I held the phone in my hand, staring at the receiver. The person on the other had just muttered something unprintable, and hung up on me.
My offense?
Simple. I didn’t want to write five blog posts a week for free.
Overexposure
This call came from an "entrepreneur" who contacted me by email; he said he wanted an experienced, knowledgeable writer to populate a "high profile" blog, though the true "height" of the profile fell as the conversation wore on.
In my email reply, I said I’d been asked to write several blogs, but the stumbling block was always budget — a gambit I use to filter out those seeking freebies.
Sadly, he called anyway, but more startling was his attitude; he expected me to jump at the chance. And got agitated when I didn’t.
You Can’t Eat Exposure
Exposure is fine. Exposure is good. Still — despite recent scientific advances — you can’t actually eat exposure.
In the copywriting world, the promise of "exposure" is fast replacing "there’s more work in the future" as the empty negotiating promise of choice.
When a prospect promised me more work in the future, I learned to ask two simple questions: how much work, and what kind of contract were they willing to sign right now?
Similarly, when someone promises you exposure in lieu of monetary compensation, you’ve got every right to ask "how much exposure?"
If they can’t (or won’t) quantify the audience, it’s like saying "we’ll pay you, but we won’t tell you how much."
Copywriting is evolving rapidly, and it’s not all for the better. Truthfully, I’ve never been asked to write so many commercial projects for so little.
When confronted by that choice, I simply asked the prospect exactly what he was offering me. He hung up, suggesting he wasn’t offering much.
I wouldn’t go for that. You probably shouldn’t either.
Keep writing, Tom Chandler.
Comments 16
There are some topics that make their way around the blogosphere like a flu. This is one of them, but it’s probably the only one I don’t get sick of reading about. The idea that someone would have the nerve to ask (let alone expect) a writer to work for free is appalling. I rail against low pay and I happen to think $10 for a blog post is a major rip-off for the writer, but free? Noway.
Keep encouraging writers to realize the value they bring through their words!
Posted 09 Apr 2008 at 9:43 pm ¶Hey Tom, here’s a discussion you and I have had many times. Although I do think guest blogging on high-profile sites is one effective way of reaching a new and wider audience, working for free has got to be on the writer’s own terms. Time, talent and expertise all come hard-earned and I never just give it away. Nor should any other writer, either.
Posted 10 Apr 2008 at 2:52 am ¶Blogging and social media platforms have made publishing so easy that I can understand why there has been, perhaps, an erosion in the (financial) value placed on good writing.
That said, engaging an audience and actually inspiring them to return is incredibly hard in such a competitive online world. This only highlights the critical importance of writing talent, which I believe is extremely hard to find.
Able, passionate writers have enormous value, and I think your advice is bang on.
Posted 10 Apr 2008 at 3:26 am ¶One of my high-tech clients is rapidly moving to a new model: low-cost copywriting from an offshore team. It’s a disturbing trend - one that is requiring me to rethink how I market my own (more valuable) writing skills.
Posted 10 Apr 2008 at 5:58 am ¶Thanks for commenting. This issue has always been with copywriters, though it seems to be a fast-growing one.
Whether that’s simply a technology issue or an artifact of the growth in the population of new, parttime copywriters is hard to say.
I’m with Roberta; free work is OK when there’s a payoff that fits your needs, but never trust amorphous promises of exposure or “more work.”
Posted 10 Apr 2008 at 8:07 am ¶I think it’s all about positioning yourself in the marketplace. Have you ever had to select a doctor from the booklets that health insurance companies send out? You will see several doctors listed, but underneath his/her name it says: CLOSED TO NEW PATIENTS.
Posted 10 Apr 2008 at 9:03 am ¶That not only tells you to choose another doc, but it’s a MAJOR positioning statement. The Doctor is telling you, “I’m real good, my services are in such demand that all my billable hours are spoken for. Tough luck.”
When I am asked to do free work, I always say,”I’m so sorry, but my workload and deadlines don’t permit me to do free work. I know some newer inexperienced copywriters with time on their hands…would you like a referral?” This has many times opened up a discussion with the prospective client, and gives me an opportunity to educate them, and for them to understand that talent and experience don’t come cheap. Often those people have ‘discovered’ money in their budget to pay me (handsomely)for my services, and one has become a major cash cow for me.
As for exposure, that is baloney. If you want to do free work, volunteer at the local hospital, feed the hungry, or whatever else floats your boat. Don’t do free copywriting.
Just the thing with me. People want me to write blogs, articles for them at Rs 50 per page that’s around a dollar. Imagine their cheek. It’s pathetic what these people think about writers.
Keep writing.
John
Posted 10 Apr 2008 at 7:42 pm ¶It isn’t limited to blogging, or even writing… I was talking with a woman yesterday and she explained that several local training organizations want to pay a ridiculously low price for teachers / trainers…
The answer in all cases is to turn down the offer, and you did well in staying civil.
We’ll all give, but it’s different when the other party starts out asking to take quite a bit and offers nothing in return…
steve
Posted 11 Apr 2008 at 6:51 am ¶Apart from my own blog, I do a regular blog for one of my clients and receive what I consider a very reasonable monthly retainer. And you know what? People read and enjoy that blog and come back for more. Anyone who low-balls such work these days is a fool.
Posted 11 Apr 2008 at 8:48 am ¶Sounds like a lucky escape. I’m not sure how successful this ‘entrepreneur’s’ venture will be if his business plan revolves around getting everything done for free or cheap.
Although I’d like to think/hope otherwise, the threat of writers being expected to charge lower fees can’t be ignored. I’m now working on supplementing my one off project fees with ongoing income from eBooks/information products.
It gives me an opportunity to put into practice what I’ve learned about the internet in the last two years and hopefully a cushion so I don’t feel tempted to write for ‘exposure’.
Posted 14 Apr 2008 at 2:49 am ¶Matt & Simon: One of the issues with engagement/content marketing is its distance from the revenue stream; it’s often hard to quantify the impact of projects like blogs on the bottom line.
By contrast, a direct mailer or landing page generates a lot of data (and often direct revenue), and as a result, I don’t think those projects have experienced as much downward pressure.
And Matt, I think a *lot* of entrepreneurs are making a ton of money getting everything done for free or cheap; think Google, Facebook, etc.
Posted 14 Apr 2008 at 7:17 am ¶I have yet to encounter someone who asked me to work for free–or even quibbled seriously over money–who was not a nut or a complete pain in the cloaca. It’s a major red flag.
Posted 14 Apr 2008 at 2:20 pm ¶Smarty: Clearly, this guy was a yutz, but more troubling is the growing tide of yutzes, who — after all — are merely reflecting what’s true all over the Internet: intellectual property has become passe, and paying for “content” is a laughable concept.
That some of that attitude is bleeding over into the copywriting world isn’t surprising, especially given the legions of new writers who are willing to work for free.
Most of my clients haven’t been affected (infected?), but I suspect we’ll see a lot more who have been in the future…
Posted 15 Apr 2008 at 10:01 am ¶Hi Tom,
Yes, this a challenge many bloggers write about and most writers face.
But I like the way that you have written it. Specially the part about exposure we can’t eat.
There’s an amazing video of Harlan Ellison, writer for Star Trek, giving quite some powerful sound bytes on what he thinks about people wanting writers’ services for free. I had blogged about it in my post called “Should writers work for free or be paid like every other profession?” at http://www.indiancopywriter.com
I found your counter questions useful - including the retainer contract suggestion.
Thanks for bringing this up. I hope your reads this post… and gets it.
Posted 15 Apr 2008 at 12:53 pm ¶Thank you, thank you, thank you for this post– subscribing to your blog, immediately.
I priced myself right out of a longterm blog job recently, when I refused to continue to write 5 great posts a week without fail, for less than the cost of a few designer lattes.
The employer then countered my price suggesting that I write 7 posts for a slight increase in pay– essentially .002 cents per word. Write MORE for LESS? I said no and thank you.
Shortly thereafter I was informed by the employer that he’d found someone else to, “help him out” at the old, sweatshop rate. WOW. So, I was HELPING, not writing. Lovely. There’s always someone who will do it for less, I guess.
How do you negotiate with an employer who equates your work to running an errand, or doing him a favor?
Posted 03 May 2008 at 3:24 pm ¶Jones: Sounds like you didn’t have a longterm blogging gig as much as your were making an ongoing charitable contribution to someone else’s bank account.
How do you negotiate with a client like that? You probably can’t — it’s not a negotiation when one side doesn’t apply any real value to what the other side’s offering.
The “helping” language is classic stuff. One of the biggest red flags you can hear from a client is the classic “I’d do this myself, but I don’t have the time.”
They’re typically not interested in buying talent, just keystrokes. Keystrokes are cheap.
Good luck with your future endeavors.
Posted 03 May 2008 at 4:15 pm ¶Trackbacks & Pingbacks 3
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