Outsourcing ebook creation

Before I contact a writer, I will do a lot of the research myself and know exactly what I want.

Before giving the writer the ebook project, I would have either tested him/her before with some articles, or he is a trustworthy friend's recommendation.

I would tell the writer what I want...in detail. I would go as far as creating a table of content and asking the writer to improve on it.

Once you are sure what you want, the writer is under pressure to deliver a good product for you.

Never give a writer a topic and ask him to work on it. It's very likely that you won't like the final product...UNLESS you regularly work with the writer and have a good understanding.

I do a lot of outsourcing and this advice is from experience. Hope it helps you.

This is like asking how much does a writer charge for an article - the answers will be all over the map. My standard rate is $18 per page (not including cover and index) but I also do the formatting unless I'm asked not to for whatever reason. I've seen prices as low as $7 per page and as high as $25 per page.

Tina

What Tina said.

Plus, you also have to know what a particular writer considers one page. Many writers call 250 words a page, while some call a page something closer to 400 words... and everything in between. So if you have two equally talented writers charging the same price, one could turn out to be a better bargain if there are actually more words on the page.

In other words, think of it in terms of word count rather than pages so that you can directly compare rates. And again, like Tina said, you are going to see a big difference. Sometimes there's a reason cheap writers are cheap. (And even good writers who charge cheap prices usually don't stay cheap for long... once they've built up their reputation, portfolio, etc.)


Cheers,
Becky

@Mukul: I once paid 238US$ for about 50 pages. Have prepared about 15 pages for getting it into my style and adding all the topics I wanted and they created my ebook (I would not ask for pages, but words). Send me an email or PM and I will forward you the contact here on WF.

@OP: IMHO and experience it depends!

1. on the price
   The less you pay, the less you can expect
   As mentioned in the reply for Mukul I once paid only 200plus dollars, but ended up doing the research on my own. What I have seen on the for hire section was that, the more you pay, the mroe you can expect.
2. on the topic
   If it is a very specific niche, that only you know about, you might get the filling by a writer.

What also CAN work is a re-write! Get a decent PLR book for a dirt cheap price (something with a limited amount of copies) and get a re-write. I got offers for more then 25K words (which is more then 70pages in a normal formatting) for about $400. The reason why I said a decent PLR book is that it will cover all the research and you might end up spending less, as it only needs a re-write, to become unique. For graphics etc. you could just go to the for hire section here or spending a Fiverr.
I might add that you are getting what you are paying for. I agree with the get some articles written first step, but you still might ask somebody you can trust or a fellow warrior and previous customer via PM, as they might have a different opinion when you ask them directly!

Best
Sven