Meet Jessica McWhirt of McWhirt, LLC in Littleton

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jessica McWhirt.

Jessica, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
It started in the middle of the night with Dr. Seuss before I could read. My mother caught me on several occasions flipping through Green Eggs and Ham, The Cat in the Hat, and One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. The written word has always intrigued me.

I wrote my first poem in 5th grade about civil rights. I learned about Charles Bukowski, Sylvia Plath, Maya Angelou, Margaret Atwood, Emily Dickinson, T.S. Eliot, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Andrea Gibson in high school and college. Those writers inspired my poetry as I developed my own voice. Poetry became my outlet through my teens and twenties.

Four or five years ago, I started a blog to document my travels. When I moved to Ireland for my Master’s degree, I used my blog to update my friends and family back home about my daily life. Most of it was boring, I’m sure. I loved blogging and continue to do it today. My blog now focuses on health, wellness, mindfulness, sports, outdoors, and exercising.

I began freelance copywriting two years ago when I was working as a Personal Trainer. As I struggled to find clients in the gym, several people suggested a start writing on the side to earn additional income. Copywriting became a supplemental income to personal training. Then I moved from training clients in the gym to an online model. It gives my clients the freedom to do their workouts on their own time. Also, it frees my schedule to manage the personal training side of my business.

Right now, I train and coach clients online and write copy for businesses spanning from technology to cycling to products to apps.

Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Being a freelance copywriter and online personal trainer is both challenging and rewarding. You’re your own boss so you have a ton of freedom, but you manage and run the entire business – marketing, finances, writing, creating training plans, all of it. I’ve made it doubly hard on myself by having two businesses: copywriting and personal training.

It requires me to stay focused throughout the day, scheduling and prioritizing to stay on top of everything. At the same time, I can go on a bike ride whenever I want and that’s the best feeling.

McWhirt, LLC – what should we know? What do you guys do best? What sets you apart from the competition?
With regards to personal training, I focus on self-identifying women cyclists. I take a holistic approach to coaching my clients. I take into consideration their stress levels, their life outside of training, their goals, and having them as much a part of their structured training as they want. This means self-assessing at the end of every week and asking themselves if they put their all into every workout. If not, how they can do better moving forward.

I make myself available to them whenever they have a question about a workout or a struggle they encountered. I try to help my clients learn the process so they understand what they need to do when I’m not around.

I use a similar method when I work with copywriting clients. I ensure it’s a beneficial relationship between us. I take the time to understand their goals, asking a lot of “whys,” and creating something that’s meaningful to them. Having a professional background in the outdoor industry as a woman navigating that space helps me see companies and their audience from a different perspective. Having a natural inclination to write poetry draws out the creativity needed to connect with an audience, which is what people want nowadays.

People want to trust businesses. They want to connect with a business on a different level than simply seller-consumer.

What moment in your career do you look back most fondly on?
Making the decision to go out on my own has been my proudest moment. There are a lot of people who meant well but warned me against it. They told me it’d be hard, I could fail that finding a full-time job was safer and more stable.

They’re not wrong but “working for the weekend” isn’t something that motivates me. So many of my friends and family complain about working a 9-5 job. I see and hear about people fired or laid off frequently, which goes to show that the “safe” route isn’t all that safe.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.jessicamcwhirt.com
• Email: jdmcwhirt@gmail.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jessica_mcwhirt/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/jessica_mcwhirt

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