Five Ways to Reduce Your Copywriting Quote

<h1>Five Ways to Reduce Your Copywriting Quote</h1>
<p>Professional copywriting usually pays for itself by generating increased publicity, leads and ultimately sales for your business; but there's no point paying more than you need to. By doing some homework before you commission a project, you can substantially reduce the quote and ensure that you receive maximum value for your investment. The following tips will help any copywriter provide you with an accurate and reasonable quote.</p>
<ol>
<li><strong>Provide the most accurate brief you can.</strong><br />
The more detailed and specific you make your brief, the more likely it is that a copywriter will be able to supply what you're after on the first attempt. This also saves you money, because a copywriter won't have to make allowance in the quote for time spent clarifying the requirements of the project. Give some thought to:
<ul>
<li><strong>What you want the piece to achieve</strong> - <i>e.g.</i> increased sales or leads, informed customers, positive publicity etc.</li>
<li><strong>How the piece will be distributed</strong> - will you be publishing it on your website? Printing it? Submitting it to a magazine? Is it part of a paid advertising campaign? It might be more than one of the above.</li>
<li><strong>Who the intended audience is</strong> - their age, education and income levels, interests and attitudes.</li>
</ul></li>
<li><strong>Be clear about the scope of the project.</strong><br />
Communicate clearly about where the copywriter's responsibility begins and ends. Do you want your whole website overhauled, or just a few pages written? Are you organising for a designer to work on the project, or do you need your writer to manage the visual design? By being as specific as possible, you'll get an accurate quote, the project will be completed faster and there will be less headaches along the way.</li>
<li><strong>Supply supporting materials.</strong><br />
Provide as much background information and research as you can. For example:
<ul>
<li>What need or problem does your service address for your customers?</li>
<li>Do you have statistics on how much better your product performs than the competition?</li>
<li>Are there technical terms used in your industry that the writer needs to be aware of?</li>
</ul>
Time spent on research often contributes more to the cost of a project than time spent writing. If you've already done the research, why waste time and money getting the writer to do it again?</li>
<li><strong>Be clear about what you <em>don’t</em> want.</strong><br />
Are there any specific things the piece must not include? There may be things you don’t want written about for legal or business reasons. If you think this may be the case, it's far cheaper to get advice and make decisions about this before the project begins.</li>
<li><strong>Set a deadline with adequate lead time.</strong><br />
Communicate clearly when you need the project finished. If you don't specify a deadline, your project is likely to be postponed as the writer attends to more urgent jobs. On the other hand, if you need a project done in a hurry, you may be charged a higher fee as the writer needs to reorganise his or her commitments to fit your project in. It is also possible that the quality of the work will suffer.</li>
</ol>
<p>A good copywriter will want to provide you with exceptional value, not charge extra for redundant work and wasted time. By helping us do our job better, you will help yourself get the best result from the minimum investment.</p>
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<p>Tai McQueen provides marketing copy and technical writing services to small and medium-sized businesses. For more information, visit <a href="http://www.wordspace.com.au/" title="Copywriting for Small Business - WordSpace" target="_blank">www.WordSpace.com.au</a></p>
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