Ultimate copywriter career pivot guide

Part 1 of 3: The resume

Woman with curly hair at laptop on bed

The job hunt is daunting. And when you’re pivoting into a specialty like copywriting—where you know even less about the landscape—you can be stuck for a long time. From someone who’s been there and finally made the transition, I’ve narrowed down the checklist to 3 things you need to be ready for the pivot.


So you wanna be a copywriter? Love it. You’re gonna need:


  1. A writer-specific resume.

  2. A portfolio

  3. A clear message.



This is part one of a three-part series unpacking each of these elements. Here, I’m going to walk you through exactly how to fix your resume so you can confidently apply to roles with an optimized chance to land in the interview seat. 

Create a writer-specific resume

If you didn’t already feel the pinch of a crowded job market, the numbers are in to tell us just how competitive it is right now. Goodtime.io published an article in January of 2025 surveying hiring professionals, asking what they’re seeing right now.  


Here’s what those hiring teams say: 


  • 50% say hiring landscape is more competitive [than last year]

  • 27% say the workload is unmanageable

  • 41% say a lack of qualified candidates is lengthening time-to-hire

  • 42% already use artificial intelligence (AI) to screen resumes



Adding to the squeeze on job seekers is copywriting job demand, set to increase by 3.7% between 2022 and 2032. With thousands of copywriting jobs currently listed across job boards, we have an environment where only a few can make it to the interview seat.


What this tells us about the application process? 


You have to have a clear, tailored resume optimized with relevant skills, experiences. It’s a non-negotiable. Especially when AI is playing an increasingly larger role in vetting.





Watch out for this #1 Mistake: Trying to retrofit non-writing experience

Recruiters don’t have time to interpret how your past jobs relate to copywriting. If your resume is filled with unrelated experience, they’ll assume you’re not a good fit and move on. Even if you rewrite your experiences to highlight transferable skills, resumes like this ask already stressed and overworked recruiters to do mental gymnastics. 


And that just means they’ll move on and never look back. 


I tried to make my retail experience make sense for general marketing roles for 9 years—and it never worked. Here’s a look at that resume that kept me stuck for 9 years…


With 60% of this resume not even kinda relating to writing jobs, no wonder I never got through a first round of screening, let alone booked an interview. 

Don’t leave your value up to interpretation. Literally spell it out.

Step 1: The brutal resume edit

Novelists have mastered a technique called "kill your darlings." They cut anything that doesn’t serve the story. 


A character. 

An entire chapter. 

The best line they’ve ever written. 

If it doesn’t advance the plot, it 👏 gets 👏 cut. You need to do the same with your resume.

home office with surrounded by shelves

Step 2: Build it back with granular detail

Once you’ve cut the fluff, rebuild your resume with details that showcase your writing expertise. Break larger projects into base components:

  • Content types (blog posts, web pages, email sequences, ad copy)

  • Writing style (long-form, short-form, persuasive, SEO-optimized)

  • Channels (social media, print, web, app)

  • Marketing or copywriting techniques (conversion copy, storytelling, calls to action)

 

Want some resume keyword ideas?


Copywriting skills to add to your resume

Channels

  • Blog channel

  • Website

  • Email 

  • Social media

  • In-App 

  • TV/Streaming

  • Chatbot

  • SMS (text)

  • Print 

  • Out of Home (OOH)

  • Direct mail






Content types

  • SEO

  • Paid media

  • Video scripts

  • Podcast scripts

  • Webinars, virtual events

  • Infographics, visualized data

  • Product descriptions

  • Case studies

  • White papers

  • E-books

  • Technical documentation

  • Sales enablement materials

  • Chatbot, automated response scripts

  • Advertsements

  • Press releases






Content styles

  • AP style

  • Chicago Manual of Style

  • MLA style

  • SEO-driven writing

  • Direct response

  • Conversional

  • Journalistic 

  • Creative 

  • Technical 

  • UX writing

  • Social media best practices

  • Brand voice, style variations






Content structures, elements

  • Headline

  • Subheadline

  • Hook

  • Introduction

  • Body

  • Bullet Points, lists

  • Foramtting, subsections (H2, H3, H4...)

  • Transitions

  • Quotes or testimonials

  • Citations/sourcing

  • Captions

  • Embedded media (videos, infographics, etc.)

  • Pull quotes

  • Sidebars or callouts

  • FAQs (Frequently Asked Questions)

  • Call-to-action (CTA)

  • Conclusions, summaries

  • Footer or additional links

  • P.S. (Postscript)


The goal of rebuilding your resume is to zoom into and break apart your writing projects. Identify the individual skills or activities you’ve got and write a bullet point for each one.


Helped your sister’s plant nursery-slash-cafe with Instagram content? Make that its own project on your resume and create lines for everything you did… Hashtag research, writing captions, writing product descriptions, localized marketing strategies, determining calendar placements, monitoring performance metrics, and implementing optimizations. 


Wrote a few blogs for your own blog site? Make that its own project and break it down the work into individual skills. Research and resource vetting, outlining, writing, formatting, embedding internal or external links, call to action development, content calendar development, sales funnel integrations, search engine optimization, and the list goes on. You get the idea.


If your roles or projects happened on a linear timeline, you can format that like most resumes… in reverse chronological format with each project or role from newest to oldest. But if you have scattered experience? 


You’ll need to know about functional resumes…

coffee, notebook, cell phone, and laptop on a wooden table

Step 3: Choosing the right resume format

Every copywriter’s career looks different, and when you’re pivoting into this specialty from outside the industry, you have an additional problem to solve—communicating that you are, in fact, qualified.


The right resume format helps you control the narrative while proactively side-stepping objections or distractions that could eliminate you from consideration. 


  • Reverse chronological resume → Works best if you have multiple writing projects or a clear, linear career timeline.

  • Functional (skills-based) resume → Works best if your writing experience is scattered, repetitive tasks across different jobs, or content feels too light after editing.


❤️‍🔥Hot Tip: If you go with a functional resume, include a career timeline with job titles, companies, and dates to avoid looking like you’re hiding gaps.


Examples of skills/functional resume and reverse chronological resume

Reverse chronological resume 👇


Skills-based, aka ‘functional’, resume 👇


Now that your resume is in shape, the next piece is your portfolio. Because even a perfectly edited resume won’t land jobs if your portfolio isn’t strong. Let’s talk about how to build one next 👉

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