So, you want to explore the cost of working with a professional content writer or copywriter for your business?
That’s a sensible decision, bearing in mind the biggest and most successful brands in the world use copywriters to bring their brand to life.
Admittedly, copywriting can be very expensive, mostly due to the difficulty of executing the perfect message first time. However, the long term ROI from a well worded piece of marketing can make all the difference.
The cost of content depends on the amount of time and effort to produce the result. The cost is also affected by the amount of experience a copywriter has.
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What is copywriting?
Copywriting is a specialist style of writing intended to influence your users / customers / consumers into buying your product or service, or supporting your cause, or whatever your end goal is.
What does a copywriter do?
A copywriter will improve your business’ communications with new and existing customers. All the content produced is tailored to your business, and more importantly, shaped for your target audience.
There’s no shame in working with a copywriter to write on your behalf – the biggest brands in the world do so. BSM hired us to work with them.
“A really difficult task however Tom did a great job. I would really recommend Tom for any content writing and we’ll definitely look to use him again for further pages.”
Jon, BSM
★★★★★
What is the average rate for hiring a copywriter?
A typical day rate for an experienced copywriter is around £350 – £500.
A typical hourly rate for a good copywriter is around £50 – £75 mark.
Each copywriter will price differently. We all have different rates, but you will find that we’re all there or thereabouts on cost. At TJ we like to provide a flat rate for your project – each quote is bespoke.
For a large quantity of work (ongoing or a whole month of work), we usually apply a discount on the hourly rate – we decide this project by project. If we become your copywriter and we need to provide regular content, say x10 blogs and landing pages a month, we would more likely offer an hourly rate of £45 – £65.
How does a copywriter work out how much to charge?
The key is in the brief, it’s how we quote.
A copywriter will estimate the time, effort, and difficulty of getting the content written up for you.
Whenever we work with someone, we always ask questions about what it is you wish to achieve and then come up with a content plan. Or we might ping over a Google Document for you to fill in and send back – this is us scoping up the project to offer a fair price, as well as understand what it is we’re doing for you.
This is what will be taken into account for the copywriting quote:
- Whether the brief is clear – if it isn’t then we need to discuss and potentially reshape it.
- The complexity of the job.
- The duration of the project.
- How urgent the work is.
What is the typical freelance writing rate?
The rate of a professional, high quality freelance writer is the same as hiring an experienced copywriter.
Typical day rate: £350 – £500
Typical hourly rate: £50 – £75
If it’s an ongoing agreement or a large bulk of work (x10 pieces of content or more), then there will usually be a discount.
Do freelance writers charge per word?
Some do, some don’t.
We ask for a rough word count, but we’ll write as much as their needs to be to convey the right message. Writing to hit a word count is not our style.
There are still some copywriters who do charge by the word, usually it’s when the client has said they would prefer to agree to a cost per word. If a quality copywriter does quote you per word, then this will be in the region of £0.50p per word. From our experience, those who charge by words are inexperienced writers who try to meet a word count. Such writers are found on websites like Fiverr.
How much would it cost to have content written for every page on my website?
There are several factors that will need to be taken into account to price up your website content. Content writers will price it differently; usually by days or by page.
A content writer may calculate how many days it will take to plan, produce, and edit the content– you can expect the day rate to be anything from £350 – £500. This pricing model is normally for larger writing projects, which may include establishing your brand messaging and tone of voice.
Other content writers, typically for a smaller project, will price up per page – you can expect this to be around £100 – £200 per page on your website.
Factors affecting the cost of your website content:
- Research
- Interviews – with you or your staff
- Number of pages to write
- Difficulty of the topic
- Tight deadlines
Is a good website content writer out of your budget?
We get it, if you’re a startup or small business you marketing budget may be tight.
You need content but you also need money for other important things for your business.
You could go to a ‘cheap’ writer to get your content, but the quality of that content would reflect that; we beg you, don’t do that!
Here’s a better solution – write the content yourself using the tips, tricks and considerations a professional copywriter would use.
How can you find out these tips from a pro writer? Through our Website content writing cheat sheet.
How much would an SEO landing page cost?
A single SEO landing page can take anything from 2-6 hours to write and upload to your website.
The time it takes will largely depend on the length required to compete from an Search Engine Optimisation perspective, as identified by the SEO research (the research time will also be quoted). I would estimate a 1000 word piece of content to take around 3 hours at £50 – £75 per hour, or priced per page the cost will start from £100. SEO research will be charged additionally to this, so 1 hour SEO research too.
It would be more cost effective to agree a search marketing/ongoing SEO package that includes SEO landing page writing.
You may pay anything from £500 – £2,500+ per month for SEO, but this will include the SEO landing page copywriting. You’ll have ongoing support, along with keyword tracking, keyword research, content optimisation, meta optimisation and more.
How much does a blog cost to write?
For a fully researched, professionally written, and fully search optimised blog post, you can expect to pay around £120 – £250 for a blog writer to produce a blog.
Their hourly rate will be the same of an experienced copywriter – £50+. However, if you’re to agree a long term blog writing agreement then they may provide a slight discount. Either on the hourly rate or per blog.
The average blog post takes 3.5 hours to write, according to optinmonster.com. That 3.5 hours translates into a 1,000 word blog up to a 1,500 (if you write super, super fast!) word blog post.
Blogging is a key part to every successful digital marketing strategy. Here’s why blogging is so important for your business.
How much should a product page cost to write?
Whether you need an Ecommerce category or product page written up, they can be very cost effective.
As long as the writer has all the information required prior to writing, it can cost as little as £50, depending how long the content should be. On average though, for a category or product page you should expect to pay anything from £80+.
Product and category pages vary in length and research, so it may be that the copy only required thirty minutes of a writer’s time, which would be £25.
Compare that to a long product with a lot of detail, which requires research and discussions with the manufacturer, say this required three hours, equalling£150.
The cost to hire a UX copywriter?
UX copywriting is a specialist type of copywriting for websites and other digital products like mobile apps.
UX copywriters are usually freelance or contractors. Roughly, you can expect to pay £75 per hour or £600+ per day.
There’s not a large word count to hit with this type of copywriting. Instead, a great deal of time is needed for the copywriter to understand the function of the digital product, the target audience who will use it, and what the aim is.
The price of CRO copywriting
CRO (Conversion Rate Optimisation) copywriting is a version of copywriting where the content promotes a conversion action. The aim of CRO copywriting is to get potential customers to take a desired action, usually a click (on a link, an ad, or a landing page form).
For CRO copywriting, you will be looking to pay £50 – £75 per hour, or priced per page the cost will start from £100.
How much would it cost to write the copy for my paid ad?
For PPC ad copywriting, a freelance copywriter with PPC marketing expertise will charge around £50 per ad. You should expect to have 3-4 ads written for each ad group, and that usually works out to be about 10 ads per campaign.
Please note, the cost to run the ads will be additional and paid directly to Google, not the writer or marketer managing your PPC campaign.
What’s the cost to write a Google My Business post?
If local customers are vital for your business, then investing in a freelance copywriter with knowledge of local SEO to write and optimise your Google My Business posts is essential. A freelance copywriter will charge around £30-£70 per post, depending on the length of your posts.
Do you have any other questions?
Please do not hesitate to reach out, I’d be more than happy to help!
