Without question, the most challenging aspect to my book writing career is getting others—aspiring authors—to realize the value and cost for writing a book.
Measuring the true value of something, for the consumer, is never a clear-cut thing. That is because “subjectivity” is involved, if only with the personal perspective of the individual toward the item in consideration. There are also other factors that make it seem impossible to correctly figure out what one should pay for book writing services.
The challenge in measuring the value of something is seriously amplified by the vast differences in prices being offered in the marketplace. This especially holds true, and is quite extreme, within the world of book writing. If you’ve taken a spin around the Internet lately, this is not new news to you.
The price offerings for writing an average size book—say 250 pages—can range from as low as $1000 and as high as $250,000. Wow! I seriously believe that there is no greater diversity of pricing anywhere else in the business world.
How is it possible for one book writer to offer $5000 for his/her book writing services, while another asks for $100,000 for supposedly the exact same book. Is the higher-paid writer a crook? Do we need to get out the “CUSTOMER BEWARE!” bullhorn and warn everyone? The interesting thing here is that it is not the high-priced rates you need to be worrying about.
If the literary world weren’t mysterious and esoteric enough as it is, certainly the conundrum of what to pay a ghostwriter for professional book writing services just thickens the fog all the more.
In an environment where consumers wait for items to go on sale and can compare the prices of a half-dozen competitors selling the same product with the click of a mouse button, it becomes VERY difficult if not impossible to effectively “shop around” for ghostwriters and professional book writing services.
That is because this type of shopping does not work in the literary field. In fact, it is disastrous to approach it in this fashion. I cannot think of anyplace else where the term “you get what you pay for” becomes more relevant than within the literary realm as it pertains to book writing. Products like fishing rods, Golf clubs or pairs of pants, for instance, can easily be made to “look” like they’re more expensive (name brand) counterparts to the untrained eye. But there is nothing more open and obvious than the written word. How they are joined and presented in order to convey thoughts, feelings and emotions is something that cannot be covered up with metallic paint, chrome plating or a knockoff label sewn into a seam.
In other words, you can’t pretend to have a great novel. You can’t pretend to have a book of quality. You can’t talk someone into believing that poorly executed concepts and ideas are “great” and “just as good as another book.” No, the written word is as plain to see, with regard to quality and aesthetics, as seeing a spade and calling it a spade.
Temporary deceit can be used in selling inferior products for $1,000 that are only worth $25. Examples of this are a watch or a knockoff handbag that you can find a dime-a-dozen along any major city street if you were to just walk a single block. And just the same, successfully selecting the best price of a real product (not a knockoff) from a number of competing stores requires that ALL of the products be the SAME as far as quality is concerned.
With book writing, no two finished products are EVER the same. Each is different and one of a kind. They are constructed solely upon the creation of the particular ghostwriter. To consider only the number of pages as your comparison without taking into account the ghostwriter’s abilities is a grave mistake when shopping for a book writer.
The $5,000 price offered by one ghostwriter for a 300-page book cannot be considered “the better deal” over a $30,000 price tag of another ghostwriter. To base one’s decision on price is literary suicide and certain death of a lifelong dream. If you walk away with one thing from this article, it should be this: PRICE CAN NEVER BE THE FOREMOST CRITERIA FOR CHOOSING A GHOSTWRITER!
It is impossible to consider apples to apples in the literary world. Writing is art. It possesses creativity and requires expertise, especially with book writing because there is so much information that must be manipulated.
How Does One Know What to Pay for Having Their Book Written?
At this point, it might seem impossible, but there is a practical way to shop for a ghostwriter. It first requires the preliminary step of NOT SHOPPING BY PRICE COMPARISON AS THE MAIN IMPORTANCE. After getting that out of the way, it requires knowing a little about what the going rates for true professional book writers are.
Certainly, the going rates being offered by professional book writers greatly influence what you will have to pay for a high-quality book. You will find, by your own research of PROFESSIONAL ghostwriters, that the going rate for book writing is roughly between $100 and $250 per page. This is where you will find the majority of true PROFESSIONAL book writers.
What warrants these prices? In short, it is a fact that only a minute percentage of individuals on this planet are actually capable of producing a 60,000 word or 100,000 word (or more) piece that millions of people can’t put down or stop turning pages until it’s completely read. This alone suggests that such abilities are rare and therefore make such work close to being priceless.
The reason why you will find extreme prices in the low range being offered for book writing—anywhere from $2.00 to $50.00 per page—is simply the fact that these are rates being offered by non-professional book writers. These are from people who have either 1) Never actually written a printed/published book before or 2) Have produced poor quality books in the past.
The reason I can say this with sheer confidence is because no true professional book writer could ever live on such rates. When you consider the amount of time (anywhere from 6 to 18 months) and energy it takes to complete a HIGH-QUALITY book, such rates are lower than what someone is paid for flipping burgers at a fast food restaurant.
You only need to do the math to see this shocking fact. And when someone boasts that they can produce a 250 page book within 3 months, well … once again … you get what you pay for. The high-end rates shooting above $250 per page are from ghostwriters who have made a VERY successful bestseller and can afford to ask for such rates in a similar way that a painter would do.
The non-professionals, you MUST be aware of, as this is where your book dream can become a disastrous nightmare. If you can afford the fees of one of the few high-end ghost writers, then by all means enjoy this liberty. If you think that you cannot afford the reasonable rates of the professional ghostwriter, realize that there are some well-established ghostwriters—at least I personally have always done this—who will do what they can to help their clients make their lifelong dreams become reality.
The bottom line is, if you hire a true professional ghostwriter, and he/she is someone who wants you to succeed with your book just as much as you do, there is absolutely no reason why you can’t have your book written and published within the coming months.
What should you pay a book writer to have your book written? This is where your own personal perception of value comes into play. And as long as you stay away from the lowball pricing game being played by the non-professionals, which are in multitude, you will do fine in achieving your lifelong dream by having a quality book that you can be proud of—one that the world is willing to embrace.
Payment plans and reduced rates in exchange for royalties, name recognition, etc. are a few things that we do at WriterServices.net.
