn't know much about it.
So I thought I'd go to school.
And as I started studyingwhat options would be for a
graduate degree in writing,I was highly encouraged
to skip any program thatconcentrated in tech writing
and go directly to the MFA.
(05:47):
The thinking was that that wouldgive, you know, the greatest
flexibility for any kind ofwriting I might want to do.
Plus, the MFA is regarded asa terminal degree, which means
it can qualify me to teach at ainstitution of higher learning,
a college or university.
So I said, What the hell?
And in preparation for the MFA,I got into fiction writing.
I started writing on my own, andthen that's what I concentrated
(06:10):
on when I got my MFA.
And I finished that, Ithink around early 95.
Jesse Butts (06:18):
Did the dream of painting on the nights and
weekends turn into a dreamof writing fiction on the
nights and weekends, onceyou secured a better job?
Jonathan Kranz (06:28):
Well, here's the thing.
What happened was I got my,finished my MFA, and as I
was working as a paralegal,as I said earlier, and
then I had that epiphanythat I described to you.
And my initial thought was,If I could work for myself, I
could work on my fiction for acouple of hours in the morning
and then dedicate myself to,to the business um, throughout
(06:51):
the remainder of the day.
And, and then what reallyhappened, and this is also
kind of an interesting storyis that, you know, a couple
of years in, and I realizedthat there were two things.
One is that it was harderand harder for me to get
myself motivated to writefiction in the mornings.
And a lot of that was, youknow, when you're thinking
about an impending deadlineahead, my thought was, You
know, I'd rather just do theclient work and get this done.
(07:13):
And get the money.
And I also realized, too,that, to really build
the business would takea complete commitment.
So I gave myself permission toquit writing fiction and to just
focus on building the business.
I now, at this point, I havetwo children, a first home, a
mortgage, and all the thingsthat go with that, that I'm
sure everyone who's listeningto this, or many of the
(07:34):
people listening to this willunderstand or appreciate.
Ironically, as it turnsout, years later, leaping
ahead to 2009, I got theinspiration to write a novel.
And after a six year torturousprocess of writing, looking
for an agent, looking for apublisher, I did indeed get
that novel published in 2015.
Jesse Butts (07:54):
Oh, congratulations.
So you're at this point where,you finished grad school and
you had, as you mentioned...
I'm not sure how to phraseit, if it was career
ambitions, but you wentinto it fairly practically.
You liked the flexibilitythe degree would offer you.
Jonathan Kranz (08:13):
Yes.
And at that point tomy mind had changed.
I thought, yes, I'mgoing to do this.
I'm going to becomea fiction writer.
So I had turned.
My initial motivation was,figure out some kind of
commercial application.
Then I got into fiction,got the degree, and then
I changed yet again.
Back and forth, back andforth kind of quality.
And I hope that's also usefulto your, your audience.
That not everything is linear.
(08:36):
There can be a cyclicalor iterative quality
to our journeys.
In fact, most of the timethat, that's the way they
actually really do evolve.
Jesse Butts (08:44):
So you were a paralegal and then you left
that in, I believe you said96 to start your own firm.
I, I personally would feelso intimidated going from a
paralegal to a solo marketer.
What was that transition like?
Jonathan Kranz (09:03):
I'd like to say that I went into it, you
know, with just complete 100%confidence and, you know,
just damn the torpedoes.
But the truth was I recognizedthat there was risk here.
I had never done anything likethis and no one in my family had
ever done anything like this.
So, it was risky.
I recognize that becauseeven if the wage work I was
(09:24):
doing wasn't that wasn'tparticularly rewarding or even
renumerative, it was at leaststable and reliable, you know,
you do the work and every twoweeks there's a check, right?
Or, or was somethingsimilar to that.
And I remember even, my,again, my, my baby Becca
she's, you know, wakes up inthe middle night and I get
up to, to walk her, you know,to get her back to sleep.
(09:46):
And I'm walking up anddown the hallway, just
doing the math in my headand thinking, Am I crazy?
Is this the right thing to do?
Am I nuts?
Here I am.
I'm a husband.
I'm a father.
Does this make sense?
Is this self-indulgent?
And this went on for weeks.
But I held to my initialdeal with myself and that
deal was, Look, I would findthree clients, three pieces
of business, and then Iwould commit fully full-time.
(10:07):
And let me just explain,there was a little
bit of a transition.
So I, toward the end of 95, as Iwas still a paralegal, I managed
to pick up some pieces of work.
I did my first freelance work.
In fact, it was for a,the very first commercial
writing I did was for a videocatalog, a little digest
size video catalog, where myjob was literally to write
little descriptions of themovies that people would
(10:29):
order from the catalog.
This is pre-internet.
And then after that, I managedto pick up some work with a
former studio mate of mine,Glen Wish, who left art
school to found his own graphicdesign studio and business.
And he gave me a break and hadgave me some assignments and
included a catalog called SoundExchange by Warner Bros., which
(10:50):
sold kind of a pop culturerelated merchandise, kind of
music related merchandise.
So in addition to CDs andDVDs, it would have things
like, you know, t-shirts andwall hangings and all kinds
of, you know, gimcrack andcrapola, you know, you name it.
And then I did a lot of, alsofor him, I did stuff with
Publishers Clearing House.
(11:10):
So I had that.
And then I said, Ineed two other things.
And I got two othergigs, and I said, Okay.
I gave my resignationnotice and I dived in.
Jesse Butts (11:19):
Wow.
So it sounds like acritical part of that...
I'm not sure if you want tocall it networking or just
simply stating your intentions,but I mean, you, you built
before you launched, right.
Jonathan Kranz (11:37):
Yes a bit.
And the other thing toconsider is that at first,
my first inclination was tocontinue being a low wage
slave by finding another wageslave thing, but in writing.
And I started doingall the things, a job
seeker is supposed to do.
You know, those informationalinterviews you conduct
(11:58):
with people, et cetera.
And it was during the courseof that, those interviews
that I had a kind of insight.
So the year is 1995, andmy brother Christopher was
generous enough to buy memy first real computer.
This was a Pentium 75 woo-hoo.
At the time, that wasa big freaking deal.
Right.
And that would have been,you know, one, a version of
(12:18):
Windows 3, I think at that time.
But one day I'm sitting inmy room with this computer
that, you know, probablybetween games of Doom and,
and I realize, hold it.
The modern computeris an office in a box.
It's a place tocreate your work.
It's a place to store your work.
(12:39):
It's a place to communicate,you know, via fax or email.
You could do yourbooks on that computer.
In fact, everything thatyou would need from an
employer is in the computer.
As long as you're willing,in this case, I'm willing,
to go out and hunt.
That is, to go out andget the business itself.
(12:59):
When I realized the technologywas available to enable the
independence, it also occurredto me that, You know what?
Starting out my own wouldbe no more difficult
than trying to find a jobwith a regular employer.
Because either way I hadto build a portfolio.
And I said, you know, if I'mgoing to develop a portfolio
of sample work, why notjust do that for myself?
Jesse Butts (13:23):
Well, now I'm, I'm waxing nostalgic slightly for
my Pentium 166 Packard Bell.
It, it wasn't toofar after yours.
So, I want to talk a bitabout building the business.
After you, you got some clientsand you put the work into it.
You know, I hate to embarrassyou, but I mean, you're a
(13:44):
fairly well-established writer.
You know, you're involvedin Content Marketing World.
You're at a lot of conferences,you've worked with pretty
prestigious clients.
What were those early dayslike once you, you really
started getting full time, tobecoming a pretty well-known
voice in your field.
Jonathan Kranz (14:04):
So I'm going to tell you the truth.
That first year I made awhopping $18,000, more or less.
18,000.
Jesse Butts (14:13):
Like in 1996?
Jonathan Kranz (14:14):
Yes, in 1996.
Jesse Butts (14:17):
Okay.
Jonathan Kranz (14:17):
And I spent that year aggressively networking.
At that time, again, still,this is very early internet.
The internet existed, but itreally wasn't a useful tool yet.
You have to remember very early.
I don't even know...
the first browser may havecome out by this time, but
it was still a novelty.
It was not what it is today,which is just like the glue
(14:39):
for our entire society.
At that time itwas still novelty.
So, any networking wasmeant face-to-face.
And I would actually, Isubscribed to a paper, the
Boston Business Journal.
Every town, every city,I think has one of these.
There's a MilwaukeeBusiness Journal.
New York.
Whatever.
So Boston Business Journal,the reason I subscribed most
of all was because it wouldhave an events calendar.
And so there are things like theAmerican Marketing Association,
(15:01):
the Business MarketingAssociation, the New England
Direct Marketing Association,the New England Society for
Healthcare Communicators.
The Society ofIndependent Consultants.
New England Editorial Society.
I mean one group after another.
So I would say I was doingevents like two or three a week
to network, network and network.
(15:22):
And, it panned out.
And here's, here'sthe thing about it.
If I took the attitude oneby one, you know, go to an
event and then that nightevaluate, was it worth it?
Most of the time wewould've said, No.
I mean, you get a few businesscards, you follow up with,
you know, some correspondence.
And most of the time nothingwould come out of it.
But you do it for the few timeswhen it hits, because that's
(15:42):
it, that's your traction.
That's where you start.
And through that networking,I was able to develop some
contacts that did lead to work.
And, and that goes to part two.
Well, how do yougrow a business?
Well, one opportunitycame to itself was
from a local hospital.
Local hospital hada PR department and
they needed articles.
They just contracted witha local paper where they
(16:04):
would do an article a weekallegedly from one of their
providers, one of the doctors.
So my job was to ghost write.
The payment forthese was ridiculous.
It was like a buck 25,a buck 50 an article.
I mean, I mean 150, ofcourse, but still really low.
But at the time I wasthrilled because again, you
know, I needed the money andit also gave me a toehold.
(16:25):
So what I did nextis what's important.
Is that once I did one ortwo articles, I said, you
know what I'm going to do?
I'm going to start markingmyself as a healthcare writer.
And what I did was I joined awhole bunch of organizations
that were about healthcaremarketing, largely just to
get their mailing lists.
And I literally built adatabase through WordPerfect.
(16:47):
Because WordPerfecthad that capability.
We could develop a basedirectly from the program for
mail merge, and I compiledthe list, you know, from
multiple groups of, you know,hundreds of persons long.
And I would do bulk mailings.
You know, myself with justa regular, then my Pentium
75, that Hewlett-Packard,you know, laser jet printer.
(17:09):
And a bunch of envelopesand just a lot of licking
of stamps, et cetera.
And, you know, the responserates were of course
low, but because theynaturally are ,right.
You know, 3% was considereda very good, but imagine that
means if you do a hundred piecesof mail, maybe three responses.
So the truth was I do morethan a hundred, maybe 300, 350.
Maybe I get four responses.
(17:31):
But of those four, youshould convert one.
That's all I needed.
That's all I needed.
And I would just keep doing it.
So it was a pattern of that.
I would just keep doing that.
And over time theportfolio just grew.
I had more and more healthcare,but I began to diversify.
I made an important contact atan agency that no longer exists
called CPS Direct Mail outfit.
(17:51):
And that was phenomenal.
I worked with a brilliantcreative director
named Evan Stone.
Wonderful man.
Learned the ropes from himabout the essentials of
direct marketing copywriting.
And from there, I was ableto build on that experience.
Again, with the similarprocess of developing mailing
lists, doing those mailings,continuing the networking and
(18:12):
gradually little bit by littlebit, building up a business.
In fact, so much so that thesecond year of my business,
I more than tripled whatI made the first year.
So the second year I madearound 66,000 I think.
97.
Now in today's dollarsthat...yeah, exactly 1997.
That, that ain't hay.
That's not bad.
(18:33):
And for me, it was the firsttime in my professional career
that I was really successful.
Because after college ... youknow, I'd worked a
number of crummy jobs.
Like so many, youknow, the kind of...
I did picture framing.
I waited tables, you know,all kinds of different stuff.
But this was it.
I was like, Holy shit.
I've made this happen.
I'm, it's for real now.
I'm a success, you know, I'm,I'm actually making it happen.
(18:54):
And that's reallythe story, you know.
I think the other thing I wantto say about this is not only
the sense of, you know, getthat initial traction, then
expand, exploit it to expandit and get more business.
But also I would say topeople, Expect that career
to change over time.
For example, I did a lot ofhealthcare writing back then.
Today, not so much.
(19:14):
I do it occasionally, butnot the way I used to do it.
Another thing that's changed is,I used to do a lot of junk mail.
A lot of direct mail packages.
Loved doing that.
You'd have to write theenvelope, you'd have to, you
know, with a teaser, thenyou'd have the letter, the
push note, the brochure.
The, a lift note I mean.
Everything.
And it was fun to create thosepackages, but then as you,
as you know, in the early2000s, with the rise of the
(19:36):
internet, direct mail responserates just bottomed out.
I mean, I watched itliterally year over year.
So I'd see 1999 peoplesaying, Whoa, 3% is great.
2000, if you can get 2%.
2001, one and a half percent.
By 2002, it was like,if you could get 0.75%
response, you're doing great.
(19:57):
But, that isn't great.
The business was collapsingand even my own direct
mail efforts that I justdescribed were failing.
I would send out 700letters and get nothing.
Zip.
Silence.
And that was really scary.
And, and again, Imorphed my career.
Obviously, I turneda more digital turn.
The webpage, my websitebecame more important.
(20:20):
But also it became moreimportant to write for the
web at that, at that point.
It became about the web pagesplus content that people
could access via the web.
And it's been likethat ever since.
Jesse Butts (20:33):
Sending the letters, I mean, people
call it outbound marketingor push marketing.
But then in the early 2000s,you know, there is that
switch of, Why should I waitfor someone to contact me?
I'll just go onlineand find what I need.
And that, you know,became inbound marketing
or pull marketing.
So that's when you adapted, likeyou were talking about earlier,
(20:55):
to create content that whenpeople were looking for someone
like you, that's how they findyou versus you putting more
effort into finding people.
Jonat (21:05):
Absolutely Jesse, that's a stone-cold truth.
So for me now marketingbecomes less pushing stuff
out and hoping people respondto really create, for my own
purposes, creating content.
And that kind of contentcould be, for instance, the
stuff on my blog, it couldbe ... I had an e-newsletter
newsletter for awhile.
It could be the newsletter.
It could also be writingarticles that would
(21:25):
appear either in print.
Like I.
Eventually, I did articlesfor the Boston Business
Journal, for example.
And then increasinglyonline publications.
Like I, I did a lot ofstuff for Marketing P rofs.
Did a lot of articlesfor them, and that was
incredibly productive.
And of course, speaking,public speaking.
So a little hint for people.
If you can do speaking, ifthat's something that doesn't
(21:48):
scare you, do it, because mostof your competitors won't.
So you get an instantadvantage right there.
So I'd say that my apperanceat Content Marketing World,
speaking and public speakingis a large part of what
draws the leads in today.
Jesse Butts (22:05):
I do really want to talk about speaking
and workshops, leadingseminars, that type of thing.
But before we get intothat, there's something
I'm curious about.
You've also spent a lot oftime talking about networking
and pounding the pavement.
As you were going throughthis, were you frustrated that
you weren't spending all yourtime working on client work?
(22:26):
Or did you kind of get thislittle entrepreneurial itch
of, you know, making dealsand, and building a business?
Jonathan Kranz (22:33):
Well, you brought up an essential thing.
If you go out on yourown, as a consultant or
a service provider, youinstantly have two jobs.
One job is whateverit is you do.
For instance, I writecopy for clients.
But then there's the second job.
And that job is marketingmy own business,
promoting Jonathan Kranz.
And I think that that's thedifference between people
(22:56):
who do well freelancingand those who don't is...
I think that the, the ones whounderstand that they have that
second job of self promotionare going to, are going to be
much more likely to make it.
When I see freelancersfail, it typically follows
a model like this...
You find someone who's workingfor a company, finds that
(23:18):
the clients love him or her.
And maybe one of the clientseven makes a pass, saying,
Hey, if you leave this place,you know, we got plenty of
work for you, et cetera.
And so you, you leave, intendingto coast on the contacts you
already made when you werepreviously a full-time employee.
And that typically worksmaybe two to three years.
(23:38):
And then what happens is,is that there's a life cycle
to any client engagement.
You don't get clients forever.
Maybe it only lasts one project.
Maybe it's a series of projects.
Maybe you get a couple of years.
But it's rare to get morethan a few years out of
a client relationship.
Client business changes.
They take a new path.
Another agency comes in.
There's so many reasons whythey may change their talent.
(24:00):
So what that means is ifyou're not continually
refilling that funnel withprospects, eventually you're
going to run out of clientsand run out of business.
So it's really critical,critical for anyone who
wants to go independent toconsider that independence
means having to invest inyour own self promotion.
Jesse Butts (24:19):
And speaking of self promotion,
just like you mentionedearlier, public speaking.
Can you talk a littlebit about maybe...
I don't know if it'sspecifically that first
opportunity or some of thoseearly ones and how you, you
started that and what you sawfrom, from those experiences?
Jonathan Kranz (24:37):
Yes, I can.
So, as, as I saidearlier, I attend a lot
of networking events.
And at many of these events,they follow a similar format.
You know, there's like acocktail hour for, you know,
and schmoozing for aboutan hour, hour and a half.
Then maybe there's ameal and a speaker, Q&A,
and everyone goes home.
And at first I wasreally intimidated.
I thought to be a speaker,you have to just know so
(24:59):
much about your topic.
You, you have to be an expertin order to get up in front
of all these people, right.
And then after attending anumber of these events and
realizing that the level ofquality was often marginal.
Every once in a whileyou'd hit, you, you'd
find a fantastic speakerand you'd be so grateful.
You'd learn so much.
(25:20):
You'd be inspired.
You'd get practicalinformation you could use.
But unfortunately, thatwas kind of the exception.
Most of the time, itwas pretty mediocre.
And I recognized acouple of things.
One, the bar is low.
So good news everyone whois thinking about speaking.
The bar is really low.
That's kind of good for you.
The second thing I realizedis that you don't have
(25:41):
to know everything.
Even if you know a smallthing that has value for
your audience, a littlething, that's enough.
Talk about that for 40 minutes.
And you can.
You don't have to havethe answers to the
secrets of the universe.
Do you know something that wouldbe useful to your audience?
Yes?
Good.
Go for it.
Do it.
Run with it.
(26:02):
So a little piece of adviceis, if you're stuck for
an idea, think about waysthat you would challenge
the conventional wisdomin your industry or field.
And talk about that.
Saying, everyone says, Do zig.
But I'm tellingyou, You should zag.
Here's why.
There's a speaking topic.
Jesse Butts (26:20):
I'm guessing we're kind of in the 2000s now.
you you're, you'repretty well established.
You've done some speaking.
At least from what I've seenfrom people's listings on
websites, like, workshopscan be kind of, I don't
know if goldmine is reallythe right term, but they
can be pretty lucrative.
I know this is somethingthat you've done as well.
Are workshops somethingthat, in your experience,
(26:42):
a lot of speaking led to?
Or how did you get tothat position to be able to
do those types of things?
Jonathan Kranz (26:49):
Well, it was a combination of feeling
comfortable with speaking, andthen also in 2004, I published
Writing Copy for Dummies.
So, you know, those yellowand black Dummies books.
So I wrote one, I wrotethe one on copywriting.
So that experiencewas interesting.
No one ever picked upthe book and then called
me to give me business.
(27:10):
That never happened.
So that did not happen.
I have gotten the calls,of course, from other
writers saying, Gee, howdid you get the book deal?
Can you tell mewhat the secret is?
Or, Gee, I'd like tostart as a copywriter.
Can you help me?
And usually I do help . Butwhat it really did, the virtue
of that book was that it openedup speaking opportunities and
article writing opportunities.
(27:31):
You know, it was the strengthof the Writing Copy for
Dummies that I had credibilitywith Marketing Profs.
So I published a bunchof articles for Marketing
Profs, and then I havecredibility to organizations
that have conferences,you know, host conferences
and looking for speakers.
The workshop, I'm trying toremember, I think I started
that about ... 14 years ago?
(27:52):
And I really did itas an experiment.
I just said, I now offer this.
And seeing would...youknow, run up the flag and
see if anyone would salute.
What made my workshopdistinctive is that I
said, One, we would developthe curriculum together.
There is no pre-made curriculum.
We would have a conversation,talk about the outcome
that you desired.
And then I would customizea curriculum to the
(28:15):
outcomes you want.
It's all, exercise-based.
And I got some bites.
And a couple of things happened.
One, I found that they arelucrative, or they can be.
And number two is that I reallyenjoy doing them, and find that
a very rewarding, meaningfulexperience helping other people
become better at what theydo or discover talents that
(28:37):
they did not know they had.
So that's always been anexciting part of my business.
Not always, but it has becomean exciting part of my business.
Jesse Butts (28:46):
What were you doing to, to learn the ropes
of copywriting and marketing,especially since you, you
didn't work somewhere fulltime for a couple of years
to, to learn the ropes?
Jonathan Kranz (28:58):
That's right.
So you made aninteresting point.
I learned after I launcheda business that I had
done it the wrong way.
The thing I was supposed to dowas get some years of experience
either in-house, that is workingfor a, for a company, right, on
their in-house marketing team.
Or for an agency.
And I had done neither.
I just started freelancing.
And I didn't know thatwas novel until after I
(29:21):
did fulfill the novelty.
This audience, the temptationwill be to go back to school
to learn something new.
And think about it.
If you're a person that youfinished undergraduate, then
you're, you're able to actuallyget into a grad school, which
is not necessarily that easy.
You have to, you know, the,the application process can
(29:41):
be a real pain in the butt.
You go to grad school.
And now you're, you mayhave debt from undergrad.
Debt from grad school.
And you realize I want a change.
You know, whatever,whatever reason, whatever
you studied in grad schoolis not going to be it.
So the thing is you'll saythat, I need something else.
You may think, OK I'll goto school again, or I'll go
through a certificate program.
I would discourage that.
I would say, do somethingdifferent this time.
(30:03):
And that is, find a wayto learn independently
or learn on the job.
And if there is a certificate oranother graduate degree involved
that's necessary, let theemployer pay for it if you can.
So what I did specifically in mycase is that no, I did not get
into a certificate program formarketing or marketing copy.
(30:25):
I did two things.
I did that networkingI told you about.
And also that networking alsoincluded some events that
were instructive in nature.
That became very importantto me, like this is a
program on copywriting.
Great.
I attended those.
I also read some books.
People forget that booksare still a major resource,
even with the web.
And in fact, that could beyour secret weapon, is that
(30:45):
you're willing to sit down andinvest the time to actually
read a book, or many books,cover to cover, which a
lot of people reluctant to.
I found, especially how helpful,for those of you interested
in copywriting, John Caples'Tested Advertising Methods is
a classic from back in the DarkAges, I think of the 40s or 50s.
But it's still a masterpiece,still relevant today.
(31:06):
Another book I liked isOgilvy on Advertising.
That book is as informative asit is fun and enjoyable to read.
Ogilvy has a lot ofwisdom to share and I
learned a lot from him.
And then you just pick up thingslike, you know, if you could
attend conferences, you couldpick up things through osmosis.
Not just through the sessions,but in your networking, your
BS-ing with other people,you learn this stuff.
(31:28):
And then finally, you know, you,the ultimate way you learn is
you learn by doing it, right.
Trial and error andthat kind of thing.
But I really would encouragepeople to say your next step,
see what measures you cantake to learn without having
to acquire any more debt.
Or absorb more of yourtime because that's
really burdensome.
Jesse Butts (31:50):
So with all of these experiences and with all
of these things, your businessoffers, what have you found
most enjoyable about your work?
Jonathan Kranz (31:58):
It's the satisfaction of knowing that
I helped other people do theirjobs and reach their goals.
That I actually contributedsomething meaningful that
moved things forward,especially if it's challenging.
I like the challenging stuff,not the sexy, easy stuff.
I like the difficult stuff.
And I find it really excitingtoo, to in the hard work,
(32:19):
the hard thinking, you know,consider what avenues are of
attack are really available.
Pursue them aseffectively as you can.
And then you'd get the sharein the satisfaction that just
have a job well done, buta job well done with other
people who are counting on you.
And together you'vecollectively made something
meaningful happen.
And I think that's the singlemost, in general, gratifying.
(32:42):
When I do the training, it'sreally the, the contact
with other human beings.
It's incredibly exciting whenyou realize someone's gotten it.
When you see that lightbulb go off over their head,
when they put up their handsand like, Oh, I get it.
You know, that is just sucha rewarding experience when
you're a teacher and one ofyour students, one of the
(33:03):
people that you're working with,suddenly has that insight, that
breakthrough, and they got it.
That's incredibly satisfying.
Jesse Butts (33:09):
Would you say you love your job?
Do you like your job?
How important is job fit to you?
Jonathan Kranz (33:15):
I'm going to say this.
I'm going to contradicteverything that, most everything
you've heard from everyjob seeking guru out there.
Don't follow your passion.
What I mean is you go on toLinkedIn, you read people's
profiles, guaranteed 99% ofthem will have the words,
I have a passion for....
Jesse Butts (33:35):
Industrial waste management.
Jonathan Kranz (33:36):
Whatever it is.
Right.
Exactly.
You know?
And no one cares whatyou have a passion for.
First of all.
It doesn't matter.
I'm not gonna hire someonebecause you have a passion.
Like industrialwaste management.
If I needed an industrialwaste manager, I don't care
if you're passionate about it.
All I care about isthat you're good at it.
That's it.
And conversely, from the otherside, the actual practitioner.
(33:58):
You don't have to bepassionate about something
to be good at something.
I read a wonderful book yearsago, it was a non-fiction book
that was profiling differentlaw enforcement officers.
And there was one officer whowas an expert in ballistics.
And he was an interestingguy because unlike almost
every single one of hiscolleagues in ballistics,
(34:18):
he was not a gun enthusiast.
He only had two guns,his service revolver,
or pistol, whatever itwas, his service firearm.
And then a firearm thathad been his grandfather's
many years before thathe kept as an heirloom.
That's it.
He wasn't a collector.
He didn't, he didn't love guns.
However, he was acknowledgedas one of the best ballistics
experts in the country.
(34:38):
He was excellent at what he did.
And so it wasn't about, hewas passionate about guns.
He was passionate aboutbeing a conscientious,
dedicated professional.
And so he did fantastic work.
And the way I feel, too,is you'll often hear
someone say, you know,people say, Never run from
something, run to something.
Have an aspiration to run to.
(35:00):
And I would say, well,that's a privilege.
You know, if you're in aposition where you can run to
something, that's a wonderfulthing, mazel tov to you.
But for many of us, we doneed to run from something.
For me, I wanted toget out of wage labor.
I wanted to have,to be independent.
I wanted the greater flexibilityto be, spend more time with
my kids during the day, ratherthan being tied to a desk.
(35:22):
And so, yes, I was running fromwage labor to something that
would give me independence.
So, I approach marketing,marketing copywriter, not
because I fell in love withmarketing copy, but because
I recognized that copywritingwas a way, a means for me
to achieve independence.
And it, you know, my passionis really more for freedom
than for writing per se.
Jesse Butts (35:45):
I'm interested in what you were
mentioning about passion.
You were an art major, you havean MFA in creative writing.
You, you mentioned that,you, you scratched the itch
and, and got a novel out.
Do you sometimes feel like,I really want to spend
you know, some eveningsand weekends painting?
Or, or writing storiesor what have you?
(36:06):
What is yourrelationship to that now?
Jonathan Kranz (36:08):
It's a, it's complicated.
You know, I do get thatimpulse now and again.
But I gotta tell you, it'sreally hard to sustain that
kind of disciplined commitmentto really succeed in, in
either of those things.
You know, becausethat's what it takes.
It takes that kind ofdisciplined, systematic
dedication to really succeed.
So, you know, I vacillate.
Sometimes I go, it's, I'm fine.
I'm happy with theway things are.
(36:29):
And I have hobbies andinterests that I pursue
and that's good enough.
And there are other timeswhen I go, Gosh, you know,
I wish I could make agreater mark on the world.
You know, do I havea story to tell?
Do I have somethingbeautiful to show?
And, and, and, and, and theanswer is eh, not that I
can think of at the moment.
So I would say, I'd say Jesse,that the doors aren't closed,
(36:50):
but, you know, I don't see anyimmediate plans for a creative
venture in either directionnecessarily, but, who knows.
I could be taken by surprisetomorrow, find inspiration,
develop the discipline and,and be back on, you know,
back active in somethingagain, it could happen.
Jesse Butts (37:06):
I remember from a previous conversation, I
mean, you mentioned you wereinto architecture and art.
And I mean, you, you'vementioned reading, you know,
a number of books that weremore on the practical side.
It sounds like you'restill if not creating.
Jonathan Kranz (37:21):
Oh, absolutely.
If you saw like the, themagazines I subscribe to and,
you know, and the things I,you know, like for instance,
one of my favorite magazines,it's called Ugly Things.
And three times ayear, they come out.
Basically it's noteven a magazine.
I'd call it a book.
It's like 250 pages, eightand a half by 11 or 12.
And it's dedicated to obscuremusic in the period 65 to 75.
(37:45):
So a lot of psychedelia,garage rock, all that, uh,
especially the forgotten stuff.
You know, the localhometown heroes that maybe
cut one seven inch andthen disappeared forever.
This is what UglyThings concentrates on.
And, and that's part ofmy hobby, part of the
records is, you know,exploring obscure music.
And so, yeah, I love getting,you know, reading about that.
I also subscribe to amagazine called Fungi.
(38:07):
Yes, fungus.
You know, so I'minterested in mycology.
I'm excited that spring isbeginning because that means
in a few more months, mushroomseason is beginning, and
I can go back outdoors andhunt for mushrooms, which
is a hobby that I love.
And that is a passion.
It's just somethingI love to do.
And I also, you know,I have other things.
I just, I'm learning moreabout natural history.
(38:28):
I'm spending more time outdoors.
And I still have a love of art.
Love going to museums.
If I come to a conferencein your city, yeah, I'm
probably gonna play hooky,skip the talks, and go
to your local art museum.
That's probably what'sgoing to happen in reality.
So yeah, those passions,those loves are still there,
but I don't know that I'mnecessarily a contributor.
Jesse Butts (38:48):
And just for listeners behind Jonathan is
what I'm guessing is probablyfour to 500 LPs behind you?
Jonathan Kranz (38:56):
Well, yeah, there's at least that.
And I have a totalof around 4,500.
So this is, you know, wouldthat time I spent hunting
for these records, be betterspent building my business?
Probably.
But those are the choicesI made, and, you know,
I'm okay with that.
Jesse Butts (39:13):
So this has been great, and I'm just kind of
wondering as we wrap thingsup, What questions should
someone in grad school, maybea few years out, or maybe at
any stage really, be askingthemselves if they really
think that their disciplineisn't going to work out and
they're considering somethingoutside their field of study?
Jonathan Kranz (39:35):
I would say a couple of questions.
One question I would ask myselfis, What skills or areas of
knowledge have I acquiredalong the way, and either,
or both my undergraduateand graduate careers, that
could have applicability andmeaning and other contexts?
For instance, in thesciences, you may have become
really adept at researchor statistical analysis.
(39:57):
Well, guess what?
Those are skills that arevalued in multiple contexts
beyond pure science.
Right.
In my case, it was obviouslycommunications, writing.
So where could I apply that ina way that would be, that would
enable me to have a living?
So I think you want to lookat, kind of do an inventory
of the things that you areable to do and say, Where
(40:18):
else would that be valuable?
I think that that wouldbe extremely useful.
And then apply on topof that some filters.
So first filter might be,OK of all the things where
I could apply myself that'soutside my specific field,
what would I find satisfyingor at least interesting?
And even if you're notpassionate about it, would
(40:38):
at least find doing...
like I find doing thework very satisfying.
I like succeeding.
I like beingsuccessful as a writer.
I enjoy doing goodwork for my clients.
You want to say, What else couldyou imagine yourself doing that,
even if it's not your dream,still would be satisfying labor.
I think you would ask abouttoo ,obviously, is, Who else
(41:00):
needs those kinds of skills?
Where else are those needed?
That's really the same question,just spinning it 180 degrees.
But those are thequestions I'd start with.
And then I'd go, ina very practical way,
What are the realisticopportunities available to me?
So that would depend onwhere you're located.
(41:21):
Who you know.
Networking contacts,for example.
You really do want to thinkwhere are those opportunities?
And I'm not talkingpie in the sky stuff.
I'm talking about realground level stuff that you
could actually get into.
Sometimes those practicalitiesare that there's a job you
could actually get to, youknow, that's not an hour and a
half commute, but something youcould say, yes, I could do this.
I could have whatever thecontext of my personal life is.
(41:43):
This is a doable vocation.
So those are thequestions you want to ask.
Where else are my skillsand expertise applicable?
Who needs those kindsof skills and expertise?
What would I find satisfying?
And what practical opportunitiesexist adjacent to me?
Jesse Butts (42:01):
All right.
If people want to check out yourbusiness, where should they go?
And if they're curiousabout your novel...
Jonathan Kranz (42:10):
So first off, to learn more about
my business, just Googlemy name, Jonathan Krantz.
K-R-A-N-Z.
And you'll end up atKrantz Communications.
I think the websiteis www.kranzcom.com.
And there's a bunch of,there's an outdated blog that
I haven't updated in I'membarrassed to say how long.
But there's a lot ofgood, useful content
out there, especiallyif you're a copywriter.
(42:31):
There are actually good howto articles and some stuff
that are free to download.
You don't have to giveme your email address.
It's totally anonymous.
It really is absolutely free.
There's information out there.
My novel is a, a young adultnovel called Our Brothers at the
Bottom of the Bottom of the Sea.
Jesse Butts (42:48):
Well, thank you, Jonathan.
This was a great conversation.
Jonathan Kran (42:51):
Thank you, Jesse.
It was a great pleasure.
And I wish you the bestof luck and the best of
luck is anyone listening?
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