I was writing a magazine article a while ago that, given the per-word rate — $1.25 per word, 1,500 words — was going to be a killer payday for me.
Until I was 12 interviews and a complete rewrite in.
That’s the trouble with some projects. The unforeseen can really hit your bottom line. Even magazine rates. Maybe especially magazine rates — they’re pretty much set in stone.
Oh, the things I could have done to avoid it.
I could have pushed back — hard — when the editor came back with issues that weren’t really issues.
I could have limited how many revisions she was getting. (The article was already paid for and accepted, so limits would not have been out of the question.)
I could have refused.
But I did it. I wasted far too much time and far too many hours chasing that moving target (and boy, did it move constantly). My final payday factoring all the additional time and effort — about 30 cents a word.
It goes like that sometimes. The client or editor wants revisions, or they want you onsite for meetings. Or they want you to talk to them three times on the phone.
If you’re not budgeting for that (or saying no) …
Cha-ching.
Sometimes you just end up in a lousy situation. I had one encounter in which I was seven revisions in and had to say no more. The editor was editing out things, then in the next email telling me I needed to include that info. Four times. And there I was, trying to point out politely that it was there originally.
But there are times when you can protect the fee you’re charging. Remember that every additional task is going to chip away at the per-hour profit. While the goal isn’t to do a quick-and-dirty job to get paid, the smart freelancer keeps an eye on the amount of time spent on one project.
Here are some things that suck up my time:
- Onsite meetings/onsite work
- Follow-up calls longer than 15 minutes
- Unnecessary requests
Onsite meetings/work
I’ve done both. Don’t like either. In one case, I traveled an hour one way to meet for three minutes with the woman who’d called the meeting. She realized I didn’t have exactly the background she’d wanted (and apparently, didn’t think to ask me in email). In the end, two hours and $15 lighter (train fare), I’d wasted all that time.
If it’s not imperative for you to show up (such as they’re handing you reams of catalogues or books of data), don’t be so eager to agree to it. Or build the travel time into your project fee.
Follow-up calls
Most initial calls last anywhere from 20-30 minutes, depending on the client and the project. When the client went on for an hour and I had to interrupt him just to get off the phone, I knew I needed boundaries to protect my rate. If it can’t be handled in email — and not everything can be — handle it in short calls in which you’re armed with smart questions that will get you the info you need.
Unnecessary requests
I was once made part of a client’s team. That came with a bio on their website, a bit of a title, and a required team call every week. Wait. What? I never signed up for that, yet when I skipped it thinking “I’m the contractor” I was called on my cell and told they’re holding up the meeting for me. Seriously.
That ended when I billed for it. They explained in a cordial way that gee, our team meetings are just part of the job. I explained in an equally cordial way that gee, I’m not an employee and I get compensated when I am required to do something.
Just because they add it to your list doesn’t mean it’s your line item to complete. Don’t do what you would never agree to if asked. And don’t agree to shit that makes no sense and earns you no money at the same time. Time is money. Protect one and the other will be sorted.
Writers, what kinds of things are putting pressure on your rate?
How do you protect your time and money?
4 responses to “Your Freelance Rate Killers”
The temerity of that client to think you’d carve out time, every single week, for them and they didn’t need to compensate you for it!
I’m told this story before, but it was a big lesson for me so it’s worth repeating: few years back I was assigned a lengthy article at $2/word. The client was new to me, so I wanted to do a great job. I followed the editor’s instructions to the letter—when I told her I might ask a few questions, she said that was fine. I just didn’t expect her answers to contradict things she’d already told me. One time I asked what the requirements were for sources (I wasn’t sure if a “spokesperson” was okay for an association that couldn’t get a researcher on the phone. The editor said that was fine, adding “We do it all the time. Just not for every source.”) The editor also sent me contact info for a couple additional sources I should try. After my research and calls revealed one of the hazards she wanted to include wasn’t even a safety hazard by federal standards, she kept insisting I put it in. I relayed the direct answers I got from the people I asked about it, noting that one person even laughed at the idea.
I turned the piece in a week or so early, because I knew being my first project for them it would need polishing. The editor said she’d be in touch. Nearly four MONTHS later—two days before Christmas, no less, when I was out of town until the end of the year—she emailed with tons of changes, almost a total rewrite. You guessed it: the same person who said including one or two spokespersons was fine decided they weren’t acceptable (even noting “we don’t use spokespeople”), and said two other sources weren’t experiences enough. Yes, those were the two sources she’d told me to try. And that non-issue that experts agreed was not an issue was something she wanted me to add. She said it was common to have people rewrite their work, so not to worry. She needed it by mid-January. I only needed three new sources.
I wasn’t able to start on it until the first workday of the year, and no one was replying to email or answering phones. When I told her that and said they must have taken the holidays off, her reply was, “I’m not having any problems reaching people. You led me to believe you were a professional.” Yep. She went there. The editor who kept changing her mind accused me of being unprofessional. That’s about the time she told me she needed the rewrite by the end of the week because they wanted it for an earlier issue, effectively cutting a 10-12 window to less than a 5-day turnaround. I seriously thought she was throwing up roadblocks to test me.
I don’t know how, but I found three sources – a doctor, a Master plumber, and a Master electrician – and reworked it to fit every single one of her notes—expect the non-issue, which I re-re-re-re-iterated wasn’t a real thing—and sent it back by the new deadline. I told her to let me know if she had any questions. All I heard was, “Got it.”
Each month I checked the website and looked for the magazine at a local newsstand. My article never showed up. In May, someone from the accounting department emailed me asking me to fill in a w9 and another form so I could be paid. “You mean the forms I sent the editor last year?” The editor had never sent them to the accounting folks! I think I just found the email I’d originally attached them to and forwarded it back so they’d know the editor was the sloppy one, not me. I asked the person which issue it was running in. She said, “Oh, didn’t the editor tell you? They killed it. You’ll be getting a kill fee.” A few hours later the editor sent a terse email, “Sorry. I thought someone had told you the story was killed.” Someone? She was my only contact there at the time. Seriously, who did she think told me? The Byline Fairy?
All of that extra work due to the editor’s poor communication skills probably wouldn’t have been worth the $2/word, but a 25-30% kill fee? I had to chalk it up to Lessons Learned: per-word rates don’t matter nearly as much as how the total fee breaks down into hourly rates. I’ve had projects with much lower per-word rates break down to a far higher hourly rate than the $2/word nightmare.
Paula, that would be unbelievable if something similar hadn’t happened to me. It’s a case of an unorganized editor blaming you for her mistakes. We’re freelancers. We’re the easy scapegoats as they don’t have to face us in the lunch room every day.
In my case, like yours, I’d pre-approved the second round of sources. And the third. And fourth. And fifth….by the time edit #12 appeared, it was clear there was no way I was ever going to hit that moving target. Even with email proof that the editor had agreed to the last interviewees. One interview subject, upon learning why his commentary wasn’t going to be included, called me to complain about how unprofessional SHE was. Not me. He saw it. I didn’t go into bashing the editor as that’s not professional, but I didn’t defend her, either. He had every right to be upset. He’d gone out of his way to find another source for me — one whose comments were also dropped. (The editor had accused me of being paid by this guy to interview him, so anything that was related to him was “tainted.”)
The moving target is never going to end well for us. And we’ll be the ones taking the brunt of the “unprofessional” label. Damned if you do…
Well, you know me and phone calls. I bill in 15-minute increments, like a lawyer, separately from the fee. It’s spelled out in the contract. Phone time payments are also due at the end of the business day in which they happen. Saves me a lot of time and frustration.
I have one client now where it makes sense to do the work on site; another, I worked with for a few months, and it made no sense to work on site, and I won’t, if it comes up again. Most of my clients are remote at this point, because they’re the ones who respect talent, whereas too many of the locals demand I work for free. Since that’s not going to happen, I book remote clients.
The mantra in this region is “I don’t pay for that” (meaning writing).
To which I respond, “Then I don’t work for you.”
To which they say, “But you should be grateful I asked.”
To which I say, “This is my business, not my hobby. You don’t pay, I don’t work for you.”
If they try further argument, I warn that I will start to charge them a Negotiation Fee.
Devon, I’m not too surprised the locals don’t appreciate talent. It’s often the smaller towns (and even some of the bigger ones) where they fuss the most about a fair price.
I love your mantra best: “This is my business, not my hobby. You don’t pay, I don’t work for you.”
Amen.