Should you Hire an Editor?
April 20, 2009 by Allison Boyer
Filed under Jobs
Yesterday, I posted about big grammatical blunders and mentioned that I have an editor who looks at my work before I send it to clients. He’s really more of a proofreader, actually, since most of what he does is pick up typos and similar errors. This raises an important question, though: As a freelance writer, should you partner with an editor to ensure that clients get a clean copy of your work?
The answer isn’t a clean cut-and-dry yes or no. Here’s my advice:
Yes, hire an editor if…
- You have writers working under you and don’t want to proofread all of their work yourself.
- You’re a notoriously bad typist.
- A client has mentioned in the past that your work needs improvement in the area of typos.
- You can afford it and hate looking over your own work.
No, do not hire an editor if…
- You’re an excellent proofreader yourself and have time to look over all of your work at least once or twice.
- Your client had his own editor/proofreader (and your work is pretty clean, for the most part).
- The person you’re writing for is a middle man – ie, they own a writing business and work with the clients (and, again, your work is pretty clean, for the most part).
There’s one exception to this that I want to mention. If you land a really high-paying gig, it might be worth it to you to hire an editor, even if you think your writing is typo-free. You don’t want a wayward letter to put your job in jeopardy, and if the gig really is super high-paying, you should be able to afford paying someone a small amount to edit for you.
Personally, I use an editor/proofreader for about 50% – 75% of the work I do with clients (outside of network blogging). We’ve negotiated a price per page, but I know that some editors are paid by the hour or even per word.
Do you use an editor?
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I am an editor, and I’ve also worked as a staff editor and writer for a magazine. I do think a lot of writers could use editors’ help, and not just to correct grammatical errors or typos. Magazine writers I’ve edited tend to write long; an editor could help them tighten up their work. Also, it is helpful to have a knowledgeable person read your work before you submit it. We all know that it’s hard to be objective about a piece you’ve spent hours on. Staff editors appreciate it when articles come in relatively clean and adhere to their length and format guidelines–it saves so much time.
I just wrote a blog post about the same topic–very funny. I mostly proofread and edit my own writing-for-hire and articles. But for really important things, I try to use my network of friends who are writers to look over my work.
I use an editor and proofreader (might be the same person) for client work: documents such as white papers, case studies, and business plans. For my web site I use a proofreader. But I do it myself – for better or for worse – on my blog.