One can always tell when there’s an economic meltdown occurring. Besides my own McDonald’s Economics theory, there are the obvious signs that the economy is in the gutter.
I’m talking about the job postings.
Anyone who knows me at all knows I loathe job postings as a means of building a freelance writing business. It’s too passive, too much like an employer-employee relationship, and almost always lets the client set the rates.
I loathe them for another reason —
They’re loaded with junk.
Thanks again to Devon Ellington who sent over another job posting she happened upon that could well be worse than last week’s lousy job posting. I never think I’ll ever come across one worse than the last one, but the internet proves me wrong every time.
Here’s this week’s worst.
This Job, Not That Job
Freelance Writer, part-time
We are a writing agency that is seeking a talented and detailed oriented writer. We are looking for the following soft skills:
- Attention to detail
- Creativity
- Integrity
- Organization
Our writer will be assigned projects from a wide range of different industries. Each project will require research to allow the writer to establish a working knowledge of industry lingo, trends, and target markets.
…..
We have a 0 tolerance policy for plagiarism, and require our writers to create 100% original work. We run plagiarism checks on every content piece to ensure compliance at all times.
Our team works via email. As a writer, you will be sent project descriptions via email. We require 24 hour turnaround times on every content piece, and include specific word-count requirements. Upon completion, you will email back your team lead with the completed assignment (including links, structural formatting, and thumbnails/ sources).
Our pay rate is $5 per 100 words. Typical projects range from 400 to 2500 words.
Please submit a 500 word .doc or .pages document for the following prompt. This prompt is similar to what you will see as a writer working with our clients:
“We need a 500 word blog post for a digital marketing firm. They didn’t have specific requirements, but would like the blog post to be well structured, include a thumbnail (and source), and focus on why “influencer marketing” is losing its appeal.”
Job Type: Part-time
Education:
- Bachelor’s (Required)
Language:
- English (Required)
……..
Work Location:
- Fully Remote
Hours per week:
- 10-19
- 20-29
Schedule:
- Monday to Friday
- Weekends required
- On call
Company’s website:
- In Progress
Okay, let’s just dig into this pile of … er, this listing.
We are a writing agency that is seeking a talented and detailed oriented writer
Let me get this straight — they’re asking for detailed, oriented writers? So how does one detail a writer? And in which direction should they be oriented? They couldn’t mean detail-oriented, could they? Hmmm…..
- Attention to detail
Right. Because this job posting started out with such attention to detailed.
Our writer will be assigned projects from a wide range of different industries.
Why this bugs me — this is not a company with a focus. It’s a scattershot gathering of topics, and the “wide range of different industries” just screams click bait. And redundancy, but that’s another matter.
Each project will require research to allow the writer to establish a working knowledge of industry lingo, trends, and target markets.
Hmm, a pretty serious requirement that’s couched with a promise for you, the writer, to establish all sorts of industry knowledge. For a wide range of industries. So you have a bit of a learning curve ahead of you, freelancer.
We have a 0 tolerance policy for plagiarism, and require our writers to create 100% original work. We run plagiarism checks on every content piece to ensure compliance at all times.
And that’s your cue to turn and run away. Any hiring manager who has to remind you that you cannot plagiarize is not looking for established, professional writers. And you don’t even have to see the pay to know they’re paying garbage rates.
Our team works via email. As a writer, you will be sent project descriptions via email. We require 24 hour turnaround times on every content piece, and include specific word-count requirements. Upon completion, you will email back your team lead with the completed assignment (including links, structural formatting, and thumbnails/ sources).
Oh great. More requirements. You have to turn it around in a day (researched piece that includes industry lingo), hit a specific word count, AND you have to show your sources, get the artwork, and link that sucker up — using their formatting.
So how much do you get for all your efforts?
Our pay rate is $5 per 100 words. Typical projects range from 400 to 2500 words.
So twenty bucks to a hundred twenty-five bucks for what amounts to about three to five hours of work.
And you’re okay with that? But wait — there’s more:
Please submit a 500 word .doc or .pages document for the following prompt. This prompt is similar to what you will see as a writer working with our clients:
“We need a 500 word blog post for a digital marketing firm. They didn’t have specific requirements, but would like the blog post to be well structured, include a thumbnail (and source), and focus on why “influencer marketing” is losing its appeal.”
A sample. An unpaid sample. Oh, hell no.
And I can’t help but wonder how much they’re charging their clients for this (especially since they themselves have no clue how to use hyphens — again). Some of the firms I’ve worked with charge rather impressively for things like this. Bet your next paycheck they’re not charging them $20 to $125. Think more along the lines of a thousand or better. IF there’s a client at all, that is.
Job Type: Part-time
Education:
- Bachelor’s (Required)
Language:
- English (Required)
Oh gawd, they didn’t. Yep, you are now an employee. Only you’re not. You’re not getting paid minimum wage. You’re certainly not getting benefits. But you’re getting the crap jobs, aren’t you? And that’s exactly why you earned that “required” bachelor’s degree, isn’t it?
Adding the English (Required) just makes them look like any other content mill.
But here’s the part that really ticked me off:
Hours per week:
- 10-19
- 20-29
Schedule:
- Monday to Friday
- Weekends required
- On call
What the what? Is it part time or is it full time? Those hours are definitely just under the legal definition of full time, but do you really want to spend nearly 30 hours a week earning five bucks for every 100 words?
And do you want to be on call? On weekends, too? They are requiring you to be available at all times. You have no choice. If you apply, you’ve agreed to become their damned servant. On call, which means you can’t even sit down and watch tv at night because hey, you have to be watching your email.
Company’s website:
- In Progress
Company’s Facebook page:
- In Progress
Oh no, you did not just reveal that you’re not even a legitimately running business, did you? So you’re basically someone who’s decided you’ll put up a storefront and hire some unwitting freelance writers to work their asses off for you, and you’ll charge way over what you pay and make a fortune. Know what we call that?
A content mill. Go away.
Not you, dear reader. You stick around, for we’re about to reveal a much, much better opportunity for you:
AARP magazine is a leading publication for people 50 and older.
Looks for content covering the following:
- Money: investments, savings, retirement, and work issues
- Health and Fitness: tips, trends, studies
- Food and Nutrition: recipes, emphasis on healthy eating
- Travel: tips and trends on how and where to travel
- Consumerism: practical information and advice
- General Interest: new thinking, research, information on timely topics, trends
- Relationships: family matters, caregiving, living arrangements, grandparents
- Personal Essay: thoughtful, timely, new takes on matters of importance to people over 50
Pay: $2/word for print; $1/word for online content.
Write exactly three words and you make more than the job posting above is paying for 100 words.
Writers, what kind of job posting nightmares have you seen?
Because some of these job postings are better written than this one, we get fooled sometimes. Have you ever been taken in by one of these ads?
6 responses to “Writers Worth: This Job, Not That Job”
Yikes. This is gross all-around. But the plagiarism checker line is a huge pet peeve of mine.
Not only does it say they know they aren’t paying for an actual professional… not only is it disrespectful as hell… but it says they don’t know WTF they’re doing in the first place.
Any client who thinks they only have an issue if a writer rips off someone else’s material word-for-word is going to end up in hot water eventually. They’re the same ones who are fine with “rewriting” rather than actual writing, and deem something “original” if enough words are change. They have no comprehension of copyright law and the fact that derivative works (which a rewrite would be, even though it would pass a plagiarism checker) are still copyright violations.
I don’t know why that detail ticks me off as much as it does, but it does. And it’s not worth working with clients that ignorant about a vital aspect of their business, because you don’t want to get caught up in the mess when one of their contributors steals from the wrong person. Never tie your reputation to a client who says something like this unless you’re prepared to lose it.
YES. I use sites like Upwork to fill in the gaps and pick up one-off jobs (though lately I’ve moved away from them as they’ve started charging 20% of the fee) and I loathe the “no plagiarism” thing. Who do you think you’re hiring, some high school kid?
IF I respond to a “rewriting” job, which I very rarely do, and only if the pay is reasonable enough to make it worth my time, I skim the original article for tone and points and write something entirely new from my own research and sources.
I honestly believe many of those types of clients are hacks and amateurs themselves, and every single time I’ve lowered my standards to work with someone like that (early in my business) I ended up having to pursue payment or being ghosted. No-thank-you-very-much.
I have much better luck with clients I’ve met through a Facebook group and referrals.
Mary, that’s a great line — “Who do you think you’re hiring, some high school kid?”
I hear you. Yes, you can rewrite from the original idea as long as it’s a completely new spin. That’s the right way to do it. Otherwise, “rewriting” is nothing more than changing a few sentences, which is nothing more than theft.
I remember one job posting years ago where they wanted someone to do a rewrite. I responded that it was basically plagiarism they were suggesting. And they responded (and I’ll never forget this): “Not at all. We expect each article to be 60 percent different.”
Uh, how exactly? That’s still not enough. In fact, why not just hire someone and say “Find a point in this article to expand on” or “I need 1,000 words on X topic.”
Just make it a new assignment. We write about the same ideas all the time. The amount of work it takes to “rewrite” something would be similar to just starting with a fresh slant on the same topic.
Jenn, thanks for your response. I agree. That line is just heinous.
What ticks me off about it is the many messages they send with that one line. They want “professional” writers, but aren’t willing to pay enough for actual professional writers, so they’re stuck with people they think will plagiarize. They’re saying that their workload is such that people might be tempted to plagiarize to meet the demand. They’re saying that they don’t trust their writers. They’re saying they’re coming into this relationship not respecting you at the outset. And they’re saying they don’t trust you without ever meeting you.
That’s how it reads to me. Who knows what they’re actually saying. I’ll never know because I’ll never waste time with them.
Wow. That stinker makes the response I had today, from what I thought was a respectable market, look almost okay. It’s not.
This one wanted at least one 2600-3000-word article per week, at 6-cents per word. A “paid” test was required, but they only pay for tests they publish. Hard pass.
Paula, that’s absurd, isn’t it? To me, that says what they’d be like to work with. Frankly, anyone who isn’t willing to pay decently for good writing is showing their lack of respect.