Pinning a Value on Your Time

Writers, like other artists, often have a hard time when it comes to pricing their work. With visual artists, it’s a difficult prospect because a project may take hours and hours of grueling work before its completed. If they charged an hourly rate, their work would be overpriced in the market place. Instead, many just take a wild guess and figure that if someone wants one of their pieces bad enough, they’ll pay whatever it takes to get it.

As a writer, on the other hand, if you produced one copy of a book, for example, and charged what it took in time to produce it, no one would buy it. But as a writer, you have an advantage. You have to ability to produce multiple copies of a work or get paid by a publishing company for them to do so. Artists who have adopted this same business model are doing significantly better than those that don’t.

Still, how do you figure out what your time is worth? The first thing you have to remember is that you’re in business. And as such you have overhead—the cost of utilities, including phone and the Internet, office supplies, postage, food, transportation, insurance, equipment, clothing, etc. All that adds up! And before you can make any profit, you have to be able to pay for it all.

There’s no guess work involved when figuring out what your hourly rate should be. It’s simple mathematics. First, you add up all your regular monthly expenses, then you factor in the cost of extras, such as buying replacement equipment. If you can’t wait to get the latest smartphone, then you’ll have to add in that cost to the mix. You can’t leave anything out.

Next, you need to divide your total monthly expenditures by four in order to get the amount you spend per week. By dividing this by seven, you’ll find out what you spend per day—even on days when you’re not actually working.

If you work the standard 40 hours—not necessarily 8 hours per day—then you should divide your weekly total by 40. Let’s say your monthly expenses come to approximately $1,600, then your weekly expenses would be about $400. Dividing that by 40 hours gives you an hourly rate of $10. But that doesn’t allow for any profit, so you must add on an equal amount or higher to make sure you’re getting enough to cover your expenses and make a profit.

However, you won’t necessarily be working steadily as you would in a salaried position. Instead, you may work more one week than in another. Generally, money won’t be flowing in regularly. So it’s a good idea to make your hourly rate slightly higher to cover the times when you may not have any work. In the beginning, you can possibly shoot for a lower rate, increasing it as you gain more experience and more complex assignments.

While you probably won’t ever get your hourly rate, at least you’ll be able to judge if what you’re getting paid is enough for the time you put into your work. You may also want to consider establishing a minimum rate for writing projects. But don’t make that rate too high or you’ll be cutting yourself out of some easy jobs that overall will net a higher profit.

While you won’t have much control when it comes to be paid by editors of magazines and newspapers—essentially, they generally tell you what they’ll pay you—you still need to know if what they’re paying is enough for the time you put in on a project.

Many freelance writers make the mistake of putting in the same amount of work on each article they write and then get paid a different amount for each piece. But unlike products produced by other businesses, no one piece of writing brings in the same amount from different publications. You may get paid $300 from one publication and $50 from another for exactly the same piece. Also, some editors may only pay a pittance but ask for a lot more work. It’s only by knowing your hourly rate that will enable you to decide it what they’re offering is enough for you.

Listen to Yourself

Everyone thinks they know how to write. In fact, just about everyone can because they all learned how to write in school. But learning how to write and knowing how to write are two different things.

Because writing is one of three universal forms of communication—the other two being speaking and listening—writers are susceptible to comments and even harsh criticisms from just about anyone.

It begins with someone telling you that you should be a writer. “You certainly have a way with words,” they may say. Or, “Have you ever thought about being a writer? You certainly have the talent for it.”

In most cases of this sort, the person making the comments has neither the background nor credentials to determine whether you should be a writer or not. Only another writer can truly comment on your aspirations. And even then, it’s only their opinion.

And even if you’re trying desperately to become a professional writer—one that gets paid for their writing—the person who doesn’t write for a living but just writes to communicate can’t understand what all the fuss is about because to them writing is an everyday thing.

So what makes a writer so special? Although “wordsmith” is a word only used in pseudo-intellectual circles today, it best describes what a writer does. A writer crafts articles, stories, and books using words in a special way to achieve a purpose, to communicate a special message. People describe those who can do this without too much effort as having “talent.” But, in truth, any writer can achieve the same goals with hard work and determination.

It’s like when you were back in school. Some of your fellow students got good grades with hardly any effort. It seemed as if they didn’t do half the work you did. But in the end you may have received good grades by working harder. The same happens with writers.

Once you’ve had something published for pay, you think you’ve made it. But getting published is only the first step in a career-long process. At this point you can claim to be a writer, for you’ve written something and gotten paid for it. But other people don’t see the difference. To them, you write just like they do—you put your fingers on the keyboard and tap away.

Because of this, they look upon you as a threat to their writing abilities. Normally, you may not have a problem with this, but should you use your writing abilities for a project that isn’t related to your professional work, all bets are off. At this point, others see your writing abilities as equal to theirs. So whether you know that a passage should be written in a certain way doesn’t matter. They won’t hesitate to criticize your work because they feel equal to you.

Ironically, this doesn’t happen with other professions. No one tells a doctor or a lawyer or even a business owner the right way to do their work because they know nothing about it.

Even in the writing industry, we have prejudices. People look upon writers who are on the staffs of newspapers and magazines as professional writers. But they don’t look upon freelance writers with the same eye, even though they also get paid for their work. To many people, working for a weekly paycheck gives the job credibility. In fact, most people don’t even realize freelance writers actually exist even though they read their work in publications all the time. And what about all the authors out there? Using the word “author” after your name only says you write books, but in the end, you’re a writer all the same.

So what can you do to gain credibility in the eyes of others? First, you must study your craft and learn all the grammar and usage rules. Then you need to learn when to break those rules to make a point or show emphasis. Academics only write by the rules. General writers write using the rules or not depending on what they’re trying to say. What makes it difficult for freelance writers is that there are no requirements to be one—no special schooling, no degree, no internship. The only credibility a freelance writer has is his or her ability to get published and get paid for it.

In the end, stick to your guns and listen to yourself, for only you know what you want to say and how you want to say it and get paid for it.

On the Road Again

Have you dreamed of traveling around the world then writing about your travels and getting paid for it? A lot of beginning writers and lots of other people have done just that. There’s something glamorous about travel writing. You’ll definitely impress your friends when you tell them you’re off to another far-off land. For them, travel comes maybe once or twice a year during vacation time. But to travel whenever it beckons you is to them a dream come true. But is it that easy?

True there’s a touch of glamor surrounding world-journeys-for-pay. Getting started in it isn't all that difficult if you hustle enough, but since 9/11 things have changed, not only because of what happened on that fateful day, but also because the publishing markets have changed.

Fifteen to twenty years ago, most readers got their information about other places from reading articles in magazines and travel guides. Since then the market has drastically shifted to include videos, podcasts, and hundreds if not thousands of Web sites with information on where to go and what to do. So the market for travel articles isn’t what it used to be.

Secondly, for the most part, you’ll make more if you work for minimum wage at McDonald’s than if you traveled the world and wrote travel articles. Have you seen what it costs to travel today? Compare those travel costs with what editors normally pay for travel pieces. No, I don’t mean the ones in Travel and Leisure and National Geographic Traveler. I’m talking about the majority of travel markets. The pay is pitiful for the amount of time and energy involved.

But still many writers try to break into this field. That’s because it seems to easy to everyone. Retired doctors who have the bucks to travel think they can dabble in travel writing. Retired teachers, who have the time and some bucks want to do the same. But how would they feel if you, the writer, wanted to dabble in medicine or teaching. You might be able to do the latter, but certainly not the former. To say the field is overcrowded is an understatement.

If you want to succeed in travel writing—and not just dabble in it—you have to work hard and be extremely organized. Remember, every moment you spend traveling is time spent, time for which you need to get paid.

Today, you pretty much have to have the means to travel to do travel writing full-time—or a spouse who will pay the bills while you travel and write about it. It used to be that airlines, hotels, and the like gave writers discounts or free transportation or accommodation. That isn’t so true anymore. Many hotels still give discounts and free rooms, but you have to get there, and the cost of doing that could hit you out of the ballpark. It doesn’t make sense to spend a $1,000 on a trip, only to make $200 on the article that results from it. So that means you’ll need to write and publish five $200 articles from that same trip to make up for the cost. And in reality, you probably won’t get paid $200 for each article, but less, which means you’ll have to publish a whole bunch of articles to make that trip pay for itself—and that doesn’t include any profit.

If you’re serious about travel writing, there are some things to do before you start packing. Discuss your travel plans with several editors—in person, by phone, or by email—regarding  places you'll be visiting, people you'd consider interviewing, and so forth. Often one or more of them will give you a noncommittal letter of introduction from them. This letter doesn't actually commit them to publishing any of your writing, but it helps open some doors, especially in foreign countries. At the least it should help establish that you are a working writer looking for good material. If you cannot get such a letter—and as a beginner that’s nearly impossible—then  take with you some backup material such as copies of your articles to present when strangers ask who you are and why you're asking all those questions.

Once you get established as a travel writer, you may, with luck, get a letter of assignment from an editor. This is the only way you’ll get any help with costs from hotels and such. Editors won’t hesitate to give one of their regular writers one of these, but they usually don’t give them to writers they don’t know.  Letters of assignment can get you out of tight situations when traveling, but more so they can get you into many museums and private libraries for your research and perhaps get you private tours with curators.

NEXT WEEK: More on travel writing.

Stringing Along

One way I got by early in my freelancing career was to become a stringer. The term stringing goes back to early newspaper days when a reporter's copy was "strung together," so the newspaper paid him—there weren’t very many female reporters back then—by the inch. Today, that term means working for a newspaper or magazine “from the field,” turning in ideas and stories to the editor either when I find them or when the editor sends me an assignment.

Each publication sets up its stringer network differently. Some stringers receive small retainers plus a fee for an article when the publication prints it. More often than not, publications forego the retainer in favor of a loose agreement as to the acceptance of pieces or guaranteeing a certain number of them will see publication throughout the year. Or the publication will just keep feeding me regular assignments with no guarantee—the most common practice. Either way, the editor knows the quality of my work and how to get hold of me fast.  In turn, I know what kind of stories they want and how to present them, including sending photos if needed. From experience, I know I can count on a certain amount of work each month which helps me plan my budget. What’s even better, I can string for several publications at the same time as long as they’re not competing for the same readers.

When I first started freelancing, it took a while to find a publication willing to take me on as a stringer. Just by luck, I was working as the manager of a mom-and-pop travel agency. A friend at another agency signed me up for a press trip to Guatemala at a trade show. At the time I wasn’t writing for any publication and needed an assignment to go on the trip. I cold called the managing editor of a travel trade magazine. She was interested in the destination and gave me an assignment to write about tourism there. Upon publication, I was to be paid a whopping $30. She liked my article so much, she started assigning me more of them. Soon, I was writing two or three articles a week for her. These pieces weren’t especially complicated to research or difficult to write, which left me time to try to get articles published in other publications.

Four years later, I had quit my day job as a travel agent and jumped head first into freelance writing. One morning I cold called the managing editor of the Philadelphia Business Journal—I live just outside the city—and explained that I had experience covering business topics (Isn’t tourism a business?) and was interested in writing for him. I pitched an idea to him, which he liked, and I got my first assignment. After completing several other assignments, he began to call on me every week, sometimes twice, to cover a variety of business stories. Some were news while others were features. He gave me feedback on my articles, telling me what he wanted or didn’t want. As time went on, he even told me who to call on for interviews and gave me their phone numbers. The Journal paid $160 for each article. In most cases, I had three or four days to complete a story from research to finished article. He knew I could turn a story around very fast and that he could count on me to be accurate. At the same time, I was still writing for my original travel trade publication.

While the per article amount may not seem like a lot in either case, it quickly became income I could count on while I tried to get published in national magazines.

Working for both publications, I amassed a tidy file of contacts in business and tourism. I knew who to call for what and could get in touch with people quickly. This was before the Internet and E-mail. The articles I wrote for these publications and others like them became the core of my freelance business—at least until I got published in larger national magazines.

Do You Know What Your Time is Worth?

Have you been considering freelance writing? If so, you need to figure out how much your time is worth. While you won’t have much control when it comes to be paid by editors of magazines and newspapers–essentially, they generally tell you what they’ll pay you–you still need to know if what they’re paying is enough for the time you put in on a project.

Many writers make the mistake of putting in the same amount of work on each article or short story they write and then get paid a different amount for each piece. When I first started writing, another writer told me that he put in the same amount of work for whatever he wrote. But unlike products produced by other businesses, no one piece of writing brings in the same amount from different publications. You may get paid $300 from one publication and $50 from another for exactly the same piece.

To judge whether you’re getting enough for the time you need to add up all of your monthly expenses–mortgage or rent, car payment, credit cards, etc.–and don’t forget to add in groceries, gasoline, heating fuel. Figure out how many hours you work a week on your writing, then divide the total by the number of hours. The result will be the hourly amount you’ll need to get for your writing.

While you probably won’t ever get that amount, at least you’ll be able to judge if what you’re getting paid is enough for the time you put into your work.

Read the Kind of Writing You’re Going to Write

Besides writing articles and books, I also teach writing. Over the last 25 years, I’ve had a lot of students take my classes. I’d venture to say that only about one percent of them had read the type of writing they intended to write. To be a good writer–to be a published writer at all–you need to read the kind of writing you intend to publish.

Unfortunately, the majority of beginning writers still hold the attitude that what they write is important. After all, didn’t they learn in school that every word is a nugget of gold. While that may be true in rare cases, in most a word is just a word, unless it’s strung together with other words that have meaning for the reader, for the reader is the most important part of the process.

When asked why they took one of my courses, many students say that they’ve been trying to get published but have had no luck. They think it’s their writing–and sometimes it is. But usually it’s because they have no idea of what’s being published out there. They have no idea of what editors want. And to find that out, short of asking an editor, is to read what that editor is publishing.

To learn to write a good article, short story, non-fiction book or novel, you first have to read ones that have been recently published. Notice I said recently. Reading short stories published in 1910 won’t get you anywhere. They’re just not written in a contemporary style. And style and structure, even more than content, is what you’re looking for.

So to learn how to write to get published, seek out good examples of the kind of writing you plan to do. By doing that, you’ll be well on your way to your first pay check.