Last December, Susan Campbell ’01, threw a party for the employees of her company, and she was happy to see that everyone was visiting with each other and having a good time. That may not sound too unusual, except that, up to that point, most of her 11 part-time employees had never met each other.

Susan’s employees, who have a variety of backgrounds and skill sets, work on computers from their homes, choosing the amount of hours they want to work. It was a proud moment for Susan to see the successful interactions at the party and to be able to listen to her employees. “Everyone was excited to be there and excited about their opportunities. It’s not just a job to them, and that makes it fun,” she says. “It’s important to me that they love their jobs.”

Seven years ago, after extensive research, the Missouri Western graduate combined what she had learned as a marketing major with her love of writing, and a successful business – Susan J. Campbell Copywriting Solutions, LLC – was the result. When she started out, Susan, a native of St. Louis, was the only employee, but the business has continued to grow every year.

SJC’s copywriting services include writing articles, newsletters, executive summaries, brochures, press releases, and more. SJC also provides marketing strategies for companies and nonprofit organizations, and manages social media for some of its clients.

The company’s niche, Susan says, is conducting research and writing blogs or articles to direct readers to their clients’ websites. For example, one of her clients owns rehabilitation centers, so Susan’s company conducts research on addictions and writes blogs and articles about it. She estimates her employees write at least 125 articles each week to drive readers to their clients’ websites.

One of Susan’s first clients for that service was a telecommunications company. “I was writing about Facebook before anyone knew what Facebook was,” she said with a laugh. 

 SJC is currently designing an online marketing strategy for a company in Kansas City, Mo., and providing marketing services to a local organization, but she also works for clients in Australia, Ireland, Chicago, California and New York, to name a few. “There are clients I’ve never met, but I feel like we’d be good friends if we did,” she says.

A sign of the company’s success is the fact that SJC still works for many of Susan’s original clients, and her company is doing more and more work for those clients. “A lot of people do what we do, but not as quickly or as well. I deliver what I say I will deliver.” Susan says she never forgets that her name is on everything the company does.

But she is quick to credit her employees for their contribution to the success of the company. Her first hire, in 2007, was a longtime friend, Lisa Smith. Lisa is the project coordinator who oversees the writers’ assignments and client submissions.

Every Monday morning, Lisa, Susan and a third employee, Rachel McCoy, hold a conference call to plan the week and make writer assignments. Rachel was hired two years ago as a marketing communications specialist

“Susan is a great example of following a dream and watching it take off, while taking advantage of the opportunities provided by the unique world of the ‘virtual’ company,” Rachel said. “She leads the kind of organization most of us always hoped we’d work for.”

Susan says she’d like to see her company grow even more, but it has to be “controlled growth” so that it doesn’t affect the quality of their work. She is thinking about finding office space in the future and hiring more employees, possibly full-time.

“It’s been a blessing for my family,” Susan says of her company. “I absolutely love what I do.”

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