We recently connected with Joanna Flynn and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Joanna thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Before we get into specifics, let’s talk about success more generally. What do you think it takes to be successful?

I define success differently than most Americans. Many people would define success as a six-figure paycheck, an award in their field, or a corner office with a view of the city. But the definition of success is “the accomplishment of an aim or purpose.” Well, I aim to create an abundant life! A life where I am free to do what I want with the people I love.

Much of this perspective comes from what my dad – an entrepreneur himself – taught me. He always told me, “Work to live, do not live to work.” His perspective towards life and business taught me that it was possible to make your own way. I was not bound to work for a faceless corporation for the rest of my life.

Thanks to what he taught me, I have never had what my dad calls “an employee mindset.” I have never been content to work for a faceless corporation and break my back for a cause I don’t believe in. Instead, I’ve found ways to work towards creating a life I love.

Right now, I’m not making six figures. I haven’t won any awards. And most of the time, I work in my bedroom on a desk I bought from Facebook Marketplace.

But I am already successful. I am not waiting for an outside source to give me something to feel like I have accomplished my goal. My goal is to live abundantly. And even as I work at my second-hand desk, I breathe deeply, look out the window, and feel grateful for the life I’m building.

For me, success requires a specific mindset. This mindset can be really hard to maintain in a culture determined to prove our worth by what we accomplish. But each day, I get to decide what success feels like. And most of the time, it feels like being proud of the work I’ve done today and looking forward to tomorrow. It feels like cooking dinner with my fiance and being able to rearrange my schedule to have coffee with an out-of-town friend. It feels like freedom.

For me, right now, that is enough.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Hey! My name is My name is Joanna, but everybody calls me Jo (yes, just like Little Women!). I am a copywriter for wedding vendors. I specialize in helping wedding pros find their brand voice and creating search engine optimized website copy and blogs. I love helping my clients rank higher on search results ( and get found by their ideal clients!) through market research and keyword strategies. Then, I love helping them build their community through blogging, email campaigns, newsletters, and more.

But before all that, I am a woman passionate about intentional living, laughing frequently and uncontrollably, and truly “sucking the marrow out of life” as Thoreau instructs.

​I’ve been writing forever, helping friends, family members, and then strangers that became family, find their voice and style on paper. I earned my B.A. in Communication Studies & Creative Writing, polishing these skills even further and learning the psychology of human communication. Now, I use these skills to help wedding vendors connect with their dream clients. My goal is to make sure you feel seen, known, and appreciated. Because I mean it when I say you’re amazing!

I started J. Flynn Copywriting in 2023, after writing and editing a few pieces for a wedding photographer friend. I loved channeling her personality into her writing and despised the idea of going back to writing literature guides. A friend taught me the basics of starting a copywriting business and I haven’t looked back.

I dove headfirst into the wedding industry in January of 2024, unknowingly a week before my boyfriend proposed! Now, my life is full of all things weddings. Planning my own wedding gives me an inside view of the wedding industry and helps me create informed, empathetic copy for my clients.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

Each goal I have for my business can be summed up in one word: Freedom.

I started J. Flynn Copywriting for the freedom of working for myself, creating my own schedule, and working from anywhere with Wifi.

But mostly, I started my business so I could raise a family.

I think there is no greater honor than being a mother. It is a sacred, beautiful, wildly difficult thing to be. I think there are sides of motherhood I will have no concept of until I am one. But even now, I look at the mothers in my life with profound respect.

I think mothers face unique and extreme pressure in our society. On one hand, they must work a 9-5 job and not let their family interfere with work. On the other hand, they need to be present 24/7 to take care of their children. Culture is playing tug-of-war with our values, and mothers are frequently caught in the middle and dragged through the mud.

Though I don’t have children yet, I want to be able to be home with them. I want them to know that they are my priority, and I don’t want to sacrifice time with my children to work a 9-5 job. I don’t want to put my children in daycare and miss so many of those beautiful, precious moments of watching a child become their own unique person.

But at the same time, I want to continue to create and express myself through my work. I want to continue helping small business owners. In fact, many of my clients are mothers – because they know how deeply I value family and trust me to communicate their values to the world.

Perhaps I’m naive. I wouldn’t be surprised. But I want to believe in a world where a woman can be a mother – and fully embrace being one! – without sacrificing her other interests, passions, and abilities.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

The last three years of my life have been full of pivots. I swear I can hear Ross Geller yelling into the stairwell of my brain.

But my biggest – and most recent – pivot has been niching down my business. Which, like all things, has required pivoting my mindset.

As someone in marketing, I understand the value of choosing your niche (aka, choosing what field or industry you want to do business in). I would post about this online and talk to clients about it. Yet I refused to do it for myself.

When I first started J. Flynn Copywriting, I knew I wanted to work with female small business owners. I wanted to work with creative, passionate women who believed strongly in what they were doing. And for eight months, that’s exactly what I did.

Yet I found myself struggling to find consistent clients. And when I did, I got intellectual whiplash from working on a holistic health practitioner’s blog to a family photographer’s website. I was constantly researching different topics and rarely felt well-versed in any of them. I was struggling to market myself because my business was being pulled in too many different directions.

In early January, I had one night where I couldn’t sleep. My brain was too jumbled and I couldn’t make sense of any of my business ideas. I knew my current business plan wasn’t sustainable.

In short, I lacked direction.

So I asked myself what types of copy I enjoyed writing the most, and for whom. I sat in the dark at 2am and got really specific about what I wanted my business to look and feel like. I scribbled half-formed ideas into my journal and prayed.

Soon, I realized that I loved writing long-form copy (like blogs, websites, and emails). I loved helping people find their brand voice and feel confident online. And the clients I enjoyed were with the most were all in the wedding industry. Every single one of them.

I fell asleep that night with a plan. The next morning, I felt more refreshed and excited for my business than I ever had – despite the lack of sleep. I felt at peace with my decision and immediately began marketing to wedding vendors, like photographers, florists, planners, etc.

I received more leads in the first month of marketing to wedding pros than I had in the previous eight months of my business.

When I first started, I would accept any client who came my way and do any kind of project they needed. I was afraid that I wouldn’t have enough, so I would lower my prices and, quite frankly, my standards. But my confidence grew as my experience did. After that sleepless night, I would only accept projects that I felt excited about. That meant saying no. And that was really, really scary.

But soon, I stopped receiving inquiries from people who didn’t want to respect my rates. And I started receiving more inquiries from people who respected me, what I stood for, and the work that I did. Those are the projects that got me excited. And those are the clients that became friends!

I wasn’t always good at this. In fact, I still struggle with it when some months are slow. But I now have a community – both in person and online – that reminds me how far I’ve come and how hard I’ve worked. They remind me that I offer incredible value, and should not sell myself short. This, like my understanding of success, is about my mindset. When I feel insecure about myself or my work, I’m tempted to take on projects I know will not excite me and work with people who do not respect me. But when I am confident of myself, my work, and the value it offers, I work with the most incredible people on the most fun projects.

Pivoting my mindset has changed my business and the quality of my life.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/j.flynn.copywriting/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61553770633654

Image Credits
Carina Danielle Photography