How to work with a freelancer: pricing

This is the last in a series of posts on how to determine if a freelance writer is experienced (and why “freelance” isn’t a dirty word).

It’s time to talk pricing.

If you’re hiring a freelancer on a project basis, they should be able to offer per-deliverable pricing and possibly bulk discounts. If those projects go well and you want to reserve their time on an ongoing basis, they’ll also be able to offer a retainer option.

Per-deliverable prices should be based on the project scope. After discussing scope in your initial communications, including a discovery call, the freelancer should be able to provide a statement of work that covers what’s included and what’s not. For example, I don’t include design work with my content services.

A statement of work (SOW) will also delineate how many rounds of review, meetings, and interviews are included in the deliverable/contract prices. SOWs can also include how much à la cart extras will cost. These extras could include extra meetings, rounds of review, and optional subject matter interviews.

Projects can veer off-course for many reasons, but if the writer specifies in the beginning what will happen if it does, everyone knows what to expect.

I hope these posts have helped clarify what to look for and what to expect when choosing a writer for your project. If you have any questions on aspects that I haven’t covered, please let me know in the comments.

How to start working with a freelance writer

If you’ve selected a prospective freelance writer for your project, you have groundwork to do. Note that the questions you should know the answer to and the ones the freelancer might ask overlap. But you’ll already know the answers to many of these:

• Why this project/deliverable? What problem are you trying to address?

• Why now?

• What is the project worth to us? If you’re looking to increase sales, calculate by how much and multiply that by the average sale amount.

• Who is your intended audience? The more you can tell the writer about your audience’s pain points, the better they can engage your audience.

• What makes your offering unique?

• How will you measure success?

• Who are the stakeholders and reviewers? Knowing this will streamline the creation process and keep costs in check. Experienced freelancers usually indicate how many rounds of review are included in their statement of work. Last-minute stakeholders could increase your costs and delay publication.

This isn’t a complete list, but it’s a great start. Check out PJ Srivastava’s What to Know Before You Start a Project for more context and questions.

You may have already filled out a project information form or exchanged emails with the writer. But a discovery call will give you a chance to see if you’re a fit to work together.

Questions like these show that the writer understands the value and impact of the work and how to help the project run smoothly:

• Have you worked with freelancers before? This answer will give the writer context.

• Why did you reach out to me in particular? What do you like about my experience/approach?

• What is your budget for a freelancer? If you don’t know, the writer can create options for you. Keep in mind the project worth from the previous list.

• What’s at stake with this project?

• What is the project timeline and what is driving the deadline?

• Are there any challenges I should know about?

• Do you have a creative brief or a content strategist? Audience personas or product messaging?

• What background materials should I use? If you’d like the writer to interview your subject matter experts, talk to them before the project starts.

• How often do you want to communicate and via what channel(s)?

• How will you onboard me? The writer might need access to your timesheet or invoicing systems, or your internal document repository. Or you could exchange documents via email, like templates, guidelines, and creative briefs.

Thanks to Ed Gandia of High-Income Business Writing for ideas on discovery call questions.

Knowing the answers to these questions will help you and the freelancer. Pay attention to their questions and answers to see what they bring to the table.

The Portfolio Papers: freelancer writing samples

I’ve been posting about working with experienced freelance writers. Aside from asking about their years of writing work, which I talked about the week before last, look at their writing samples.

These could be from a variety of clients, and the selection will give you an idea of the subjects, industries, and formats that freelancer has worked on/in. I’d argue this shows more of their writing range than samples they’ve created themselves, because pieces written for hire demonstrate how well the writer reflected those clients’ brands, including voice, tone, and subject matter. And the more clients they’ve written for, the more reliable they are. As a freelancer, it’s easier to get new clients through referrals and networking than by cold pitching.

Even if a freelancer’s samples are from their days as an agency employee, they reflect flexibility in working for multiple clients. Getting hired at an agency also means other creatives found that writer competent and professional.

In my case, my samples also reflect different ways of working. I based the case studies on subject matter expert (SME) interviews, product messaging, and industry research. I created the blog posts by collaborating in print with SMEs, adding my knowledge of content structure and tone to their industry expertise, product knowledge, and thought leadership. Ebooks and emails were based on creative briefs and online research.

Let’s talk presentation. Writing portfolio sites provide the added bonus of letting the freelancer’s personality shine in the site design and the copy that introduces the samples. If the freelancer doesn’t have a site, they might send you samples as file attachments, or make them available in a shared folder. As long as the samples were written for a client, that’s the important thing.

The advantages of hiring a niche writer

A nice advantage of working with freelance writers is that you can find one who specializes in the type of content you need. If experience is what you need, here are tips for finding a specialist.

Specialization could be at the audience, industry, or content type level.

At the audience level, for example, I write B2B (business to business) marketing and technical content, which means I help brands sell to other brands. It would be more of a stretch for me to writer B2C (business to consumer) content than it would be to write B2B content for a brand-new industry. Everyone’s got their sweet spot.

Industry experience can be broad or deep. Because there are many industries served by high-tech software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions, I’ve written B2B content for healthcare, manufacturing, insurance, mining, professional services, cybersecurity, public sector, and energy industries, to name a few.

But if you’re looking for a B2C writer to promote your luxury jewelry line, you’ll want to hire someone with a few years of experience writing for luxury brands. Or, if your industry has lots of compliance considerations, like pharmaceutical marketing, you’ll want to work with someone who is familiar with those regulations.

There are also various content types, produced by copywriters, content writers, and ghostwriters. Copywriters create marketing copy to sell products, whether for websites, online ads, or product packaging. In the B2B world, content writing can lean more technical, whether it’s got a how-to or a product-feature focus. Case studies and product pages are good examples. There’s also thought leadership content, which is a form of ghostwriting. That’s where you help an executive share their opinion on an industry trend or current event. They contribute their knowledge and opinions, and you help them craft their message in the most effective way.

How does experience play out? As an example, while writing a case study, I was reading a transcript of a customer interview that I was not part of. I researched the names of the third-party products that the customer mentioned, and it turns out that one of them is an generative AI product associated with the client. I know from experience that AI is a big focus, especially if it’s a solution that the client invested in, so I asked if we wanted to include that angle in the story.

Ok, so everyone these days knows that AI is a big deal, but you get the picture!

Finding the right freelancer: experience

Last week I posted five indicators of a skilled freelance writer.

The top one is experience.

If you want to work with a seasoned writer, here’s how to distinguish between a pro and an enthusiastic beginner looking to start a side hustle. No shame, we’ve all been there; but if experience is your top priority, read on.

Experience could include freelancing or working at a marketing agency or similar company where they created content on a regular basis. How many clients have they written for? What industries were those clients in? The answers will help you determine their experience writing the type of content you need.

To find out how many years of experience a potential freelance hire has, you can poke around on their website or LinkedIn profile. If they don’t have a website, it’s not the end of the world. But they should be able to supply you with quotes or references from happy clients.

Or talk to them about experience and track record during the discovery call. That’s the initial meeting when you talk about your writing needs and figure out if you’re a good fit to work together. After that, if it’s a go, the writer will provide a quote for the project, among other things.

If all they ask for is for you to fill out an intake form, and they respond by emailing you about their hourly rate, those could be signs of an inexperienced freelancer.

If they lack experience writing for clients, they might not know to ask questions about your audience and their pain points, and what you expect this piece of writing to accomplish. Pros are familiar with timelines and deadlines, and how to make sure they deliver what they promised when it’s due.

A seasoned writer also knows some business basics about how to work with clients, charge for a project, write a statement of work, and provide a contract to sign if needed. Craftwise, they’ll understand enough search engine optimization (SEO) writing, project management, and content strategy to keep a project on track. They’ll also know how content provides business value, and how to maximize that value.

As you can probably tell, finding hiring a freelance writer will involve some project preparation on your side in addition to vetting potential writers. We’ll get to that in a later post.

In the meantime, thanks for reading.

5 reasons “freelance” isn’t a dirty word

Some industry voices can give the impression that freelancers are people with lots of enthusiasm but little experience. They claim freelancers’ professionalism and quality of work vary widely.

As a self-employed writer with 15+ years of experience, I can say those voices are right.

Except when they’re not.

Hiring a freelancer can also provide you with experienced content-writing talent who would cost your business too much if you hired them full-time. Professional freelancers are great when you need project-based (occasional) or retainer-based (a certain number of hours per month) support.

One option is to hire a freelancer through an agency, where you’ll be paying for the agency’s sourcing and vetting processes.

What’s the best approach?

If you have an agency you like to work with (and the budget to cover the costs), great. If not, you can do your own vetting without breaking the bank. That way you’ll know you’re hiring someone who will bring value.

Search online for a freelancer (say, on LinkedIn) or ask your network for referrals. When you find a candidate, here are five core things to look for to make sure you’re talking to a professional.

An experienced freelancer will:

• Have extensive experience. How much experience is up to you. It’s definitely something to ask about in a discovery call, before you begin working with this person.

• Specialize. This might be at the industry level (i.e., technology vs. pharmaceutical marketing), audience (B2B vs. B2C), or type of writing (copywriting, content writing, ghostwriting).

• Have writing samples from paying clients. Folks who are starting out will often write their own samples, which is enterprising and creative and shows how they like to write for themselves. If you want someone with experience meeting a brand’s expectations around voice, tone, and topic, they should be able to share at least a few published examples of client work.

• Ask how you like to work with freelancers. For example, they’ll want to know how you’ll exchange and store files. How many reviewers will provide feedback on the drafts and when?

• Offer pricing options. These could include package deals, bulk discounts, and retainer options.

Be a good client is also important for getting the most out of hiring a seasoned freelancer. When both of you are prepared, everything goes more smoothly.

I’ll write more about all these topics soon.