Let’s talk about how to choose the right content writing services for your business. Content writing is critical, especially for online businesses and bloggers.
Content is king, yet creating good content is one of the most challenging things that bloggers and online businesses encounter.
It can be tiring, sometimes you might not understand the topic you want to write about, and you’ll have to research a lot to create informative content.
Not forgetting storytelling skills, you must input to write exciting and engaging content.
The entire curation process can be mind-boggling, and at some point, you are left with the choice of engaging content writing agencies and freelancers to write blog posts.
And many online marketplaces and agencies are offering online writing services. So you are spoilt of choice. It gets hard to choose the right content writing services that will bring you the best results.
In this article, we’ll talk about the process of selecting a content writing service and what you need to consider before you settle on a service that will bring in the right results.
But it would help if you were ready first before starting the selection process. This means defining the prerequisites of a successful content writing service selection process. They include:
- You having your goals ready.
- Knowing the content types that you require from the campaign
- The cost that you’re willing to incur for the content creation process.
- Timeline and deadlines for publishing content.
- Project management tools.
You can’t just ask for services without knowing your needs and goals. Once everything is ready, then you can proceed to the following steps.
Steps in Choosing Content Writing Services
1. Research and Create a List.
You can start with the Internet, it has everything you need. Every content writing service provider has a website. It’s the foundation of their business.
If you are in the content creation industry, you can ask your colleagues to recommend the best writing services for you.
Also, look for reviews and ratings of the writing service providers on social media forums and business review sites.
From these sources, curate a list of potential content writers and agencies available.
2. Research on their Reputation.
Go deeper with your research on the Internet for the reviews, testimonials and complaints from existing customers of each agency. This gives you a comprehensive view of what you’re dealing with.
You can also get reviews from your peers. This is crucial since friends cannot recommend poor services.
With freelancers, you can get testimonials and reviews on their respective marketplaces. Most of these platforms even have rating systems to elevate the best freelancers making it easier for you to spot quality content writers.
From your list, scrap off freelancers and agencies with a questionable reputation, especially if there is a common complaint among customers on an issue you wouldn’t compromise.
3. Find Specialization.
After narrowing down the agencies based on their reputation, you need to find their areas of Specialization.
These are agencies that deal with the kind of content that you produce. You wouldn’t want to hire an video production agency while you are interested in content writing.
It’sleast likely to adjust to meet your requirements and standards.
Check if the agencies have writers or they use freelancers. It would be best if you had high-quality writers who can produce content that interests and engages readers while informing them. This will draw in more customers.
You cannot do this without writers who have specialized in your field.
4. Ask if they have a process
Having narrowed down your list to around three agencies, the next step is finding out whether they have a content production process.
A process is the content creation system they follow to ensure high productivity and delivery of results.
Ask these agencies or freelancers the processes they follow, from the beginning to the end and choose an agency with a good work agreement and process. We shall discuss this a little later.
5. Terms of work
Next, you need to factor in your terms of employment.
One of the things you needed to determine when preparing for the selection process was the budget. Most bloggers and small businesses will have a limited budget earlier on.
So the writing service you select must fall within your limits. But don’t go too low because you don’t want to compromise on the quality of content.
Also, find out whether the service provider has a timeline that works with your deadlines. Only work with time-conscious service providers; writers who are focused on the time limit that suits you.
6. Revisions
Don’t forget to ask whether they offer revisions. Revisions are basically when an agency or a writer has to rewrite or tweak the work they have provided to meet your standards or requirements.
So, for instance, after submission from a content writer, you note some mistakes. So you send it back for correction of the errors.
Most companies offer revisions, but some charge for the corrections. So, you need to find out whether the modifications are affordable and if there are any limitations.
7. Customer Results.
No one wants to work with an agency that does not produce results.
Hence, you should request the writers or the agencies to provide analytics that shows other customers’ results from their services.
Only agencies that can back up their work with good results are worth working with. Otherwise, you might invest time and money in a service that doesn’t convert.
Factors to Consider when Choosing Content Writing Services
In following the above steps, there are certain things you ought to be looking for in the content writers.
1. Reliability
Reliability is when somebody is always available to offer you the services that you require at the best quality possible.
Three characteristics define reliability.
- Are good and consistent in communication. Whenever you need them, they’ll be available.
- Can produce high-quality content consistently.
- Can meet the deadlines that you provide.
It’s hard to come about such people, but here are some tips
First, consider your peers recommendations. People cannot recommend to you a service that they didn’t like.
You can also seek services from established agencies. Established agencies have optimized their services to be reliable and you’ll need to do your research and find out the best article writing agencies before choosing one.
When seeking freelancers, you can look at the testimonials and reviews on the marketplace.
Also, when negotiating with the freelancers, consider their willingness to discuss with you and the time it takes for them to respond to you.
2. Pro-activeness.
Pro-activeness is the enthusiasm shown by a content writer in finding solutions that are going to help you.
You can tell this by observing what happens when you reach them.
A pro-active writer will ask questions that will enable them to offer the best solutions to you. They’ll want to understand your audience and brand well. More about this in point 5.
Lastly, they would also do some research and offer insights.
3. SEO content.
This is content that has been optimized to rank high in Google searches and other search engines.
There is no need to write content, which does not appeal to search engines because you will not be discovered, and that is the basis of doing content marketing.
To identify the writers with good SEO content writing skills, look out for those with
- Knowledge of the most popular SEO tools.
- High skills in keyword research and search analysis.
- Skills in optimizing content, which you can find out from the samples that they provide.
Check whether they practice what they preach based on the performance of their websites using specialized SEO tools.
You’ll know their SEO capabilities by their ability to drive traffic using their content and how frequently they create content.
Also, you can ask them how they SEO optimize their content and their optimization techniques.
4. Expertise
Being an expert means you have specialized skills in a particular field due to work experience over a long period.
To identify experts in a specific field,
- Ask for content that they have written before on that field.
- Find out about their work experience
- Check their understanding of technical language in that niche
- Check whether they know the audience
- If they know and can use keyword research method and can research market trend in that sector.
To find such people, you need to ask for samples that demonstrate their expertise.
Remember, you might have to increase your budget because experts are more expensive than average content writers.
Nonetheless, the result is content that converts.
5. Audience and Brand Understanding
Does the content writer ask about the audience and the brand?
If not, walk away.
The best content writers are willing to learn. They ask questions to know what they need to create content that suits your audience and converts.
Please focus on the questions that they are asking. This shows they are serious about understanding your audience:
- Your goals.
- Your target audience including demographics.
- The main pain points of your customers
- How your product helps them.
- Your brand voice which helps them adapt and style their writing to suit your audience.
You can also share your insights to know whether they are more concerned about that information.
And you can discuss goals so that you can agree.
6. Convenient work arrangements.
You don’t want to be working with somebody who has other ideas in mind and who cannot flow with your work and schedule.
- Be keen on the transparency of their work. Is the agency or writer willing to show you the process of content creation and include you in every decision they make?
- They should demonstrate a streamline of processes that ensure high productivity.
- They should also demonstrate the ability to work with team members, especially if you have other colleagues in your content creation system, such as editors.
- They must have accessible payment gateways to easily transact and close the deal when the time for payments comes.
To find such people with convenient work arrangements,
- Look out for people who are happy to negotiate terms with you.
- Ask what processes they follow upfront to be sure that they have the best system or work arrangements.
- Ask whether they are willing to work with your project management tools, such as Asana and Clickup so that you can streamline your work.
If you want an easy way to find convenient work arrangements out of the box, you can work with content marketplaces and agencies that have a streamlined content creation process.
7. Additional Services
Lastly, if you can find content creators that provide content creation and other services such as,
- Developing a content strategy
- Monitoring the performance of the content
- Helping with content distribution.
That’s a big bonus. All these services are instrumental for content marketing success.
Not all content writers offer additional solutions, and if they do, they will charge more. If your budget allows it, ask if they can provide the additional services.
If you consider all these, you are very likely to find the best content writing services for your campaign.
But it doesn’t end there.
Once you select your writer or content agency, follow up to ensure that you’re getting the results for your investment.
Install analytics on your SEO content. There are many tools, such as SEMrush SEO analyzer and Google Analytics, to update you on your content’s performance.
Using such tools, you can know where your content is or whether it’s giving you the results you desire.
If things are not going well, you can always change your writer or agency.
Wrapping up
Finally, content writing is a must for any company to succeed in the online landscape. It is the backbone of online marketing.
So, it is very crucial to invest in content creation. The above steps will surely help you find the best services for your specific market and guarantee better results.