Greetings!
This should be filed under the reference:
“You’ll Get What You Pay
For!”
Some years back I subscribed to one of those freelance
advertising websites. I’ve since stopped taking them seriously. You, the gentle
reader may ask: “Why?”
Since I still get their e-mails, here’s one that came in on
Sunday, February 18th, 2007. It’s totally unedited, but I have left
out any business specific information that could identify the culprit… err… company.
Read it … then stay tuned for my special comment. (Note:
Bolded text is mine!)
“I am the owner of a writing
service company seeking another writer whom I may hire to assist in my
organization's overflow of projects.
Project Description:
I require a skilled
writer to create 50 original SEO
(keyword optimized) webs articles on
various health and self-help topics.
Topics will be provided when you are selected for the project.
Writing rules:
- Articles will be submitted in WORD .doc format.
- US English spelling rules
-The keyword should be noted in the upper left corner of the article.
-Each article should contain a title that includes the keyword.
- The keyword should be mentioned in the first sentence and 5 to 8 additional
times throughout the article.
- The articles should be submitted in
batches of 10 as they are completed you finish them.
- All articles must be submitted by
February 26.
- Articles should be 500+ words each.
- The articles must be completely
original - no copy and paste. I will be checking all work with EVE
plagiarism detector as well as CopyScape.
I will pay up to $5 for each article.
My budget does not allow for anything higher.
More articles may follow this project if you are interested, and I am hoping to
keep in contact with the selected writer for future projects as well.
I look forward to working with you!”
Who Are They Kiddin’?
If I didn’t know
any better, I’d think this was a joke! Fifty (!) 500+ word articles, each completely original and SUBMITTED within a week.
All for 5 bucks a
pop. Or $250 the bunch.
Let’s Break This Down:
A
500 word article.
Researched and written. That’s about a full page of writing, if one is using the
smaller 10 point Verdana font. Multiply that by 50, and we get … 50 pages! (Duh
… math was always one of my strong points!)
The absolute
minimum amount of time for each article
would be about an hour and a half –
and I’m being QUITE optimistic here. (Remember – we have to research!) So we
now get 75 hours of work – or almost
two entire weeks sweating full time over these articles.
BUT! You only have a week to complete them – so figure on putting in some heavy duty overtime and
late nights. (Not to mention the extra coffee you’ll have to buy.)
Getting
back to the higher math.
Let’s see, $250 divided by 75 gives us a total of…. $3.33 an hour!
Good Friends, Are They
Daft?
Any decent
copywriter wouldn’t lift a pencil for the three bucks and three odd bits offered. (A bit, by the way is 12 ½ cents. It comes from the old
Spanish silver coins - pieces of eight. They were broken into “bits” of eight
pieces – each piece being the fractional part of a dollar.)
In fact, I can’t
imagine anyone of sound mind taking on this project.
What Would Be A Reasonable
Offer?
$250 per article is
not out of line. If someone is just starting out in the business, then perhaps
fifty bucks in the pocket (real low – a giveaway price just to gain some
experience) is OK. For each one!
When you hire a
copywriter, you’re hiring expertise.
I can’t count the number of times someone has said to me: “What! That much (whatever I quoted)
for just writing?” As if writing effective, money making copy was
mere child’s play – a profession in which only dolts and buffoons were the only
participants.
I’d love to see
what this person would say if they went
into a job interview and were offered the princely sum of $3.33 an hour,
for a 75 hour work week.
After a few choice
words of derision, they’d leave laughing their heads off. Sort
of like I do when I come across these “offers.”
Maybe they’d be
better off looking for talent in Bangladesh,
and not the USA.
