Content writing rates vary. You see writers charging anything from $50 to $600+ or a short article, so it can be somewhat confusing to decide how much you should pay. What you should pay content writers really comes down to the quality of the content and the level of service you require.

Just like every other profession, when it comes to content writers, there are good ones, average ones and awful ones. If you scour the Internet for the lowest rates possible, it’s obvious which group will be most likely to accept your work. The good content writers will simply not undertake work at those rates – nor will the average ones for that matter. They don’t have to – they’re busy working for people who understand the importance of quality content and the value of professional and reliable writers.

If you take a quick look at the websites that broker freelance writing work, you’ll notice that a large percentage of the writing jobs posted are offering abysmal rates – some as low as a few dollars per article. There are plenty of “writers” bidding on those jobs. What you won’t see are established brands and professional marketing firms looking for professional writing services at those rates. There’s a reason for that.

Content writing jobs come in a range of sizes – from a handful of articles for an individual website owner, to significant retainers for large brands and government contracts. For an individual webmaster, receiving a few articles of poor quality and having to re-write them is somewhat of an inconvenience – but consider the position of a firm that has ongoing or substantial content requirements. When a firm receives poorly written articles from writer they must –

• read every item closely to identify errors;
• re-write or edit them in-house or
• find someone to re-write or edit and
• pay them to re-write or edit;
• explain the delay to someone; and
• find another content writing service.

Hiring low-cost content writers could end up costing far more than paying higher rates for professional writers. The time marketing personnel spend reading and correcting articles can be substantial – the process will take longer than it took the cheap writers to complete the articles. The hours spent doing this is time lost working on other projects.

Professional Writers vs VA and AI Services

When considering rates, establish whether the quotes you are considering are from professional article writing services or experienced copywriters, or from another type of business that has added writing services to their offerings. In the latter case, the writers are more likely to be less experienced, and unlikely to have writing-related qualifications or significant copywiting experience.  They might be using AI tools or writers based overseas to create the content at a very low rate.

AI Writing Options

Using tools like Chat GPT can be an option if your content creation budget is low. However, while you can do-it-yourself using these tools, there are a number of issues to understand before you do:

• These tools simply regurgitate and reword existing material – whether it’s content already online, information you put into the tool, or a combination.
• They have a tendency to repeat certain words or phrases.
• If your business is very niche and competitors are limited, you risk the tool copying a competitor’s content too closely.
• Search engines like high quality unique content.
• It’s likely you’ll have to revise the content the tool creates to improve it.

If you’re counting the pennies, consider this – professionally written content can give you a good long term return on your investment. Spending on professional writers is likely to bring quality traffic to your site and increase your sales – while poorly written content could give your visitors the impression that your business is as ‘dodgy’ as your content writers.

When you think about creating content, think of it as an investment  – an asset that will play an ongoing role in driving revenue – rather than an expense.

Our Content Writing Rates

We don’t publish our content writing rates online. For casual work, we quote each project on an individual basis. For regular and retainer clients, we provide a rate schedule tailored to their content requirements and briefing preferences. To arrange a quote for your project, contact Article Writers Australia.