How do I know what I'm worth?

ShannonR. said:

I didn't find another thread about this, so I'm asking here.

I'm seeing all this stuff about "don't work for less than what you're worth". My question is, how do we know what we're worth? Is it based on the rates you've worked for before? I've taken what was offered in the hopes of getting established, but I'm told the rates were low and, frankly, I need more. Should your rate vary based on genre (nonfiction articles vs. blog posts, etc)? Does volunteer writing (personal blog, etc) count as "experience"?

I want to get into writing for magazines or newspapers, something with wider readership. I enjoy writing for AllWomenStalk.com, but I'd like to make more.

Thanks, everyone.

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Most established magazines and newspapers have set rates they pay freelancers.

No, your blog doesn't count as 'writing experience' - it shouldn't be used for clips.

You need to find out how much others are receiving for the same kind of work, and base your rates on that.

cornflake said:

Most established magazines and newspapers have set rates they pay freelancers.

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Yes, but these are seldom set in stone. They'll gladly give you the posted rate, but they'll also almost always give you more, if you ask. For some reason, an awful lot of writers seem afraid to negotiate price.

Writers even fail to negotiate rights. I remember when a writer asked the editor of a magazine that buys all rights why that's their policy. He said they were glad to buy only first rights, but writers almost never asked, and if they don't ask, too bad.

Negotiating both pay and rights is something every writer should do regularly, but new writers must be afraid they'll tick off the editor, get rejected, blacklisted, or something.

As far as negotiation goes, I can tell you this. Years ago I was writing regularly for a local newspaper. He was paying me $75 per feature story. I had been writing for him for at least a year. (probably longer) I felt I was a valuable contributor to his paper, turned my stories in on time, and did a good job, so I asked for an increase. ($100 per story) I was shocked when he turned me down. He said something along the lines of "I can't give you a raise, but if you still want to write for us we can still use you." Well, I quit writing for him because I felt he really didn't value me. Naturally I could have continued to write for him but there would have been bad feelings. Oh, and I should mention that I did find another newspaper to write for back then; the editor agreed on $100 per story. But I negotiated that up front.

To give you an example of what amount is too low in my book--not too long ago I queried another local publication (and this one was a glossy), asking if they accepted freelance contributions and what their rates were--and the shocking answer was that they paid $25 for an article that was 700-800 words in length! So I certainly didn't write for them. I know how much time it takes to interview people, do research, write the article, then edit and proofread, etc. If another local publication wanting the same length article will pay me more than $25 (and they will), why should I work for one that pays so little?

So I think a lot of it comes down to your experience and what the going rate is.

As a freelancer with no other income, you should aim for a bare minimum of $50/hour (though you figure it by the project for quotes - never give a client an hourly rate). The reason? You're responsible for all your own taxes, your own health insurance, your own overhead, etc. Anything below $50/hour, unless you live in an EXTREMELY low-cost area of the country, is going to make it a lot harder to make ends meet.

Here's a good post from Make a Living Writing that explains further.

I would agree that blogs do not make good writing samples, unless you're one of the very, very few bloggers who have a HUGE following (thousands of readers) in a niche topic.

Volunteer writing done for others, however -- like pro bono work for a local charity -- does make a great writing sample. And it's also important to remember that you don't have to have a huge portfolio to start writing for magazines. If you have no clips, you'll have to really knock your query letter out of the park, but if you can show excellent writing and research skills, you can land a magazine assignment as a complete newbie.

As for newspapers...unless you're writing for a bigger paper, there's not a lot of money there, either. As rhymegirl noted, $100 an article is probably the upper limit for many small, local papers.

How do I know what I'm worth?

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Just ask your mum.

ShannonR. said:

See, I've felt really stupid for a long time because about three years ago I thought $8 an article for a regular blogging job (I found it through a freelance site and it was regular income) was a good deal and now I've been told multiple times that I'm a total idiot for taking that...I didn't know any different and it makes me feel worthless. Period.

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Don't feel stupid or worthless -- you just didn't know. A LOT of writers -- me included -- start out in content mills or writing for really crappy pay because we don't know how to find real clients, or what professional freelance rates actually look like.

ShannonR. said:

Exactly...does having done this kind of writing make me look bad to future clients? Sort of like, "she must not be very good if she works for that"?

What *do* they look like (actual rates, I mean)? I've been looking at some jobs that are about $25 an article (maybe 400 words, not as long as I've written before), which is a lot more than what I made before. I've never been asked to give a price or anything, I just took what was offered on the freelancing site. I *have* had someone mention a price but ended up paying me more because he liked my work. I guess that's encouraging.

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I don't think it looks bad to your next client, anymore than an employer wouldn't hire you because your first job was at McDonalds.

I worked my way up in the content mills because it was what I could get, and at that time, it was a way to start getting writing credits. As I've been able to show more credits, I've stopped looking at jobs at the low end of the scale. Right now, I need $1/100wds for fiction to even look at a ghostwriting gig, and my blogging jobs all pay between $15-$20 an article. I've been at this for about a year.

Essentially, each time I get a new client, and get that situation stable, I reevaluate all of my clients. Can I do better? Are they likely to be able to give me better pay? What emotional attachment do I have to the particular job? For example, I have one client where I get to write about a subject I have a lot of passion about in a field that's somewhat crowded (mommyblogging), so I'm willing to accept a much lower rate there. For another client, though, I'm writing trending news, which doesn't interest me as often, so it's all about the benjamins there.

I once negotiated a rate with a paper and was able to get three times what they were paying some other freelancers. However, I knew what I was worth and was able to say why I was worth more. I had experience as a business reporter and had recently won an award for it. I could write about banks and mortgages and know what I was talking about. This was when lending practices were big in the news. It also helped that the business editor was familiar with my work because he had read some of my stories that ran in other publications. It was clear I knew what I was talking about and was coming to them with contacts and sources that other freelancers didn't have. I ended up writing about more than just business for them, but still had the pay rate we had agreed on.

However, when the newspaper ran into some finical problems and was sold and bought, I was told they couldn't pay me my rate anymore. They dropped me down to what everyone else was making. I ended up still writing for them here and there. Once there was more money in the budget, they gave me a raise again without me even asking. Sometimes it is not the editor with the final say. It can be the publisher.

I once worked as a editor at another paper and worked directly with freelancers. We had no money to pay them. I contacted local colleges to see if any journalism students were looking for experience. They were going to need clips. This worked out. A lot of their work needed heavy editing, and I spent a lot of time to get their pieces up to par for publication. I told them from the start to feel free to stay with us to get a few good clips and then go on to places that could pay. For a few of the better writers, I recommended them to editors I knew at other papers and one even landed a full time job through my contacts and recommendation. I don't think anyone should work for free, but it wasn't my call, and I think I made the situation as valuable as I could for the freelance writers.

You are going to need real clips (at least 3 to 5) that show your skills to land even freelance work at bigger papers and magazines. I know there are exceptions to this. You can always try to negotiate pay. Sometimes it will work. Sometimes it won't. Then you have to decide what you're worth. Really think about what you bring to the table, and use that in your argument for more money.

The problem with breaking it down to an hourly rate is that some people might be able to do in an hour what takes you four hours.

gettingby said:

The problem with breaking it down to an hourly rate is that some people might be able to do in an hour what takes you four hours.

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That's why I don't recommend quoting the hourly rate to clients -- you just use the rate you need to make hourly to come up with your total project fee, and that's what you quote.

For example, a client approaches me to write a new home page for them. They want about 350 words, and I know I'll have to do some basic research and maybe an interview with someone in the company to write a great home page. Altogether, I figure it'll take me roughly an hour and a half. Since my current hourly rate is $100, I actually quote the client $150 for that page. And, of course, if the page is going to require intensive research (if, for example, the company is in a really technical field I'm not familiar with), or if they want considerably longer content, then that rate goes up from there.

Of course, you should be aiming to get your writing time down to something reasonable, too -- you can't charge $400 for a 500-word post because it takes you four hours to write (except, again, in really high-tech, research-heavy fields -- finance comes to mind as one where you can get big rates like that).

As a rank newbie, your goal should be to get a bare minimum of $50 for a 500-word blog post-style article. There are plenty of sites that pay that, but you have to do some legwork to find them. Here's an excellent list (with links to more lists, totaling more than 100 sites) to get you started. A few may have changed their guidelines, but that leaves plenty still taking guest posts and paying a decent rate for them.

ETA: One more list - most of these pay $50 or more per guest post.

Angie said:

That's why I don't recommend quoting the hourly rate to clients -- you just use the rate you need to make hourly to come up with your total project fee, and that's what you quote.

For example, a client approaches me to write a new home page for them. They want about 350 words, and I know I'll have to do some basic research and maybe an interview with someone in the company to write a great home page. Altogether, I figure it'll take me roughly an hour and a half. Since my current hourly rate is $100, I actually quote the client $150 for that page. And, of course, if the page is going to require intensive research (if, for example, the company is in a really technical field I'm not familiar with), or if they want considerably longer content, then that rate goes up from there.

Of course, you should be aiming to get your writing time down to something reasonable, too -- you can't charge $400 for a 500-word post because it takes you four hours to write (except, again, in really high-tech, research-heavy fields -- finance comes to mind as one where you can get big rates like that).

As a rank newbie, your goal should be to get a bare minimum of $50 for a 500-word blog post-style article. There are plenty of sites that pay that, but you have to do some legwork to find them. Here's an excellent list (with links to more lists, totaling more than 100 sites) to get you started. A few may have changed their guidelines, but that leaves plenty still taking guest posts and paying a decent rate for them.

ETA: One more list - most of these pay $50 or more per guest post.

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I still don't think the hourly thing is the best way to approach this question, especially for someone pretty new to freelancing. It also sounds like you are doing corporate work. Having "clients" rather than editors and creating content for a website rather than writing a story for a newspaper or magazine is very different work.

If you're writing for magazines, you likely won't be able to set your own rate -- you'll be writing for the standard rate the magazine offers, unless you're a veteran writer and/or great at negotiating. So I see what you're saying.

But I still maintain that you can -- and should -- aim for a minimum hourly rate. You can do that by pitching magazines that pay enough per word or per article to make your rate.

Or, fine - you can go by a weekly or monthly rate, too. My point, really, is that you need to know how much you *need* to make in order to cover your expenses, cover your taxes, and have enough of a cushion to make this career worthwhile.

I don't think we disagree -- we're just getting hung up in semantics.

It really depends on where you're pitching. Blogs usually respond faster than magazines, since they don't have quite as much work on their plates. And some blogs are like some magazines - they won't respond at all if it's a no.

If they don't list a response time, I think you could politely email them two to three weeks after your submission to ask if they've received it and whether they've had a chance to review it. After that, if you get no response, I'd just move on.

It depends a lot on how much work those revisions will be. Is there any way you can get ahold of a sample of what he wants edited? For some clients, "editing" means "a complete and total rewrite," which is a LOT different than a simple cleanup of grammar and readability. It's really, really hard to give a good estimate without knowing which way this project will go.

Also, if he says he wants them edited for SEO, run away (or at least be very, very cautious). In that case, he's probably still stuck on old-school SEO methods like keyword stuffing, which are completely ineffective -- and actually HURT you in search engines now.

ETA: Don't feel stupid. Everyone's got to start somewhere.