DP not a Writers Heaven!!!!!

I am not a copywriter,I am on the client side so I thought I share my views on the matter: As Anne Moss (webgal) said, those paying pennies for copywriting work are not your target. Those are (usually) people new to affiliate marketing that do not know what a good copy does in terms of sales or do not have the financial resources to support such a project. I've been in affiliate marketing for 4 years but till about a year ago, I wouldn't have thought of paying serious money for copywriting because I was doing pretty good with short term projects. Right know I am in a place where I want to create a serious, long-term business and I have resources to do it. These type of people are your target market. I know there are a lot of people here on DP that earn a lot of money so, if you are a good copywriter, I'm sure you'll find what you're looking for.

 

Quality doesn't come into play for good reason. The article is about setting the absolute minimum rates you need to get by, while being realistic (most new writers aren't, because they don't know how to account for all costs involved up front). If your quality doesn't justify those very basic rates, and by their nature you couldn't work for less, then you shouldn't be a freelance writer (so the article can also be a bit of a reality check for some who don't belong in the field).

Quality and capability start to come in when you're looking to charge more than those base rates. Even then, it comes down more to your marketing skills than your writing abilities. There are far more average writers with excellent marketing skills making the big bucks than there are excellent writers with average marketing skills.

 

you are exactly right

dp is a middle class forum here 70% webmaster have middle level mentality
No big sites can be sold on dp,no big deals can be made here ...but its very good forum for beginners and middle level webmaster

 

Agreed. So marketing skills are necessary as much as writing skills.
I wish there were a neutral service or person or software that automatically set the rates for each article based on it's quality.
Because there are so many fields of writing and a writer cannot always be equally good at them all. I could write top notch articles about maintaining aquariums, but if i were to write about latest technology, i'd be average.

 

I've found great clients on DP, none of them of the 1 cent a word variety. I've also been able to land a couple of prestigious gigs on highly trafficked blogs though this forum. Would never have happened if I didn't apply to every job that I felt was capable of paying me my rates.

 

I think it's really great (and something to respect) if you're making $100K or more or even $50K or more as a freelance writer.

I wonder, though, if it isn't just the marketing... but also the market. There is tremendous competition for writing jobs and positions that are obvious and traditional: the next ".. For Dummies" book, a column for a well-known magazine, and so on. My experience is there are many really good writers--often with really good agents--going after those opportunities.

There may be much less competition for outside-of-the-box opportunities...

 

I don't really think I've had to look too much for "outside-of-the-box" opportunities to earn decent money freelance writing. For me, what worked was targeting Web publishers early on - and large ones.

There's still this attitude with a lot of "old school" freelancers that writing for the Web is garbage, not worth any respect, and all poor-paying gigs. I've happily laughed my way to the bank while watching some of them come out with almost nothing. I think embracing respectable Web-based gigs was really the key to me - looking at the larger companies and "getting in on the ground floor" before the overall attitude changes. Because I did that, I have options now that I wouldn't have otherwise had. And there's really still time for people to do that... they just have to be a bit more choosy about the types of clients they'll work for, and make sure they're getting at least some bylined work out of it in their specialty to build up their own reputation.

 

For the record, I don't think that web-related writing or publishing opportunites are garbage...

I have publicly said many places that I make more money writing and selling ebooks than I do from my paper books... You don't/can't already know this, so I'll share that I have written more than 150 books... in English those books are sold more than 5,000,000 copies...

In the old days of the tech boom, computer books were outrageously profitable for writers.

But these days I think that the writing opportunities, in particular the self-publishing opportunities, created by the web are really strikingly good.

My standard advice to my computer book writer friends is self-publish ebooks and edocuments.

 

.01 per word? Yeesh.

The thing about DP (and any market for that matter) is that you get what you pay for. High quality material is worth every cent.

 

I hope it didn't sound like I was including you in that group, as that wasn't the intention. The biggest glimpse I got of this was when I was blogging about e-books not long ago on my freelance writing blog. I had more than a handful of people email me to tell me it's not "real" writing, and that I should spend my time writing about other things (like magazine writing). I was surprised at how passionately some people really still dislike writing for the Web. At the same time, I just remind myself that it's less competition.

 

If I could find a better way of marketing myself I would whore myself out faster than Lindsy Lohan at a beach party.

 

I have found a few modestly paying gigs from dp, that have helped to keep the wolf, nay wolves, from the door. The advantage to dp is that there is so much traffic here - you can always find something, even if the pay is not that fantastic.

More recently I am using job boards, such as Problogger, to find writing gigs - the pay is better, but I reckon there are loads of people applying for them.

 

OP - enjoyed your views on the matter. I pay top dollar for my sales pages/auto responders/emailers etc. You are right, newbies don't have a clue what responsive copy does, however more-so they don't have a clue about launches/JV's/recruitment/retention etc. either so it's good that they don't go all out on just one element of a campaign... I have hired the same writers ewen chia and other big names in the industry use, and wouldn't want anything else for my projects - I've also hired mid-grade writers and i always end up re-writing/editing/grammar/typo's etc. (what an irony).

I would applaud hiring writers from DP however this whole forum is a shark pool when it comes to making a few bucks, if I put out a $500 callout for a good writer I'm sure I would get absolutely bombed with responses and filtering would suck - Once you narrow down a good writer that converts your projects for you like water to a man in the desert, hold onto them for dear life - you can have the best product/service and graphics but if your pitch and close aren't strong you will lose 60% or more of your sales - and vice versa. You can sell dog S#!t if it is packaged right - alternatively you can have a hard time giving dirty gold away.

Cheers, *Writers - don't settle for less than what you are worth - go dry for a while if you have to - only take on bigger projects and bigger clients - and overdeliver when you can - you will keep them longer and build your rep as a top dawg.

Norb.

 

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I think what's nice about DP is that someone can get an idea if you are a good fit for a project. It gives you more to go on than a just a listing or a website.

You can get an idea of style. You also get the opportunity to learn from what has worked with others, what to avoid and get a global perspective. I think this is a great opportunity.

 

i seen people on DP write 5 words for 1 cent, that is really cheap and the quality is acceptable, you however might have to fix some grammar spellings etc

 

I'd like to charge at least 5-10 cents a word eventually. I just wish more people left me iTrader.

 

Decide what you are worth and stick to it.

Price per word changes depending on the quality desired.
I have writers that I pay .01 others .02. others .04 per word.

When I've wanted much higher quality I paid .14 per word for several articles. If your quality and reliability matches your price you will find clients that will stick with you. Even at DP!

I've even recently paid $2000.00 for the design and copywriting of one sales page. Unfortunately, I was unable to find someone qualified to do that here (dp), although I'm sure there are some here that were qualified (they just didn't respond to my threads ). There is money here, you just need to be able to convince the right people.

 

I participate in another forum for writers. And I get people who have never published a book or written for a magazine telling me that if I was a real writer, I'd be pitching books to big publishers.

For a while, I tried to explain to them why I thought they were wrong. And every so often, I'll roll out the writing credentials. But mostly I just shake my head...

I suspect that some of these people actually write very, very little. Mostly, I think, they probably talk about writing.

 

The old adage that you learn something new everyday comes to mind. My wife and I left another writing firm to get into the forum posting gig, because I could not generate enough writing jobs for both of us. Or for that matter I couldn't turn over any.

She went from earning $50k per year to nothing, but at least the previous site and webmaster that pimped out our services no longer called up berating us for either missing keyword density or not being appreciative.

Your thread has energized me enough to go after more writing jobs. Hopefully I can hit the 0.02 that we were getting as our second jobs.