Finding the best writers is all about knowing where to look. It’s like apartment hunting in New York City: if you don’t know what you’re looking for, it can take forever. You’ll spend hours traipsing around the city, trying to find something that fits your budget and your taste, only to discover that there’s nothing of the sort out there—and then have to start all over again.
So how do you find high quality blog writers for hire when you’re not a writer yourself? Where do you get blog writers? There are three easy options:
1) Check the bylines of prominent blogs in your niche;
2) Get referrals from other writers; or
3) Use LinkedIn or Twitter
Let’s take a closer look at each one so that you can see which might be right for your needs!
How Do I Find Good Blog Writers for Hire?
Marketing is a tough gig. You want to get your message out there, but you don’t want to spend all day writing the copy yourself. So what do you do?
In the past, marketers used freelance marketplaces like Upwork, Guru, Problogger, Scripted, and Textbroker to find writers. On these platforms, you’ll find some talented writers, but the vast majority can’t deliver the quality you need. You’ll have to filter through numerous applications to weed out the unqualified writers!
This article will show you where to hire content writers that are already vetted easily.
When hiring writers on Upwork, Problogger, Scripted, etc., you should always ask them to write a paid test article before you agree to hire them full-time.
1. Check the Bylines of Prominent Blogs in Your Niche
If you’re looking for the best blog writers, you might want to start by checking out some of the most prominent blogs in your niche.
Why? Because these writers already have an audience that loves them. They’ve already proven that they can write something that prompts a reaction from readers, so odds are they’ll be able to do the same for your audience.
You can also check forums and discussion sites for people who write long-form posts about the topic you’re interested in. If someone writes a long post on a forum or discussion site and it gets tons of comments and shares, that’s a clear sign they know how to write something that prompts a reaction.
How to use this method
Take note of anyone who has mentioned your company in a successful piece of content before. Alternatively, you can pull up a list of the top 10 blogs in your niche, check their recent posts that you just find interesting, and see who wrote them.
Look for compelling writing and insights—the kind of stuff that gets people excited about what you do. If you find something like that, search the author’s name on Google and see what else they’ve written about. Reach out to them! Make sure they’re not in-house employees—you’ll have an easier time reaching out to freelance blog writers.
Pros
- They can increase your traffic by writing blog posts that are relevant to your audience and drive people back to your site.
- Your website will have a fresh perspective and an expert’s opinion.
- They can help you with guest blogging on high authority sites since they’ve already built a targeted portfolio writing for high authority sites.
Cons
- These writers usually have a lot of experience and will charge premium prices.
- It requires a lot more manual work on your part
- You know what they say: “You can’t judge a book by its cover.” And you can’t really tell the quality of a writer just by checking their byline. Because while it is true that a lot of good writers have published on high-quality sites, there are also some pretty bad writers who have published on high-quality sites. High quality websites have skilled editors & a good editor can literally turn garbage into gold.
2. Referrals from Other Writers
When it comes to finding talented blog writers for hire, referrals are your best bet. The majority of writers find work via referrals—and that’s because they’re a convenient way to land high-quality work. Your referred writers know the kind of quality you expect from your content and can take pride in helping you attain it.
Plus, when you have a good relationship with your writer and they like working with you, they’ll be happy to refer their colleagues to you. If you want an assurance of the work your new writer can deliver, ask for recommendations for those they’ve worked with in the past.
How to use this method
Unless you’ve been in the game for a while, you probably won’t have a big personal network of freelance blog writers for hire.
But you can ask your current network for referrals of freelance writers. Also, use a formal or informal employee referral program to compensate employees for referring skilled writers to you. Since existing employees (especially writers) know the company’s mission, they should be able to find you qualified freelance blog writers.
Pros
- You don’t have to worry about your writer’s ability to create good content. You can trust that these people can write well for you as they’ve all been vetted by their mutual connections. For a writer, a referral reflects on them and their relationship with your company. So they’ll give you the most qualified people they have!
- The mutual connection often serves to increase familiarity at the outset of the relationship. This means that when you’re starting out, there will be more familiarity between you and your new writer—which can help make things run smoother!
Cons
- Not every writer will fit every organization. It is critical to consider their style of writing and their primary niche.
- You may not get a referral at the right time when you need writers. If your company needs help with content creation, but there’s no one in your network who can refer you to someone, then you’ll have to wait.
- It takes a lot of effort to scale this method: if you are looking for 20 writers immediately and can’t wait for recommendations from friends or colleagues, this isn’t the right method for you!
3. LinkedIn or Twitter
You’ll find a lot of writers and content marketers using Twitter to build their audience and share industry knowledge. You can also follow them on LinkedIn and even see what they’re writing for other brands through their social media pages.
If you’re looking for a writer to work with, check out their Twitter feed. If they write articles on LinkedIn, check their LinkedIn articles to assess their skills.
How to use this method
First, you can use the search tab on LinkedIn or Twitter to find the best blog writers in your niche. Then sort through them and pick the most suitable for your brand. This is a quick way to find someone who specializes in what you’re looking for.
You can also put out job postings to hire content writers on these platforms and have your employees share or retweet them. This is a smart way to expand your network of potential candidates by getting people who already work at your company involved as well.
When sharing these “blog writers wanted” posts on Twitter, ensure to include hashtags like #hiring and #writing – so people can find them!
You can also post job offers in LinkedIn groups or Facebook groups and have freelance blog writers reach out to you directly through those channels.
Pros
- They’ve likely built a solid audience, which means that they can share your articles with their audience—which is a great way to build brand awareness and get more exposure for your content.
- You can easily research the freelancer by browsing their profile on Twitter or LinkedIn. This will give you an immediate sense of whether or not they have experience writing in your niche.
- It makes it easy to connect with the writer so that you can quickly establish a relationship before starting work together.
- You can quickly expand your network of freelance blog writers
Cons
- The competition for top-notch blog writers for hire is fierce! There are so many companies posting “blog writers wanted” job posts on Twitter and LinkedIn. This means that your job post might not even be seen by the right people unless you boost it or reach out to writers individually. And that can get pricey or exhausting really fast!
- You might get spam messages or connection requests
How Much Does It Cost to Hire a Professional Blog Writer?
Now that you know how to find good content writers, how much should you pay professional blog writers? When you’re looking for a blog writer, it’s important to know what you’re paying for. As a general rule, the more specialized the content, the higher the price. On average, you should aim for $200 – $400 for a standard blog post.
But here’s the thing: it’s hard to know precisely how much a blog writer would charge. Many companies take the following factors into account to determine a blog writer’s salary:
- The scope of the writing project (type and length of blog post + additional elements, e.g., topic, research, media, etc.)
- The writer’s level of expertise and experience
- The industry and audience (B2B vs. B2C)
Hiring cheap blog writers brings more headaches than results. Conversely, even if a topic has been done 100 times over, a rockstar writer will add new insights and bring a new angle that helps improve your post’s shareability. It’s about giving value for money and ultimately creating posts that generate money for your brand.
Are you looking for experienced blog writers for hire? Then checking the bylines of prominent blogs in your niche is one of the easiest ways to find them. Personally, I’ve been published in 28 high authority real estate and marketing blogs. See my portfolio here.