Freelance Editing Rates: Most Popular Search Terms

What are people looking for when they find this blog through search engines?

moneyAlthough I’ve been signed up to Google Analytics for ages, I don’t pay as much attention as I should to the statistics. However, with the latest upgrade, WordPress now shows statistics from Google Analytics on the dashboard.

Since I’ve been seeing the statistics every day, I’ve noticed something surprising. There is one post that has significantly more traffic than any other, and it’s a post from nearly two years ago:  How Much Will It Cost? Average Freelance Editing Rates. That post has had more than 2500 visits in the last year, more than 300 in the last month. It regularly gets more traffic than any other post except the latest one.

The searchers may be freelancers trying to set their own prices or they may be prospective clients wanting to get an idea of how much it will cost them to have something edited—most likely, a combination of both.

Three of the top five search terms that bring search engine traffic here are related to this topic: freelance editing rates, freelance editor rates, and freelance editing fees. Out of curiosity, I searched those three terms on Google. My post is #1 for freelance editing rates and #2 for the other two terms. Strangely, my post is basically a summary of the information and a link to an excellent chart from the Editorial Freelancers Association (EFA). That organization’s site doesn’t appear on the first page of Google for any of the search terms, but the site that is #2 where my post is #1 and #1 where my post is #2 also links to the EFA site. Guess I’ll never understand search engine ranking.

I’m thinking about writing a series about the topic of freelance rates, but I need your help. Please give me your input in comments. Answer one or more of the following questions and share any other ideas you have.

  • Would you be interested in such a series? If so, would you like to see it focused on editing rates or would you like to see writing rates included as well?
  • Should it be from the perspective of a freelancer determining her rates or a client trying to understand and compare rates?
  • What resources (blogs/Web sites, books, etc.) should I include?
  • If you are a freelancer, would you be willing to take part in an anonymous survey to report your rates?

Thank you for your feedback. People seem to want to know about freelance editing rates, and I’d like to provide the information they seek.

Added: I have compiled a short survey to gather information about what freelance writers and editors charge. If you freelance as a writer or editor, full-time or part-time, please take the survey described and linked in this post on September 26.

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