Comments on: Writers Worth Week: Why Your Per Word Rate Isn’t All That

By: sarah henry

sarah henry — Sat, 02 Jun 2012 13:44:17 +0000

Love the idea of Writers Worth Week and this is a timely reminder of how some assignments are huge time sucks and thus not necessarily worth it.

By: Missie

Missie — Thu, 17 May 2012 21:06:38 +0000

Great Info! I just stumbled across this site for the first time today and I love it! Thank you!

By: Ashley

Ashley — Wed, 16 May 2012 01:14:57 +0000

Fantastic post, Susan. I have been in both of these situations before. One of my editors frequently needs one- or two-source stories and provides all the contact info - either for that person directly or their PR person. I get paid within 30 days. Total time: 3 hours or less.

The article I'm finishing right now pays twice as much as the previous editor. But I've had to track down about 10 (ten!) different people (some of the sources I had to come up with myself) all with interviews, collecting photos, getting releases, and I can't ever get a response from the editor when I have questions. I have EASILY spent 20 hours on this story. I'm getting paid pennies, when I calculate it out. And on top of that, it took three months for me to get paid last time. She's a nice editor, but it's not worth all this trouble!

By: Wade Finnegan

Wade Finnegan — Tue, 15 May 2012 19:21:44 +0000

Sometimes it is better to "just do the math". As writers most of us are not number thinkers and there is psychological response for a $1.50 compared to $.50, but Susan has it correct. At the end of the day you need to crunch numbers and decide how much money you want to make per hour.

By: Samar

Samar — Tue, 15 May 2012 17:39:56 +0000

I love it when you break down rates like this Susan! One of my biggest reason for specializing in blogging and ebook writing was the money (which is good in both if you find the right clients) and the time involved in both.

By: Lisa Romeo

Lisa Romeo — Tue, 15 May 2012 16:12:18 +0000

Good advice here.
Because I once worked full time in public relations, and had to track every single minute back to a specific client and specific project, I carried this over to all of my writing and freelance work — and you are correct. Very often, *smaller* jobs are the real money-makers.

By: Lori

Lori — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:50:50 +0000

Diane, my best tip for getting the lower-maintenance clients is to raise your rates. Seriously. The more they pay, the less hassle they seem to be to work with.

By: Sharon Hurley Hall

Sharon Hurley Hall — Tue, 15 May 2012 15:33:07 +0000

Great advice, Susan. It's important to weigh up the hassle factor too, I agree.

Like Cathy, I've used time trackers to see how much time I really spend on some projects; it's very enlightening.

By: Paula

Paula — Tue, 15 May 2012 14:52:19 +0000

Susan, thank you for explaining what I've been trying to get across to a handful of self-proclaimed writing experts on a forum I've been involved with for a few years.

One "expert" keeps stating her bottom line per-word rate, and I finally gave up trying to explain how lower rates sometimes pay more when you break it into hourly rates. Yeah, that's when I realized she wasn't an expert on anything.

I'll take a quick 50¢/word assignment from a good client anytime!

By: Devon Ellington

Devon Ellington — Tue, 15 May 2012 13:49:32 +0000

Yup, you have to figure out how much time it takes in proportion to payment. A good relationship with the magazine generally prevents that back-and-forth redo scenario, though. I've sometimes run into that for the first article I've done, and then we sort out the obstacles, and things run much more smoothly going forward.

Of course, some publications have senior editors who always have to put fingerprints on everything, so it doesn't matter how to-the-mark your work is; they're still going to mess with it.

The trick is not to go too low down on the per word rate, or you wind up in content mill land.