The Real Lance Brown

A Recommendation from Ruth Schwartz of High Performance Advocates, as posted on LinkedIn:

“Lance started editing articles that I was writing for my (soon to be) blog and web pages. I found him exacting and provocative. He challenged my ideas and helped to make my writing and my ideas better. He loves writing and comes to this job with great passion and integrity. Then he built my website. He has a spontaneous understanding of what is necessary and now to make things work online. He was so proficient and fair that we have partnered to bring website challenged business owners the websites they need in this century – quickly, inexpensively and self managed. He will go far and I want to be there when he does.”  -February 14, 2009

Top qualities: Great Results, High Integrity, Creative

I’ll be making a more sophisticated portfolio section on my site soon, but I am long overdue in introducing the web sites I have been designing for clients in Nevada County this past year. (Or in the case of Project Simplify, these past many years. :-))

Project Simplify (original design, now re-done by Velocity7)

High Performance Advocates (original design inspired by client materials)

SCO Planning, Engineering, & Surveying (original design inspired by client materials)

VJ’s Salon & Day Spa (original design inspired by client materials)

Gold Country Roofing (original design inspired by client materials)

Mark Davis Plumbing, Inc. (my WordPress-based adaptation of an existing original design by Brook Design Group)

Debbie Costa Design (designed in collaboration with Louise Preston, who also provided the artwork)

HeartMatters.pro (my WordPress-based adaptation of an existing original design by Susan Powell)

ABT Plumbing, Electric, Heat and Air (original design inspired by client materials)

I will discuss these projects at greater length soon, but suffice it to say, those are some great local businesses in the Nevada City/Grass Valley area. I had a great time working with all these folks as we went through the process of getting their sites built. If you’re from Nevada County, CA, or even if you aren’t, check out their sites and give them some e-love (like links, comments, etc.), and/or some brick-and-mortar love.

Yay for my clients!

I’ve been writing copy in various capacities for the past 12 years or so. Here are some examples of my business and copywriting.

– For Project Simplify –

Since December 2005, I have been working as a freelance consultant for Project Simplify, a business simplification services company based in Nevada City, CA. My duties have been widely varied, and have included website development, copywriting and editing, business and marketing consulting, and quite a bit more.

You can read a testimonial about my skills from Project Simplify’s founder here, and another blog post that she wrote about my work here.

Here are some of the specific things I’ve worked on:

Website copy

Here are some examples of copywriting I’ve done for Project Simplify.

From Project Simplify’s Hire Us page:
The Simple Website Solution
The New Biz Systems Setup
The PS Simplifier Service

*In all of these cases, I wrote the base draft text, and then applied
revisions and edits based on discussions with the client Project
Simplify in order to create the final version.

Newsletter writing and editing

Since May of 2006, I have served as co-editor and a writer for Project Simplify’s newsletter, The Simplifier (previously The Weekly Simplifier).

In that capacity, I have proofread and edited all of the 80 (and counting) issues of the newsletter, along with Project Simplify’s founder. I have been responsible for the original content in the sections titled “In The News”, “Featured at ProjectSimplify.com”, and “Keep Smiling” for all 80+ issues as well.

You can find all of the past issues on the newsletter archive page here.

Additionally, I wrote for the other sections of the newsletter in a few instances:
-I wrote the introductory “Note from…” section in issues 20, 19, 13, 11, and 9.
-I wrote “This Week’s Simplification Tip” in issues 15 and 16.

Articles

I also wrote two articles which were featured in the newsletter and on ProjectSimplify.com:

– Various Other Copywriting and Creative Work –

You can find a varied assortment of other things I’ve written, designed, and otherwise created at works.lancebrown.org.

Editing is an important part of writing, and my experience and skill as an editor is an important part of my strength as a writer.

I have edited several newsletters over the past 14 years. One such newsletter was News from the Internet Renaissance, the e-mail newsletter for the company I co-founded, PeoplesForum.com. For over a year from 2000-2002, we had a paid writer who prepared that newsletter, while I served as editor.

That writer, Adam Graham, wrote about his experience during that time. Here is an excerpt:

“I thought it was a dream job. I would be writing for a living rather than cooking curly fries. Little did I know how demanding the job would be. Lance Brown was a perfectionist when it came to every aspect of writing. I often found myself resenting what I perceived as “nitpicking”. However, in retrospect, I look at Lance, the way people in my grandfather’s generation would look at their old Army Sergeants. Simply put, Lance gave me a few good kicks in the pants and in the process helped make me a better writer.”

You can read his full thoughts here, about halfway down the page.

And make sure you read this other testimonial from Shawn Tuttle, about my writing and editing work in the past year for Project Simplify.

For the past year, I’ve been working as a consultant-of-all-trades for Project Simplify, a business simplification services company. My duties have included website development, copywriting and editing, business and marketing consulting, and quite a bit more. (You can see examples of my work here.)

Here is a note about my work from Project Simplify’s founder, Shawn Tuttle.

Lance Brown has been applying his diverse writing skills to my business, Project Simplify in several different capacities. He has written copy for my website, while maintaining the tone of my writing. He has contributed to the copy of all my newsletters to date, and has, on occasion, contributed the featured article. I’ve been impressed by his prolific and creative ideas that are congruent with my mission, even though the subject was new to him when we began working together.

Working with Lance for the past year has had a great influence on my own writing as well. In his work as editor of my newsletter and articles, I’ve relied on his eagle eye to catch grammatical errors, his analytical skills to flag those sentences (and paragraphs!) that don’t quite convey their intended meaning, and his creativity to get me out of a jam when I get stuck.

While I am so appreciative for all his assistance to Project Simplify, I also see that his writing talents are ready to support him as a writer in his own right. I’ve no doubt he’ll produce fabulous works of art given the opportunity!

Shawn Tuttle
Founder, Project Simplify

She also wrote this blog post about me, where she called me “an amazingly diversely talented individual” – my favorite compliment of 2006. :-)

I have been working since before it was legal for me to do so – my first real job, as a tiny 14-year-old, was stripping and refinishing furniture for $3.50 an hour under the table. I can still remember riding home from work on the bus, coated from shin to chin with noxious goo — paint stripper mixed with paint and varnish and who knows what else. It set a good precedent for me; nearly every job since has seemed pleasant and easy by comparison.

Here is a partial list of the jobs I’ve performed since that first one in 1986:

furniture restoration (refinishing, etc.)
fast food: every station (x2)
dressing room attendant
dishwasher
cash register operator (x7)
temp work:
-proofreader
-furniture mover
-assembly line worker
-general labor
-data entry
-software training
laundromat attendant
convenience store clerk
front desk clerk for housing complex
copy shop clerk/operator
painter (buildings, not paintings)
telephone book deliverer
food delivery driver
print shop delivery driver
taxi driver
airport shuttle driver
dispatcher/office worker
telemarketer (just for one day, I swear)
Rainbow cleaning machine salesman
online forum administrator
entrepreneur/CEO
newspaper delivery
newspaper subscription sales
wine grape picking
landscape install laborer/rock worker
book editor/proofreader
computer tech support
PR writing
business writing
website design
website design training
newsletter production (w/ writing and editing)
XML Accessible Media Developer

I’ve been doing political and opinion writing since the early 90′s—moreso since 1996, when I launched my first website. Here are a few samples.

Op-Eds:

• Bill of Rights Day Op-Ed (2001) (The Union, Grass Valley, CA)
• Time to Get Serious About the Bill of Rights (2002) (The Union, Grass Valley, CA)

Essays/Articles:

• “Boston Public”: The Case Against Schools
• 10 Reasons Why MoveOn’s “10 Reasons Why the Recall is Wrong” Is Wrong

Extended blog entries (“blog essays”, if you will):

• The USA-PATRIOT Axe
• Atlas Shrugged and Me (and a Movie Makes Three)

Here is one of my initial forays into fiction writing, the short story “The Show Must Not Go On”:

“The Show Must Not Go On” – short story version

I took a whirl at adapting it into a short screenplay also. Here’s that:

“The Show Must Not Go On” – short screenplay version