Deciding Your Worth

As with any freelance career, earning a good living is up to you. No-one will tell you your salary and pay it automatically into your bank each month. No-one will sit you down at the end of the year, review your performance and decide whether or not to give you a raise or a bonus. You will be exclusively responsible for deciding what you want your hourly, or per word rate to be.  This can be a daunting prospect for new writers.

Speaking to your peers can lead to huge confusion, as the amount that each writer gets paid varies hugely depending on their quality, clients and industry. Top technical or marketing copywriters can earn mega bucks, journalists for major publications can command over $1 per word, freelance writers for magazines can earn between $60 and $600 per article and writing for websites, and small or indie publications can pay as little as 1 - 3 cents per word.  If you are looking for clients in a global freelance marketplace such as oDesk or Elance, then there is no such thing as a standard minimum wage, as you will be applying for jobs alongside experienced professionals who can command a higher rate as well as freelancers from countries where the value of the dollar is much higher, and can therefor charge a lot less.

So the onus is really on you, to decide what your time and skills are worth, and what you want to earn.  So how do you go about putting a financial figure on your writing?

The first element is to look at how much you need to earn. Do you need to bring in a certain figure from your writing to survive? Calculating this figure will give you your absolute minimum financial goal which can be broken down into how much you need to earn per week, per day or per hour.