About Carol Tice
Carol is a full-time freelancer for both publications and businesses. She has worked with Forbes, Entrepreneur, Delta Sky, The Writer’s Market, Costco, Deloitte, and American Express. In addition, she owns a blog-based business and has created the award-winning Make a Living Writing blog, which sees 1 million annual readers. In 2011, Carol founded the membership community Freelance Writers Den. Recently, Carol’s focus has turned to ghostwrite books and other content.
When Should You Hire a Ghostwriter?
Writing a book is hard, and if you have an idea for a book that’s been sitting around for several years, you are a good candidate for hiring a ghostwriter. “If you’re coming from another field (other than writing) you’ll find that writing is hard.” To put your legacy out there, you’ll need to consider getting coaching and help from a professional ghostwriter.
Pricing Out Your Ghostwriter
There’s a point where you’ll need to consider the importance of writing the book yourself, says Carol. If you’re not making progress, you’ll want to hire a ghostwriter.
When pricing out ghostwriting, a 250-page book will start at $30,000 and can range to $75,000 or more depending on the writer’s credentials that you are hiring. Those who have a track record of writing and selling book proposals for agents to use when pitching a publisher will retain more income than a new ghostwriter starting out.
If you hire a ghostwriter out of the country that charges you $500 to write your book, “What you get is probably going to disappoint you. You are highly unlikely to be satisfied with the result.” However, if you know of an experienced writer who is getting into ghostwriting and gives you a reasonable price to write your book, that is a good choice for your ghostwriter.
How Ghostwriters Charge for Their Work
You’ll need to look at how many words are in the manuscript. Although the charge isn’t an exact word count, you’ll need to consider the length based on the approximate word count, not the number of pages, as font sizes, margins, and formatting can differ.
Some ghostwriters charge a monthly rate, but Carol sets a flat price. She wants her project to be finished to put her name on the book and have credit for editing. With project pricing, you can create three to four payments depending on the draft or calendar timeline.
If you aren’t sure when you need your book, the direction, or the main focus, you will need to get a retainer monthly or hourly pricing. There isn’t a definite scope of work, in this case, so your book may take longer or less time depending on what you decide you want from your book.
Listen in on today’s episode to find out what types of content you can use to create your book, what to expect if you hire a ghostwriter and why you’ll want to read the work of a ghostwriter that you are considering hiring before you hire them as your writer.
Show Highlights
- [02:02] When you should hire a ghostwriter to write your book.
- [04:55] Pricing ranges of ghostwriters.
- [08:25] How ghostwriters charge for their work.
- [13:08] When to get an hourly rate for ghostwriting your book.
- [15:56] The overall time frame for ghostwriting a book and how long you can expect a ghostwriter to take.
- [19:05] Process of ghostwriting and what to expect.
- [22:02] Average length of time to write a book.
- [28:38] Accent, language, and dialect of a region can affect how a ghostwriter writes your book.
- [30:09] Building in checkpoints during your ghostwriting process.
- [33:06] When you need a ghostwriter and when you want to hire an editor.
