Track your Time and Make More Money

Blogathon, day 26.

I often say that I don’t consider dollars/word when I accept an assignment. Instead, I consider how much I’m making per-hour. To do this, however, you have to keep track of your time on assignments. In doing so, I know my true hourly rate.

I find that my hourly rate varies, depending on the project, and the client. But even work I do for the same client can produce a different hourly rate. Here's an example. I create custom content for a nonprofit client on a regular basis, and am paid a set fee for each article. 

For one article of 650 words, I was paid $300, and spent a half-hour doing background research and another hour writing the draft of the article. (It was on a subject I’d written about before, so it was a fast draft—and this story didn’t require me to conduct any interviews.) Edits and a quick proofread took another half-hour. So the piece took two hours to write. Hourly rate: $150. 

Another piece for $400 required five interviews, which eat up a lot of time to schedule, conduct, and then transcribe my notes. The interviewing, transcribing  and thank-you notes took a little over four hours, and writing the story itself took another three. Edits took another hour. So this story took eight hours, much longer than I originally expected. Hourly rate: $50. 

A third $300 piece required more background research—more than two hours’ worth, and another two hours to write and edit. Hourly rate: $75. 

From tracking my time, I know that work for this client typically pays $50-150/hour; I make more for stories that require less legwork and research and less for stories that require more research upfront. I know what each of my projects' hourly rates are, which helps me decide what to charge and whether to say yes to a new assignment. You can do the same when you track your time. 

Your assignment: Track the time you spend on your next assignment and determine your hourly rate. 

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Only $400 for 600 words? Why I Said, "Yes."

I've posted before about the difference between dollars/word and dollars/hour, and why the latter is a better indicator of whether an assignment is worth it. Don't get me wrong--I want to get the highest rate possible, believe me! But I take assignments that other writers might say "no" to--if I think I can make my hourly rate. 

For example, a couple of weeks ago, an editor I'd worked with before emailed me. The magazine she worked for had been sold, and she was now editing another publication, one that's new to me. She asked me if I'd be interested in taking on a brief assignment (600-700 words) that involved creating a workout plan and shooting photos of it as well. The rate? Only $400. That's a pretty low per-word rate, especially considering that I'd be providing photos as well. 

A few years ago, when the freelance environment wasn't as competitive, I may have turned this assignment down. After all, I used to do a lot of features for national magazines that paid $1-1.50/word--and I much prefer a $2,250 assignment to one that pays less than 20 percent of that. Plus, most of my work these days is ghostwriting/coauthoring books for clients, which typically pay at least $15,000.   

Well, I said "yes." Surprised? Well, let me explain my reasoning: 

1. I've worked with this editor before, and have always enjoyed it. She's smart and easy to work with, and I knew I wanted to to continue our professional relationship. 

2. I knew the piece wouldn't take me long to complete. I've written dozens of workout stories and they're relatively easy for me to draft. 

3. As an ACE-certified personal trainer, I didn't need to source this piece. In some cases, editors want me to rely on other experts, but here, I had the OK to create the workout myself. That meant I had to do no extra research--after all, I write workouts for clients. Now I was writing one for readers. 

4. The publication's subject matter focuses weight loss, fitness, and health, subjects I specialize in. It's likely that if I do a good job, I'll be offered other assignments--and hopefully become a regular contributor with the magazine. 

5. I hadn't shot photos for a story before. I'm a writer, not a photog! But I figured this was an opportunity to practice a skill that would be valuable to clients in the future. Plus, I already had a "fitness model" in mind and I thought it would be fun! 

6. Even considering a photo shoot (which took just 35 minutes), I thought I could write the piece and deliver the photos in five hours, which meant an hourly rate of $80, not bad at all. 

Get the idea? Well, the assignment ended up taking just over five hours, total. I turned in the story long before deadline, and my editor accepted it a few hours later. Better yet, she's so happy with the piece she's promised me more work soon--and now I've gained some experience "shooting" as well as writing. 

Remember, you can't control what a market pays, or what a potential client offers you. But you can make an educated decision about whether that assignment is worth it to you--and whether it may offer some long-term benefits as well. 

Readers, what about you? Do you say "yes" to assignments you think other writers would turn down? Tell me about a time you've done so, and I'll enter your name in a new giveaway for some free freelance consulting time! 

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Your Daily Nut--And How to Track It

I often talk about dollars/hour as being a more accurate reflection of what a project is worth than dollars/word. But there’s another figure freelancers should keep in mind: what I call their daily nut.

The daily nut is the amount you have to average to meet your annual income goal.

Say your annual income goal is $60,000 (and remember that one-quarter of freelancers surveyed make $60,000+), and you're planning to work 240 days out of the year. That's Mondays through Fridays, with four weeks off for holidays and vacations.

Grossing $60,000 a year comes to $5000 a month, or $250 a day. So your daily nut is $250. Instead of thinking about making $60,000, which can seem unreachable, focus on meeting your daily goal—and then track your progress.

Every day, you should average your daily nut, or you won’t hit your financial goal at year's end. So, an article that pays $1,000 should take you about four days' worth of work. A book proposal that pays $4500 should take about 18 days' worth of work, total. Of course, not every project will work out exactly like this--some will take more time, some will take less. The idea, though, is that you average a certain amount each day.

So, question one, what's your daily nut? And question two, did you make it today?

Five Good Reasons--to Write for Regionals

I've posted before about how I focus not on dollars/word when accepting work, but rather dollars/hour. The latter is a better indicator of what the assignment is worth to me. Keeping the dollars/hour figure in mind makes some markets that other writers might ignore lucrative options for me--like regional magazines.

Why write for regionals when their national counterparts pay more per-word? Here are five good reasons:

1. Less competition. Editors at the major national magazines receive hundreds of queries a week. When you pitch regionals, you're competing against a smaller pool of freelancers, which automatically ups your chances of getting noticed--and getting assignments.

2. Fewer editing hassles. I've written for more than 60 national magazines, and the more editors a publication has on staff, the more editing you can expect. Your assigning editor may love the piece, but then her boss requests some changes...then her boss requests changes...then the editor-in-chief decides she wants to go in a different direction. Smaller magazines=smaller staffs=fewer rewrites, in my experience. And that helps keep my dollars/word rate high.

3. Less research time. Finding experts for a story is no problem-- you can turn to draw on sources like Help a Reporter Out, book authors, universities, and associations. But what about the dreaded "real people," or anecdotal sources--you know, the real-life examples often included in articles? Finding a breast cancer survivor in her 20s or a mom of three children who's slashed her grocery bill by 50% or someone who's started his own online business and makes a six-figure living is by far the most time-consuming part of researching stories, especially when you need to have a "geographic spread" (meaning your sources can't all come from the same area). I've found that locating those dreaded "real people" is much easier when I'm doing it on a more local level--after all, between friends, neighbors, fellow parents, workout buddies, etc, I feel like I'm connected to just about everyone in the Chicago area.

4. Higher chance of steady work. You're competing against a smaller number of freelancers--that's one thing. But those freelancers are more likely to be newer to the field or inexperienced, and if you do good work for your editors (and I know you will, if you take the advice in my blog!), you'll find it's relatively easy to develop a relationship with them, possibly even become a regular contributor. Steady work=less time spent pitching=higher dollars/hour rate.

5. Higher local profile. Even with Facebook, Linkedin, Twitter, and other social media, there's something to be said for being known in your own locale. Having your name in regional publications can create higher visibility on a local level. I've had more comments from friends and acquaintances from my articles in Chicago Parent, for example, than from anything I've written for national mags. And the more people who know (and remember) what I do, the better.

Readers, what about you? Do you write for regionals, and if so, why? And if you don't, has my post encouraged you to try it?