When I started out, I didn’t have any kind of copywriting contract for my clients to sign. But after a few months of relying on informal, emailed proposals, I felt I needed something more official.

Yes, contracts are boring, dull, tedious and generally unenjoyable. But they are important.

They explain exactly what each party in a business relationship should expect – and what they have to do. They can also be invaluable if things ever go wrong, because it’s harder to argue with something if it’s written down in black and white.

Here’s my copywriting contract for free

Most contracts I’ve encountered are written using lots of legalese and can be very confusing. I wanted mine to use plain language, so anyone could understand it. To get going, I needed some inspiration, so I hunted around and found Andy Clarke‘s excellent killer contract.

This seemed like a great starting point, so I grabbed it and made some pretty substantial changes. Andy offered his contract up to anyone who wanted to use it, and in the same spririt, I’m doing that too. So download my copywriting contract now. It’s available in several file formats:

• Copwriting contract in Word format
• Copywriting contract in PDF format
• Copywriting contract in Open Office format

I received a lot of really helpful feedback while working on this. So thanks to Simon Wicks, Matt Telfer, Matthew Stibbe, Jim Anning and Martin Grocock.

What you need to know about my copywriting agreement

Feel free to download my copywriting agreement and use it however you like. All I ask is that if you republish it, you mention me and link back here.

You can change it any way you want. At the very least, you’ll need to replace the bits in square brackets with your own details and decide how you want to handle cancellations.

Oh – and this is important: I’m not a legal professional, so get your legal eagles to examine it properly if you decide to use it.

More information about my copywriting agreement

I tailored this contract to address the following problems in particular, because they’re things I’ve been concerned about when working with clients:

• Scope creep. I usually work to a fixed price on projects and try to be flexible. Clients seem to prefer this – but I’ve been worried they’ll see my flexibility as an invitation to change the brief midway through a project, creating lots of extra work for me.
• Tardy payment. So far, I’ve been pretty lucky – most clients are super-speedy payers. But with no agreed payment schedule beyond the 30 days stated on my invoice, I’ve not been particularly well covered if I do hit problems.
• Deadline drift. It’s a real pain when you turn a job round fast only for the client take forever to decide on revisions. It makes scheduling jobs trickier – and it takes longer to get back up to speed if I’ve not worked on a project for a while.

These may or may not be things that concern you – and so you might want to add or remove bits from the contract before you use it.

Bad clients are still bad clients

I don’t think even the best contract in the world can ever substitute for treating your clients properly, communicating with them effectively and doing each job to the best of your ability. And it would be a bit naïve to think a contract can protect you entirely from bad clients.

But what it can do is make your business relationships more official, provide a clear document to refer to in the event of any sort of disagreement – and give you a bit leverage if things go wrong. If you use mine, please, let me know how you get on.

The England football team’s performance this evening was dire. Rubbish. Awful. But it did get me thinking about how big football stories tend to bring out the best in tabloid sub-editors. When it’s open season on an England manager, the puns start to flow – so look out for a few good ones in the red tops over the next few days.

In the meantime, I’ve dug up some classics that anyone would be proud of. Enjoy – and remember: although all these headlines would score virtually zero for search engine optimisation, they all looked great in 128pt type on the front (or back) page of a tabloid.

• FROM RUSSIA WITH GLOVES. In 1994 Chelsea played their first European away game for years. They won 4-2 on aggregate against Viktoria Zizkov (who?). Russian goalkeeper Dmitri Kharine saved a crucial penalty, and one of the British tabloids immortalised him with this, one of my all-time favourite headlines.

• HOW DO YOU SOLVE A PROBLEM LIKE KOREA? Back in October 2006, North Korea decided to conduct a not-at-all-provovative nuclear test. International condemnation followed, but no nation’s response topped The Sun’s. The newspaper’s headline raised the question of which is worse: reality TV, or a nuclear holocaust? Tough call. See the headline>

• SUPER CALEY GO BALLISTIC, CELTIC ARE ATROCIOUS. It doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue, but this headline from The Sun proves that the king of British red tops is difficult to beat when it comes to punnage. It’s the classic formula: rip off a song lyric everyone knows, substitute a few words and stick it on the sports pages. Brilliant.

• TWO SH*GS. Accompanying the Daily Star’s coverage of John Prescott’s various indiscretions, it’s simple and to the point. Given the amount of flesh that’s frequently on the front page of this paper, it seems strange that they’ve stuck an asterisk in ‘shags’, but then who am I to comment on tabloid standards? Whatever, it’s simple, effective – and very British. See the headline>

• GORD HELP US NOW! Regardless of your opinion on the Daily Diana Express, occasionally its staff come out with a gem. Ok, very occasionally. I liked this one which greeted Gordon Brown’s move into No. 10. It’s great because it makes the paper’s position immediately clear, pokes fun at the new PM’s name, and also sounds like something Alan Partridge would say. See the headline>

• MORON TERROR. The Sun hits the spot again. Almost two years after the 21/7 attempted bombings in London, four people are found guilty of planning the attacks. Choosing to focus on the ineptitude of those involved, the paper sums up their intelligence in two words. Presumably they included the picture so that we didn’t think they were referring to George Bush. See the headline>

• CELEBRITY BIG BLUBBER. Yet again, from The Sun. While part of the country was obsessed with the antics of Chantelle in Celebrity Big Brother, the rest of us were intrigued to see a whale swim right up the Thames and into central London. Despite rescuers’ best efforts, the poor animal didn’t survive – it just seems a shame that Celebrity Big Brother hasn’t yet suffered a similar fate.

• TOM AND THIERRY. Being an Arsenal fan, I’m completely biased on this one. Thierry Henry and Tomas ‘Tom’ Rosicky scored as Arsenal beat Liverpool at Anfield 3-1 early this year. It’s not one of The Sun’s best efforts, but they get extra points for printing it in a cartoon-style font.

That’s all folks … for now at least. What are your favourite headlines? Hit up the comment link and let me know.