How much would you write a blog post for?
I’ve had two emails today from bloggers asking how much they should charge per post for their blogging services and one email from a blog network asking how much I think is fair to pay bloggers per post.
note – all are asking about ‘per post’ payments and not revenue share which is another model of paying bloggers which I won’t cover in this post in much depth. I’ll keep this to the question being asked about ‘per post’ values.
I thought I’d open it up for discussion. What do you think?
All my answers to the emails were fairly vague because in my experience the value of a blog post varies depending upon a variety of factors:
- Post Length – not all posts are equal and one differentiating factor is post length. While sometimes shorter posts can actually take longer to write than longer ones a general principle that most blog employers and employees factor into their agreements in terms of payment is post length.
- Type of Post – another obvious different between posts is the type of post that is being written. There’s a big difference in the amount of work that goes into a newsy/link post and a longer opinion piece of tutorial. As a result I’d expect the value associated with the post would be different.
- Topic – some topics are more commercially viable than others and I would expect that this would factor into many blog payment negotiations. This relates both to the type and value of advertising and affiliate programs available on a topic but also the responsiveness of the audience to these commercial aspects of the blog.
- Post Frequency – how often the blogger is expected to post will no doubt factor into negotiations on the price of a post. If there’s an expectation of multiple posts per day I’d expect that the payment would be different to the cost of paying someone to post once per week.
- Expertise of Blogger – some bloggers bring specialized expertise on a topic and would be able to negotiate a higher fee per post than other bloggers with less expertise or expertise on a less specialized topic.
- Profile of Blogger – some bloggers have an established profile either within or outside of blogging circles. This means that they’re more likely to kick start a blog with traffic from their established fan base/readership and should mean that they can expect a higher per post fee.
- Ownership – some blog networks or owners allow the blogger to keep full or partial ownership of the content that they write – others take full ownership of the content. I would expect that this should come into play when negotiating a fee. If the blogger can use the content later or in other mediums this might mean a lower fee but if they give up complete rights to the content I’d expect the blog owner should pay a premium (to some extent) for this.
- Incentives – Some blog networks build incentives into their payment systems (some operate on a completely incentive based system where there is no ‘per post’ payment – but that’s another topic). These incentives may be based upon traffic, revenue, incoming links or some combination of these (and other) factors. The incentives offered (and the chance of them coming into play) will obviously impact the ‘per post’ payment that bloggers receive.
Ok – so how much is a blog post worth?
Obviously there’s going to be quite a large variation in terms of dollar values paid for a blog post but from chatting with many bloggers from many networks and business blogs I’m hearing that the going rate on a ‘per post’ basis seems to be ranging from as low as $2 per post up to $20 per post (and on occasion I’ve heard of payments as high as $100 for one off or less frequent columns).
Of course ultimately the value of a post will be determined by the market (ie demand and supply and the budget of the blog owner and where it intersects with the situation and willingness of the blogger).
It’s a difficult question but I’d love to hear your thoughts on how much you think a blog post is worth. How much would you (do you) blog for? Feel free to share your experiences anonymously if you’d like.
