Say Yes To Being Fairly Compensated

Over the years, I’ve changed my pricing structure based upon the economy—when the economy’s good, the pay is good and when the economy’s bad, the pay’s enough to get by. But I’ve never written for $1 per article and I never intend to do so. There is just no reason why someone living in America, with such high living expenses, should settle for such an outrageous fee.

In the past, I charged $150 to $175 per 500 word article without blinking an eye. The time it takes to understand the company’s agenda, to research, to obtain quotes and/or statistics, to write the first draft, to make editorial changes, and to rewrite the piece can take anywhere from 2 hours to several hours. I didn’t even bother with lowering my fee for articles that took less time or did not require any research because my clients were paying for my skill, my talent, my know-how.

Today, however, things are different. The recession has caused many companies to tighten their creative spending budgets—and that means cutting corners and letting go of contracted freelance writers or looking for cheaper alternatives. After talking with many colleagues, we’ve agreed that lowering our fees or changing how we charge for what we do is a matter of survival—nothing more, nothing less.

Some of my colleagues now offer sliding scales based upon their client’s budget, others have created packages and divided their fees based upon the work involved. Personally, I prefer to know what I’m getting up front and therefore have opted to provide two sets of fees. One set of fees is for information I already posses, otherwise known as head knowledge. Since I can write something up rather quickly, the fees are lower. The other set of fees is for projects that require me to learn about the product or service, to research, to interview, to find important data. That fee is a little higher. The key, during a recession, is to lower your fees just enough to meet tight budget but to keep them just high enough that you can pay the bills—especially between paying assignments.

Which brings me to a scenario I encountered a few years ago...

An email arrived asking if I would ever consider writing articles for a dating website and what would the cost be per article. Having been approached by various dating websites in the past, it was my understanding that they weren’t looking for simple how-to date or dress on your first date type articles, they wanted something with more substance—something that wasn’t available on other dating websites. They wanted interviews, statistics, and maybe even a little psychological stuff—all of which would have taken a couple of hours to put together and then write. So I developed a standard reply.

My reply was as follows: "Yes I do, but it depends on the content. As long as it’s not sexual in nature, I can write the articles. For all rights, a 500 word article is $150. This means you own the article. I cannot resell it. You can use it anywhere and as many times as you like without ever paying a reprint fee. Your byline would accompany the article. For one-time rights, a 500 word article is $50. This means that I own the article. You are buying the rights to publish the article one time on your site and can archive it indefinitely. But if you wanted to use the same article in print, in a newsletter, or in any other manner, you’d have to pay a reprint fee. It also means my byline accompanies the article."

The reply I received back was, "How about $50 for all rights per article. If you don't want to accept this offer, don't even bother emailing me back."

ERRR! I was pretty ticked. Besides the fact that that information was already up on my website, I took the time to respond quickly and honestly. I didn’t beat around the bush and I gave all the facts; there was no second-guessing, no trickery. There was no cause for the rudeness.

A few months later, I received another email, from a different person asking for some very in-depth articles. But this individual only wanted to pay $10 per article, with most articles ranging from 500 to 2,000 words. The entire project would have netted a few hundred dollars—which on the surface sounds nice, but I would have been working for approximately 50 cents per hour. Needless-to-say, I turned this person down.

Good writers are talented professionals who deserve better compensation and more respect than they get from the so-called Internet marketing gurus who preach to their “congregation” that they should pay no more than $10 per article, for all rights—and to seek out writers willing to work for $1 per article because there’s a sucker born every minute.

Good writers study their markets, they hone their skills, they write stuff worthy of being read, the take time to understand how search engine optimization works, and they work hard to make sure their content is factual, well researched, and includes the proper number of quotes (when needed).

The only way writers are going to earn more respect and more pay is to stand up for it. Say no to $1 per article. Say no to $10 for all rights to a 500 word article that takes you several hours to research and write. And start saying yes to being fairly compensated!