Ghostwriters - How Much Would You Charge for This Book?

[George Chernikov]

Dear Ghostwriters,

I would be very interested to hear how much you would charge for the following e-book:

- Relationship Repair/Get Your Ex Back
- 20,000 Words
- 2 Week Turnaround

While I am not looking to retain the services of a writer at this point, I would be very grateful to receive a price estimate for this kind of work.

[Alan Cheng]

I will charge $2000.

[George Chernikov]

Great - anyone else wants to chime in?

[Shannon Tani]

Well, 20,000 words is about 80 pages. Then you need to know a per-page rate. I'm running a special right now for $10 per page, so $800.

Love,
Shannon

[Steven Wagenheim]

I charge 10 cents a word.

That would come out to $2,000.

[Dana_W]

Yep, around $2000-$2500 sounds about right to me. I do know there are people who will do it much more cheaply; I don't know that the quality would be that good.

[JayXtreme]

Originally Posted by Dana_W

Yep, around $2000-$2500 sounds about right to me.

And rightly so.. some people (like yourself) can fully justify this price... quality work is worth paying for.

I do know there are people who will do it much more cheaply; I don't know that the quality would be that good.

This quote above is something that many people should pay attention to. The information needs to be solid and presented in a way that most readers will be able to absorb, finding a writer who does this is like hittin the jackpot..

My writer girl is a university student, and she is smokingly hot on a keyboard..

I'd be well prepared (and do) to drop $2,000 to her on a niche product.

Peace

Jay

p.s. I would have to charge $3,000.. that would be $1,000 for me and $2,000 for my writer to do the work...lol

[Raydal]

Not an area I would write for but I ghostwrite for $60 per page (250 words)
so 20,000/250 X 60 = $4,800.

-Ray Edwards

[jbsmith]

I certainly respect the ghostwriters that have chimed in, they are the cream of the crop, but you can get this done more inexpensively and still get some very good quality.

I recently combined two writers for a Yoga and Meditation book, and the system we used where we had completely outlined the product for them resulted in less than $500 cost with very good quality (in fact first-hand experience with the topic).

I prefer to design my own info products because I want them written in a certain, step-by-step, testable way - then I get ghostwriters to fill in the content for me (sometimes I tackle a chapter or two myself).

Consider becoming more active in outlining and putting your stamp on your info product and then outsourcing the content development rather than just putting the topic out there.

Jeff

[Michael Oksa]

Hi George,

Maybe we should team up in this niche.

Just a thought.



All the best,
Michael

[SurviveUnemployment]

Why would any writer worth their salt take this job for less than 20 large (by which I mean $20,000)?

There are millions to be made if you produce a good product. Conversely, you won't make much if you cheap out and hire a sub-par wordsmith.

I'd be willing to do it for you for $2,000 up front and $18,000 deferred.

[shakti2u]

I'd be willing to do it for $1000 with the rights to market the product myself.

Shakti2u

[IsaacPoad]

This makes me wish I could right so well (or waz that wright so well, or write)... so many options !!

Quite useful though that there a series of different options for calculating the costs of a product.
Per Page vs per word.
Though I guess if you are a good wordsmith you couldn't charge too much unless your work was verified as such.
So for your initial articles, though very good, you may have to charge a lesser amount until you have the recognition. Then you can begin to up the rate.

Or... I am missing the initial point here.

[Anthony Wee]

Around $1500

[ElectricEye]

My offer is $600

[George Chernikov]

Ok, everyone, thanks a lot for your feedback.

So far, it appears that price estimates range from anywhere between $600 and $2,000, with the majority of people responding to this thread leaning towards the $2,000 end of the spectrum.

However, I also see people who are willing to accept the job for way below $1,000. My question is - why is this the case? Is it a matter of breaking into the ghostwriting market and then upping the prices, or do you believe that a 20,000 word book simply isn't worth that much?

Bear in mind that I'm not looking to retain anyone; however, this piece of market research will certainly prove to be incredibly valuable for me in the future.

[CurtisN]

Originally Posted by SurviveUnemployment

Why would any writer worth their salt take this job for less than 20 large (by which I mean $20,000)?

There are millions to be made if you produce a good product. Conversely, you won't make much if you cheap out and hire a sub-par wordsmith.

I'd be willing to do it for you for $2,000 up front and $18,000 deferred.

LMAO...$1/word. That's too funny XD

I'm not a regular ghostwriter, but if I were to take this job, I'd charge $10/page.

[Bev Clement]

George in answer to your question, from my research, and I have done a lot of research in the writing market, you will find many people have believed the myth that a writer will never get any work if they charge more than a couple of cents per word.

People look to sell their services in the wrong area to the wrong type of people, it is as simple as that.

People are afraid to raise their prices because they feel that people won't pay for their work. If you want to know more, contact me and I can give you my research information.

My prices $40 per 250 words, which is $0.16 per word which works out at $3,200.

My prices are low compared to some. I have seem places where $1,000 is charged for a 400 word article.

[3stars and a sun]

at a rate of $0.10 per word, that goes around $2000

[vicone]

You can do it more economically if you broke it down to 40 x 500 word articles. It would be possible to get those articles written for $10 if you specified the topic for each.

The basic content would then cost you $400.

Of course, top writers are charging more than $10 for a 500 word article but it is possible to get a "reasonable to good job" for that amount. $15 each ($600 total) would be more likely to produce a better result as better quality writers would express interest.

2 weeks turn around could be a problem if you wanted quality work - producing 40 articles in 2 weeks could impact on the quality. It's possible, but 3 - 4 weeks would allow competent writers to produce within their comfort zone.

It would involve a bit of your own time assembling them into a finished ebook or you could pay someone to do final editing.

Graphics would be extra but are likely to be minimal for a book on relationships, where photos could be used.

Ivan

[Justin Jordan]

Originally Posted by vicone

You can do it more economically if you broke it down to 40 x 500 word articles. It would be possible to get those articles written for $10 if you specified the topic for each.

You can't assemble forty articles into a reasonable ebook on this topic. Well, that's not entirely true - you certainly could, but the work involved would be at least as great as writing it yourself.

I definitely don't think if they're going to hire someone to create a product that this an area where you should be looking for the lowest bidder. The product needs to be a quality and product to sell and keep selling. If you skimp on the writing, you may lose your whole investment. Get a quality writer, and you'll make it over then fold.

The OP's best bet might actually be to find somebody willing to do it for a smallish upfront fee and a percentage of the sales. I'd certainly be interested in doing a project like that.

[Bev Clement]

Justin if you read the OP he says he isn't looking to hire someone

[Justin Jordan]

Originally Posted by Bev Clement

Justin if you read the OP he says he isn't looking to hire someone

Hah, that wasn't a veiled appeal for work, just a comment on the kind of thing that would make me take notice.

[Bev Clement]

Hi Justin, I know that.

[HomeBasedBusinessPLR]

Hi,

I run an article writing business full time and I really enjoy working on new and different niches. I'm also looking to establish a customer base who can give testimonials on the quality of my work.

I would be willing to do it for $1500 and I'm extremely confident that I could get it done in less than 2 weeks.

[Dana_W]

Writing is one of those arenas where the prices are all over the map. I charge more for my writing because I was a newspaper reporter for 17 years and I am, frankly, excellent at research and writing.

I've found that writing press releases pays better so I have moved away from writing ebooks and articles anyway; my prices are too high for what most people in internet marketing are willing to pay.

I'll say this; I've tested out article writers and anyone who charged less than $10 an article - generally was not that great. I think that there is a correlation between price and quality.

[KateD]

Originally Posted by Bev Clement

I have seem places where $1,000 is charged for a 400 word article.

Wow, that's amazing. Even in the offline world. That's $2.50 a word!

Hmmm, so where is this place again?


KateD

[Bev Clement]

Kate didn't I say where they were?

I found them online, they have a website and their prices for a 400 word article is $1,000

Forget that, I found a couple of places online where $2.50 per word was normal, and it wasn't here on the Warrior Forum.

[anth.elias]

Originally Posted by Dana_W

I'll say this; I've tested out article writers and anyone who charged less than $10 an article - generally was not that great. I think that there is a correlation between price and quality.

Couldn't disagree more, I have my own ghost writer that I pay $3 an article. He is just absolutely awesome, there is not a subject that he cannot write from technical documents to just content for my sites. I would never give him up he is the life blood of my sites.

[Dana_W]

I'm not saying that there are NO good quality writers out there at that price range; I think they are harder to find though. And if you have a good quality article writer at $3 an article, never let him or her go!

[CurtisN]

Originally Posted by TMG Enterprises

$1 per word is fairly common for professional writing in the offline realm. The poster who said that probably isn't aware that it's much less common for online work.

Tina G

That's understandable I guess. But it's like someone coming here and suggesting that graphic designers not sell their minisite design services for anything less than $2000 per site. Maybe people pay that in the offline world, but I'd probably still have the same reaction :P