We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Diana Carter. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Diana below.

Diana, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Before we get into specifics, let’s talk about success more generally. What do you think it takes to be successful?

I love this question so much — and here’s why:

“Success” is such a broad term that culturally and generationally, we’ve hijacked to mean one thing and one thing only: Career success measured by position and wealth. On the one hand — we’ve glorified the corporate latter we’ve all rolled our eyes at — and we still hold fast to the “power” that comes with hefty titles and corner offices. On the other hand – we’ve built entrepreneurship or and “scaling to seven figures” to be the end-all, be-all when it comes to if we’ve made it or not.

Here’s the funny thing about “success” — only YOU can define it.

So — to answer your question, what do I think it takes to be successful?

1) A crystal clear understanding of your own personal values. What matters most to you? Money? Notoriety? Time with your family? A flexible schedule? Fulfilling work? Without an acute awareness and understanding of what makes you tick and what makes you say, “Ick,” — you’re chasing shadows.
2) A relentless commitment to using those values as the filter through which you make decisions. You’ve got to get laser focused on making decisions that align with your values — and you’ve got to take it seriously. This means saying NO to things that you WANT to say yes to NOW — but know they don’t serve your vision. It’s not easy — like at all — but it’s the only thing that’ll get you to where you *really* want to be.
3) A community of people who have the relational equity and permission to hold you accountable as you make decisions. This can be a team of people, your partner, friends, family, a mastermind, a business coach, etc. But sometimes — things compete with our values that seem really, really attractive — and we need people to reel us back in.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

My name is Diana Carter and I am the CEO + Founder of Carter House Copy. We’re a copywriting and brand messaging agency in Charlotte, NC and the long and short of it is this: We write words that make you money. Most of our clients are B2B brands in growth-mode or startups in seed/series funding rounds.

I’ve always written. For as long as I can remember. When other kids were tracing their pudgy little hands and making turkeys, I was folding printer paper into little booklets and crafting stories I would sure everyone would want to read. (Everyone didn’t — but my parents loved them.) After graduating with a degree in Journalism – I started my career in corporate Marketing and Communications in New York right after college. I worked for a Fortune 500 Benefits Consulting Firm and worked my way up to managing their Southeast Marketing & Communications practice before the travel got out of control. I knew I wanted a family, knew I wanted to be home when my kids got off the bus, knew I wanted to be physically present to do bedtimes — so I had to leave before the money got too good to pass up on. I took a sharp-left career turn and a 37% pay cut to dive into full-time ministry. I worked for a large multisite church for 3 years as a Communications Director and Social Media Manager and doing copywriting/content writing as a freelancer to make ends meet. In July 2020, I launched my business. In September 2020, I jumped into it full-time. By March 2021, I’d out-earned my corporate salary.

At Carter House Copy, writing websites is our bread and butter — and our most popular service is a single-day intensive called The Copy Knockout. With this package, we clear the decks for an entire day and knock out up to 7 pages of website copy for our clients. At the end of the day, they get a Google Document with their site map, SEO research, and full copy — as well as a branded wireframe of their site’s homepage to help put some skin on the bones of their words.

Some people hear about this package and think — “No way. Too good to be true. How could you write a website in one day and it be effective?”

Here’s how: We do the hard work beforehand.

When a client signs their contract and pays their deposit, we walk them through a mini-brand messaging workshop and give them access to our 22-page pre-work document that digs into the strategic foundations of their brand. We ask about their ideal client (to an annoying level of detail), their mission, vision, values, value proposition, content pillars, etc. and we get in deep. The pre-work document is due back to the Carter House Copy team one-week before our actual VIP Day and my team pours over it for an entire week. We poke holes in it. We ask questions. We make notes. We leave no stone uncovered.

Then — when we meet for our VIP Day — we close any open loops with a 60-90 minute phone call first thing in the morning. We make sure all of our questions are answered and our client’s are onboard with where we’re headed. Then — we hang up the phone, press play on our favorite Spotify playlist and knockout an entire website in 5-8 hours.

We’re proud of this because of two reasons:

1) We take the time and effort to learn our client’s brand foundations. If they don’t have sound foundations, we don’t leave them hanging — we work with them to build them and DOCUMENT THEM.

2) A lot of copywriters have brand intake questionnaires — but we’ve never, ever seen one as in-depth or thorough as ours. We do a complete 360º review of our client’s brands, goals, and pain points – and we take it all into consideration as we write their website.

Some of our other services include: Full-Day Brand Messaging Workshops, Email Marketing VIP Days, and monthly copy/content writing reatiners.

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

Believe it or not — I think we’ve spent less than $100 EVER on marketing for Carter House Copy. 75-80% of our business comes from client referrals and here’s why: We operate as if our clients are the only ways we’re ever going to get other clients. This means we treat every single client like they’re our only client — making sure every touch point they have with CHC goes above and beyond their expectations.

This doesn’t mean we’re indebted to them — all of this happens within our agreed-upon scope and our teams’ cultural boundaries (e.g., no cell phone numbers exchanged, our working hours are defined, etc.) — but within those parameters — we rarely ever say no.

When you prioritize excellence, client service, and not satisfaction — but amazement, you fish where the fish are and your clients become your greatest brand ambassadors.

Any advice for managing a team?

I feel like I say some variation of this phrase every week to my team: “We’re not anesthesiologists or FBI hostage negotiators. No one’s going to die if we… make them wait/tell them no/make a mistake, etc.”

I manage a team of contractors — meaning they have other contracts with other businesses that I have nothing to do with. Because I value and trust the people I hire — I want their experience with my business to be THEIR BEST EXPERIENCE. If they have a bandwidth issue and need to drop a contract — I want every experience they have with me to be a deposit in the, “I can never leave Carter House Copy” bucket.

Some practical ways I do this:

– I remind them of the above quote. This shouldn’t be stressful, it should be a way you support your family and find fulfillment by using your talents.
– We have weekly 1:1s to touch-base on projects as we are a fully-remote business.
– I ask them questions about their lives and I GENUINELY CARE ABOUT THEIR ANSWERS. Your dog was sick last week — how’s he doing today? How’d your daughter do at her recital? Did you guys put an offer in on that house yet?
– I pay them more than market-value. Honestly — I love my team and I know they’re good. Our business is growing and we’re profitable — why would I NOT pay them well to keep them with me?

Contact Info:

• Website: www.carterhousecopy.co
• Instagram: @carterhousecopy
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dianapalkacarter/

Image Credits
Kelsie Johanna Photography