My guide to the strategies that I use to price freelance work.

1. My Guide To Pricing Freelance Writing Projects
© Daniel Rosehill
What I’ve Figured Out About Pricing Freelance Writing In Five Years!

2. © Daniel Rosehill
By: Daniel Rosehill
Founder, DSR Ghostwriting
Freelance technology writing service.
Core Focus Areas:
● Technology
● Thought leadership
Service offering:
● Articles and blogs
● E-books
● Speeches
● Books
2

3. © Daniel Rosehill
Who This Presentation Is For
● Me! (Pricing is confusing!)
● Freelance writers
Ground To Be Covered
3
● Computing an hourly rate (part one)
● Freelance pricing models (part two)
● My current recommendation (part three)

4. © Daniel Rosehill
My Hourly Calculation Formula
4

5. © Daniel Rosehill
Breakdown of my methodology
5
● 1) Compute your target monthly income (gross)
● 2) Add average monthly business expenses over the top
● 3) Determine a credible billable: non-billable ratio
● 4) Determine how many days vacation you will be taking per month (average)
One: Determine Your Requirements
Two: Run The Numbers

6. © Daniel Rosehill
6
Some Notes About This
● There are many ways to calculate this. Most yield similar results.
● The easiest mistake is not to account for your unbillable hours.
● After that, your expenses.
● Whatever calculation you use, remember to factor in both.
● If you’re frequently sick, consider adding sick day(s) to the vacation
count.
● I strongly recommend a 50:50 billable:non-billable ratio.
● If you’re using a different formula, that would mean dividing your average
working week into (yes, only!) 20 billable hours.
● Memorize your target hourly rate in all the world currencies you bill
in. I try to know mine in USD, GBP, and EUR.
● Consider preparing a cheat sheat with various billable:non-billable.
● You may wish to adjust your ratio as your business changes.

7. © Daniel Rosehill
7
Freelance Billing Slip Ups
● Failing to charge your hourly rate
○ Unfavorable terms
○ Scope creep
● Charging an hourly that doesn’t factor in any or all of these:
○ Unbillable hours
○ Vacation days
○ Sick leave
○ Expenses
● The main symptom of these slip-ups is:
○ Working far too many hours and not earning your target income (other
cause: not having enough work)
END OF PART ONE!

8. © Daniel Rosehill
8
How To Charge For Freelance Writing
● Observations here repeated from Medium!

9. © Daniel Rosehill
9
You Have Essentially Three Options (Only!) For Pricing Freelance Writing!
● Per word
● Per hour
● Per project (flat)
○ Retainers

10. © Daniel Rosehill
10
Pricing Per Word ($0.X/word): Good For Comparison. Not Much Else.
● The gold standard benchmark of compensation in print publishing
● Still widely used for the purposes of comparison and getting a good ballpark on
what rates a client is offering
● Per word rates vary enormously:
○ $0.05-$0.10 — content mill territory.
○ $0.10-$0.30 — lowly paid professional writing.
○ $0.30-$0.50 — more respectable rates for content marketing
○ $0.50-$1 — the “upper end” of content marketing
○ $1 — gold standard for print journalism, magazine journalism; high end
content marketing (B2B, topics requiring SME expertise, etc).

11. © Daniel Rosehill
11
Pricing Per Word ($0.X/word)
👍 Pros For Writers 👎 Negatives For Writers
You can charge well if you are a quick writer Works against you if you are a slow writer
Makes it easy to compare rates at first glance It’s misleading. You can earn very well from a low per
word rate. Or poorly from a good one (scope creep,
hours)
It encourages filler and bad writing. Quality vs.
churnalism
Assuming word count is capped, per-word pricing is a
project rate in disguise! All the negatives of project
pricing apply too.

12. © Daniel Rosehill
12
Pricing Per Hour ($X/hour): The Safe and Steady Option
● Price per hour = you guarantee you will hit your target income.
● Simple mathematics: target of filled billable hours x target hourly on each account
(or greater) = target income.
● The other major advantage is it allows you to avoid scope creep. If you’re
working with a client that doesn’t seem quite sure about what he/she wants and
you’re not confident your contract terms protect you, this might be a sensible
billing option.
● Businesses don’t tend to like hourly billing arrangements because they are
variable expenses (not a fixed line item that can be included in a budget like
project rates).
● If you need to submit timesheets … this can also be added administration.
● The major disadvantage for writers is that fixed hourly rates cap your income
potential. If you’re fast, you can’t take advantage of that. This denies you the
ability to realize an ROI on accruing experience.
● Optics issue: clients will often react adversely to an hourly rate but accept the
same rate if it’s framed differently: built into a flat project rate with a controlled
time scope!

13. © Daniel Rosehill
13
Pricing Hourly
👍 Pros For Writers 👎 Negatives For Writers
Guaranteed to hit your target income if you have
enough clients paying your hourly (or above) to fill up
your target billable hours per week
Businesses tend to not like them because they’re
variables expenses unless the number of hours is
capped
Allows you to avoid scope creep. However long the
project takes, you get paid for. Further revisions? No
problem - they’ll be billed by the hour!
Your income is capped. If you’re fast, you can’t take
advantage of that as you can on a per word rate. This
denies you the ability to realize an ROI on accrued
experience!
Clients often balk at a perceived high hourly but will
pay the same rate if presented as a flat fee. The
salaried worker: consultant disconnect.

14. © Daniel Rosehill
14
Pricing Per Project ($X/article): Scope creep!
● Clients like fixed rates because they’re flat fees that can easily be worked into
marketing budgets.
● BUT scope creep is an enormous potential pitfall of this arrangement for writers.
What happens if your client demands endless revisions? You need to make sure
that your contract controls scope.
● Project rates also allow writers to disguise quick work
● Important: if you can predict the amount of time a project will take you with
reasonable accuracy, you can basically price the job at a price that will guarantee
that you make your hourly - or above.
● Retainers are basically disguised project rates. The fee is monthly. If the
deliverables are tightly set, this effectively controls scope and allows you to
engineer the above hourly calculation.
● Like per word rates they award fast writers and allow them to realize an ROI on
accrued experience by charging the same or greater sum for work that takes less
and less time.

15. © Daniel Rosehill
15
My Recommendation: Scope-Controlled Flat Rates
● Here’s how I (currently) recommend pricing freelance projects:
● 1) Put together a time budget: how long is this going to take?
● 2) Control scope to ensure that time budget can be adhered to. You may
need to limit allowable revisions, for instance.
● 3) Quote and charge flat fees while ensuring that you make your hourly or
above.
● Use flat / hourly combination deals. E.g. project includes X but they can pay Y
per hour (or Z flat) for remaining deliverables if required.

16. © Daniel Rosehill
16
Is It That Easy?
It’s anything but easy!
Reasons why:
● Client budgets are limited
● The notion of scope control may turn off prospective or current clients
● It’s an incredibly competitive marketplace with lots of freelancers competing for
the same work. The client almost always has a cheaper alternative.