Would You Outsource Your Writing Research?

I'm working on getting back into freelance writing, and a friend of mine suggested that me and my partners focus on providing research outsourcing services for writers as opposed to the general writing services to everyone else. This makes sense given that I'm launching a freelance writing blog alongside what would be the writing services.

My question is this: would you outsource your post research if you only had to:

1. Fill out a 5-question form
2. Wait for Email Notification
3. Receive a PDF with a summary of the research and sources


We would have something like a "quality sources" guarantee.

Thoughts?

 

I suspect your biggest hurdle will be building trust.

Writers would have to trust that you're going to double check your sources. Content has become such a commodity that once bad information starts making the rounds it's really hard to tell the correct from the incorrect. I had a misspelled chemical in a piece I wrote. It was amazing how many other sites either stole the article in its entirety or perpetuated my typo in their rewrites or own articles. (Made it really easy to chase down the content thieves. lol)

You would also have to convince folks that you like digging deep. If all you plan on doing (I'm not accusing here, just making a point) is sourcing from Wikipedia, About, Ezine and other similar sites you will only appeal to the laziest of writers. I bring this up because there have been a fair amount of writers around here who think those are primary sources.

The second issue that I can see is that your pool of prospective clients could be somewhat limited. I would suspect only writers in the top tier would be able to afford to hire a good researcher. There's no doubt more than enough writers are at that level to build a great business for yourself but it take some doing to get them to trust you. Sole operators feeling a crunch also might find your service a lifesaver.

A suggestion...write some blog articles about things other than writing. Pick some topic, research it like you would for a client, write the post and include a bibliography. It would showcase the quality of your research as well as show how far you do or don't dig into each topic.

Overall, I think it's a great idea. Good luck!

 

Sample articles and biblios sound like a great idea. You will probably also have to develop a policy on what appears to be the most enthusiastic group of outsourcers: college students. Making it clear that earning your grade in Poli Sci 101 all by yourself is an important part of growing up may be enough to keep the flood of those requests down. An explicit policy would also make it clear to serious writers that you're a serious company.

 

I plan on using credible sources such as official government sites, major news outlets, etc. I'll have to look into developing some samples. =)

@jwrite
Your suggestion is fantastic. I don't want to end up doing other peoples' homework, haha.

 

Why not? if the pay is good, work is work

 

There are a lot of software out there that create content for you. it will be a challenge

 

content should be unique.so,it cannot be carried out through s/w