Everything You Wanted to Know About Writing for Free

One day, your standard reply might be: "I don't write for free--here's my standard fee."

While this can be the right policy at a certain point in your career, if trading writing for exposure had ZERO benefit, no one would do it. 

Done right: It can skyrocket your brand. Done wrong: It can make you feel like you just got ripped off (because that's what happened).

So how do you know when it's worth it? Here are three questions I share with my clients when they ask me about pursuing an unpaid opportunity:

Regarding Where You’ll Be Featured

How great is their influence?

I wrote for free for years when I was starting out. My Muse articles were syndicated to Forbes, Fast Company, Mashable, Newsweek, Inc., and more. Those bylines were--and remain--so valuable. They opened a million (paid!) doors for me down the road. 

It may not always be this cut-and-dried. However, I always recommend looking at the publication's social profiles before making a decision. If you have 1200 followers and they have 120,000 with a ton of engagement, that's worth considering. (You'll of course want to ask how they'd be sharing the article with their audience.) If you have 1200 followers and they have 12, it's probably a pass. 

I have a client who pursues a monthly unpaid opportunity because this company constantly promotes their work, and guess what--getting in front of thousands of people over email, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Facebook are all things people pay for. 

How competent (or beautiful) is their work? 

Caveat #1: I strongly caution against working with a brand you don't like, even if they're highly followed. If you constantly shake your head at what they publish; odds are, you won't like what they do to your work before they share it. You won't even be happy a ton of people saw it and you won't be able to say something like "All in a days work" because you did it for free.

Caveat #2: Conversely, sometimes a company will be very new to the game so their influence and/or follower count is pretty meager, but their work is stunning and impresses the hell out of you. If you believe in them, throw them the alley-oop, because they will remember it when they go places. It also makes you look "in the know" when you can share this up-and-coming brand with your followers.

Regarding the Evolution of Your Brand

Do you want to identify as someone who "writes for free"?

To bring it back to that to the subheading, once you're regularly paid for articles, you'll find that working for free devalues your brand. It makes those awesome clients and publications who pay you question if you're worth the money--and you never want that. 

At the beginning, it may be that you need whatever an unpaid opportunity gives you. If you need exposure because you're just starting out--that's OK! There's a time in your brand when you may be hitting your head against the wall to find a larger audience and this could be the ticket. 

When opportunities come your way, weigh them against your business goals, so you'll know when you're ready to decline the majority of (or all) unpaid opportunities.