- This blog post has been updated in May 2020, to include current copywriter rates.

Not every business has the writing skills to publish great content on its digital platforms.  Even when you have the resources in-house, the drive to produce quality and interesting content throughout all your online activities, is hard for your marketing team to keep up and they shouldn’t.  Sometimes you need to outsource it.  

Your copywriter will produce and create great content for your business to generate quality leads to your website.  Your website content will forever be found by searchers for various search terms and keywords delivering a durable worth to your business that lasts.

Copywriting and hiring freelance copywriters is now an essential business expense, one that most businesses do or should factor into their marketing budget.  

Gone are the days when your sales manager wrote the blogs, the receptionist took photos of the team for Instagram or the website techie wrote the web pages.  

Building content throughout your digital footprint takes a lot of crafting interesting and readable storytelling to the personality of your business, and that is found by search engines.

Standard copywriter rates

Every business has to watch its expenses, and of course, accounting for freelance copywriting rates is no different to other expenses. Copywriters can charge by the hour or the project, depending on the copywriter and the writing tasks you need.

You may prefer your copywriter to quote based on a project basis so you know exactly how much the project will cost your business, as opposed to an hourly rate (which may be more open-ended).

I tend to charge by the project but also include my hourly copywriting rate, for other tasks that may arise during the project.

Standard copywriter rates for an experienced copywriter can start from AUD$60 plus GST, to AUD$120 plus GST per hour.

Copywriter rates for professionally written, well researched and SEO blog posts can cost anywhere from AUD$200 plus GST upwards to AUD$400 plus GST for between 900 and 1500 words in total.

Copywriting for website pages of approximately 250-400 words can cost from AUD$70 plus GST upwards to AUD$150 plus GST.

These hourly rates may seem more than what you have seen advertised, however, as with everything, hourly rates usually depict the amount of experience. I suggest you ask the copywriter for examples of their published work and how well this content ranks in Google. A great copywriter will be able to provide this information.

There are lots of things you can do to keep these costs down and not waste money where it doesn’t need to be.

How to save on copywriter rates

Having been in the copywriting business for over eight years now, and experienced all types of clients and budgets, I have created a list of tips to help keep your copywriting costs in check.

1.    Put your copywriter on a retainer

A constant stream of quality content is needed on a regular basis for it to make an impact on your website, rankings, and lead generation.  A retainer is a win-win for you and your copywriter.  

It’s like buying your copywriting in bulk every month.  You arrange to ‘buy’, say, X number of hours or X number of blogs per month.  This retainer is usually at a reduced rate because you are committing a quantity of work for the copywriter to produce each month.  This is a great way to budget for this expense and allows you to save on your marketing costs.

Freelance copywriters love retainers too because they can rely on the work each week or month.  They will be open to offering a better deal than for one-off projects.

2.    Split your copywriting projects

Use an experienced copywriter for the writing tasks that your in-house marketing team or employees do not have the skills for or content writing that is time-consuming and better suited to a copywriter.

3.    Provide the content or blog in point form

For a blog article or a web page topic that you know a lot about, if you provide the points you want the copywriter to base the article around, this will save a lot of time in terms of research and ensures that the main points your business wants in the copy will be included.

The copywriter will create an interesting and relevant article based on your points, whether that be in list form, an interview, a story or similar to a feature article and will include keywords for search engines.  From something that you have put together in a matter of minutes, the copywriter can turn into a current blog or web page.

4.    Reuse and recycle your marketing content

When your copywriter has written a number of blogs for your business, repurpose these on other platforms or publish them on a third party or media websites?  How about publishing a long-form post on Linkedin or publishing the article on an industry specific website?  With a bit of rewriting of the article to suit the target audience, that one blog has now become three different articles, that has contributed to building your content and digital footprint.

The blog could also be cut up and the content used as a FAQ’s page on your website, or use a portion of the blog in a tweet or add an image for a Facebook post.  You are only limited by your imagination.

5.    Plan your Content Writing in advance

Sometimes a copywriter will put a premium on content writing that is urgent or has a short deadline.  Why?  A freelance copywriter works to a deadline set by the client.  However, when something is needed in a hurry they have to put aside other projects and reschedule them to complete your job.  Copywriters don’t really like to do this but do understand that things unexpectedly happen and need to be written quickly. 

If you can give the copywriter sufficient notice for all copywriting projects, you will be charged a reasonable rate. 

By following these simple tips, you will not only save you money on your copywriting, it also gives you more marketing dollars to spend on more content creation or other strategic marketing.  Or perhaps you can now hire a more expensive copywriter and receive better quality content that your customers will love and respond to.  

Have you found any other ways to save on your copywriter rates?  We all would love to hear about it! Write a comment below or send me an email

Get your copywriting quote here -