How The Economics Of Copywriting Works

I was recently asked in a popular forum, “Which is better, an individual copywriter or a company with several copywriters?”

Obviously, I’m biased since ACP falls into the latter group. But I’ve been in the former group as well and I can honestly say there are pros and cons to each. It really depends on what your goals are as to whether you choose an individual or a company. But if we get down to where the thread rubs the asphalt, it really just boils down to economics.

Individual copywriters tend to charge more than companies do. Why is that? Believe me, there’s a good reason.

Why Individual Copywriters Charge More

Individual copywriters fall into two groups: Those who are good at the business side of freelancing and those who are not so good on the business end. Those who are good at running a business place a value on their time. If their time is worth $50 per hour and they know it takes an hour to research and write a decent article then they will likely charge $50 for an article. Copywriters who are not so good at the business side of freelancing haven’t really thought through the value of their time, or maybe they’re just not good at marketing themselves and can’t get enough business to make sure their $50 per hour fantasy income pay them for full time work.

If a writer charges $50 per hour they’d better make sure they can get enough work to earn an average income that will pay their bills, put food on the table, and make their spouses smile. If they can’t earn that kind of income then they will have to give up copywriting as a profession, seek a more secure employment status, or starve to death.

Bottom line: Copywriters know they won’t get all the business that is possible to get. Therefore, they settle for losing some business by raising their prices to a level that is sufficient to sustain them in business. If they write great copy and know that they write great copy then they can market themselves as such. Some copywriters can even charge $150 per article, but they know that the higher their prices are the fewer customers they will have. Therefore, optimizing the price of their services is a justifiable necessity. They still have to eat.

The Company Copywriting Alternative

Companies who offer copywriting services tend to hire three types of copywriters:

• Those who are excellent writers but not good at business
• Writers whose skills are not good enough to stay in business for themselves and therefore need an editor
• Excellent writers who freelance but who want to supplement their freelancing with additional income

Feasibly, a company that offers copywriting services can charge as much as any freelancer. It really depends on the service they are offering. Realistically, however, the Internet has changed the economics of freelancing. Because U.S. copywriters are competing with copywriters all over the globe in such places as India, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, we must either choose to keep our prices high and take in less work or lower them in order to compete globally. The economic principles are the same, but the playing field has changed.

The Copywriting Quality-Price Optimization Model

Since many second- and third-world copywriters are not as fluent in their English as U.S. and UK copywriters, they tend to charge less than copywriters whose first language is English. While the quality isn’t there, $1 and $2 articles is very tempting compared to $50 and $150 articles. One could easily order 100 articles at $2 each and pay an editor $20 per article to polish them. Sure beats that $50 article, doesn’t it?

Well, that leaves quality copywriters little competitive mojo and gives the advantage to the guys who can’t write squat. Copywriters who write quality English would be relegated to hiring themselves out as editors and taking less pay per unit delivered. In order to maintain a competitive advantage, copywriters who can churn out quality content must lower their prices.

In the last few years, however, demand for quality marketing articles have made the prices start rising again. Scour the Internet and you’ll find copywriters hiring themselves out for $50 per article or, in some cases, as much as $150 or $300 per article. My guess is they aren’t writing many articles. In order to get enough work to pay the bills from month to month a copywriter in the Internet economy must lower his prices to meet the demand and to be able to get enough business to be able make staying in business worth his time. That means if an hour of his time is worth $50 and he charges $20 per article then he has to write 2.5 articles to make it worth his while. Increasing the speed of delivery, of course, means sacrificing a little in quality. That copywriter likely won’t do a lot of editing and double-checking his work.

A company that hires copywriters on this economic basis has a slight advantage over the lone copywriter working on his own. The company can operate in a sort of assembly line fashion and use writers of varying skills without sacrificing too much in quality. One person can write the articles and if their writing requires a little bit of editing then another person can come along and clean it up. While it isn’t a perfect system and there is always a chance that the poorly written article will “slip through the cracks,” overall the system works for companies that take the time to improve their processes for maximum performance.

The Moral Of This Little Copywriting Fable

Webmasters looking for solid content for their marketing efforts must decide if they want to pay higher prices for higher quality and let perfection be the enemy of good enough or if they’re willing to accept a few insignificant flaws in exchange for good original article content at a decent price. Article marketing is effective not because every article floating around in cyberspace is akin to Ernest Hemingway’s best work, but because good, informative articles circulating in various places online consistently over time drive traffic to their authors’ websites. If you’re spending money over a long period of time to receive a benefit, you want to maximize that benefit while keeping your costs low. That’s why it is important to choose a copywriter who delivers quality content at an optimized price – not too high and not too low. Make sense?

ALLEN TAYLOR
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