Independent freelance writers taking private clients - is it really worth it?

It's very common that independent freelance writers take projects from various essay agencies as well as from individual clients. But does it make a lot of financial sense? Those of you who take private assignments - are you charging a lot more than what you get paid by the agencies? If an agency pays you $10-$16 per page and you charge your private clients $15-$20 per page - is it really worth taking private clients? (considering you must take care of everything when you take private clients).

Year after year I'm thinking it's not worth it. : o Especially after experiencing yet another chargeback/fraudulent credit card transaction.. : (

You must be right :)

It may be worth it if you work on a big project. The fewer private customers, the fewer payment and customer service issues.

Good question, but if the agency is paying you 10-16 bucks, do you really think they're charging the clients $15-20? Go to your agency's customer website and see how much they charge per page. Then take off 25%, charge that, and you'll still be making well above $15-20 per page. Granted, with agencies you have a wider variety to choose from and much better security for getting paid, but you can easily make double what they pay you when you take on private clients.

I'd say a mixture of both is best. It's what I aim for.

If you are in a low cost country such as India, taking private clients makes a lot of sense. Even if you charge just $16-20/page for a Bachelors level essay, you can be assured of a very good income. However, you should know your limits and you should not take more work than you can handle. Otherwise you will end up disappointing all your customers.

I agree that a mixture is best. The agencies are nice as they somewhat serve as security and allow for more job selection but private clients allow you to simply just cut the middle man out and make more money.

My advice is to request payment up front from private clients and do not begin writing until you've been paid. It works for me and keeps me from having to waste time writing for customers who don't pay. Technically, all of my customers are private clients since I've never gone through a company, so this is a handy principle to follow.

Correction: I have taken one order through a company but found it to be a waste of time. That's not to say that working through any of the companies would be a waste of time, but just that this particular one didn't seem like a useful resource for a writer wanting more than a few bucks per page.

somewriter
How do private clients find you if you don't go through a company?

I have a website through which my customers place their orders. I've had some find me through this site too, but the majority have ordered through my website.

Hey, what's your Web site? I'd love to review it.

writersbeware@f

Your request seems hypocritical given that if I'd posted a link to my website you would have accused me of breaking the rules here by advertising.

Regardless, I don't see how you're qualified to review anything. I do see that you reason poorly, constantly post nonsense, and say things that aren't true, so I have no interest in your opinion about anything.

Yeah, that's what I thought, you worthless piece of s-i*. Cowardly much?


Put up or shut up. Among my nearly 7,000 posts, what substantive assertions have I posted that are not true? What would you assert is the ratio of true/false claims in my nearly 7,000 posts?


Really? Why do you include no evidence with any of your accusations? Your game is so very tired.


Consider it a free pass in my book . . . .

So I'm cowardly because I don't want a "review" of my website from you? I have no reason to think the opinion you would give would be honest or of any value.

Among the posts that I've read, I've seen you act like a child and display a low level of intelligence. I've seen enough to have no interest in the rest. I've seen you try to state facts about things you clearly don't understand, such as in when you tried to insert yourself into a debate I was having with pheelyks (and then told me to mind my own business when I posted in response to an argument you were having with someone else, hypocrite).


Why doesn't one provide evidence when when one warns another that smoking cigarettes is unhealthy? Within the context of this forum, your nonsense is common knowledge.

Unless you are a mod, you have no authority to give "a free pass" concerning the rules. Of course, some of what you say counts as breaking the rules does not, as I've argued elsewhere. By the way, that's an example of the fact that not everything you say is true. You are a hypocrite to argue that we must all follow your interpretation of the rules and then offer "a free pass." Once again, you're just posting nonsense.

Somewriter, please contact me at paulrvistor@gmail. I would like to have a look at your website.
Cheers
PV

I'm not the only member here. Are you afraid of everyone?


Oh, you mean the "debate" in which you tried to ignorantly assert that posts were "deleted" when, in fact, the moderator has simply MOVED them to the off-topic section? Yeah, I remember that debate-it's the one in which pheelyks smashed you and I just confirmed that you are a delusional excuse-maker who refused to admit ignorance of the forum's operations.


Really? You sure do like to make assertions and issue accusations that you can't prove. Let's face it-you're ignorant, stubborn, and bullheaded. Every time I or anyone else challenges you, all you do is dance around the semantics and refuse to admit that you wrongly jumped to conclusions.


LMAO! See, this is why my "coward" label applies. By "free pass," I mean that I will not criticize you for posting your site.


What? Again, you're delusional. This is not a true/false matter. First of all, you would not be breaking the rules in this instance because I am asking you to reveal your site for a very specific, non-commercial reason. Heck-you can even PM it to me, and then I'll post it.

Like I said, I have no interest in posting a link to my site here. I don't want it involved in the sort of dishonesty, nonsense, and unwarranted attacking that go on here.


No, I mean the debate in which I backed up my claim that the posts were deleted. Your inability to understand "move" as anything but literal is childlike. Anyway, the debate is there for everyone to see, and my last comments there still have no response.


I see no need to prove it, given that I see it as common knowledge to regular visitors of this site, as well as obvious to any newcomer. You cry "prove it" in response to so many things in which that response really doesn't make sense. Do you prove every single statement you make?


Everytime you or anyone else challenges me, I respond with arguments to back up my claim. You, however, do no such thing. If I have refused to admit that I wrongly jumped to conclusions, it's only because I didn't wrongly jump to conclusions and thus have nothing to admit. You assume I'm wrong and criticize me for not agreeing that I am wrong. That's just nonsense. By the way, I find it amusing how you consider every rational argument a case of dancing around semantics. Just because you can't understand the concepts involved in a discussion doesn't mean that it's all a matter of semantics.


You understand very little, I see. I do not care whether you would criticize me for posting it. My point is that if I'd done it without you asking, you would have said it was breaking the rules. It seems quite hypocritical for you to be so adamant about nobody doing what you see as rule breaking here, and then tell me to do something that falls into that category.


Fool, get the context right:


When you say X counts as breaking the rules but X does not really count as breaking the rules, then you have said something false. Why can't you understand the simplest things? Or perhaps the better question is, why haven't you figured out that when you intentionally misinterpret what I say and respond to the misinterpretation, I will call you out on your straw man attacks?

Really? Which member-EW_writer? Ha! Oh, wait, I wouldn't want to exclude all of the fraudsters, liars, know-nothings, and charlatans! Yeah, they don't like me very much, either. That's fine by me. In fact, that's my preference.

So, just to make things a little more clear for everyone, somewriter's assertion is that posts that the moderator moved (completely as-is) to the off-topic section (using the forum's built-in "move" functionality) were "deleted," even though they never disappeared and remained fully readable to all members at all times. Does anyone except somewriter agree with this assertion?


Actually, no-you respond with longwinded, senseless drivel and metaphysical rants.


Do you want a cookie for following the rules? Regardless, that's irrelevant to the matter at hand. I am ASKING you to post it for non-commercial reasons. You talk a big game-prove it. Why are you so afraid of the spotlight?


Gee, I wonder why you can't provide an example. Hmmm . . . .

Most of my comments have no response. Go back and address my primary point, and I might be enticed to look at that thread again.

Ha, I responded to your points way more than your responded to mine. You ignored most of what I said and missed the point most of the time when you did respond. Meanwhile I continued to show how each response you gave was flawed. Once again, you are trying to distort the facts because the truth isn't actually on your side.


Idiot, this is providing an example! I'm referring, once again, to our debate when I first got here in which you claimed certain things were against the rules and I showed that if you actually read the rules you will see otherwise.


I have no doubt that it seems that way to those who cannot comprehend.


Once again, this is not about my following the rules. It is about you being a hypocrite. If the rules really are as you say, then whether or not some random member asks me to do something that's breaking the rules shouldn't matter, even if that random member is you. I've explained why I will not post a link. Stop obsessing over it.


Just to make things clear, WritersBeware thinks that making a copy of something and destroying the original means that the original is still readable. She thinks that if I'm reading a novel and you're reading another copy of that same novel and I throw yours in the fire and continue reading mine, that yours is still readable because the same meaning is found in mine. Clearly though your book is not readable and you'd be pissed that I'd burned your book. Even if I gave you my copy as a replacement, it's still not the same book. Your experience of each copy would be about the same, so you might not care after all. But suppose your original copy had some sentimental value attached. Then you would definitely pay attention to the difference between the very same copy and another copy of the same novel. WritersBeware makes no sense here, as usual.


I was referring to visitors of this site in general. By the way, there could be many visitors who are not members. You and others here sometimes make the mistake of thinking that because someone has recently registered as a member here that the person is new here. I can't say for sure what is the case for others, but I know I visited this site for a while and read many posts before ever signing up as a member.

Is that all you can do-call me childish names? Try quoting.


You obviously have something to hide.

The original post was NEVER destroyed; it was moved. You can spin until you are blue in the face, but everyone can see that you are acting like a childish moron.

You keep insisting this, despite the fact that I conceded to your semantic bs and then you went on defending it for three more days without addressing my main point. You're a loser who has to keep on insisting that you won an argument I wasn't even having.


No, WB--like other rational people who weren't caught with a desperate need to explain what they meant when they jumped to a false conclusion--thinks that the digital information creating the posts on this forum is secondary in importance and experience to the ability to read these posts.

According to your logic, we are looking at different words, posts, and threads simply because we are looking at different computers; the digital information used to create the posts is renewed every time we visit the site, and is not the same exact digital information on my computer as it is on yours. This is not false, but it isn't of any practical value.

Your original statement that started this entire asinine argument was, "They deleted our entire debate." Now, do you actually expect us to believe that what you meant was, "They [the mods] deleted the digital information the ld to the appearance of the debate we were having on this particular thread, and made a copy of that digital information that made different tokens of the same type appear in a different thread, thus preserving the actual substance of the debate while destroying the original actual words"?

Guess I was trying to communicate in a way you are accustomed to doing yourself so that you could understand. Once again, you are a hypocrite.


How is that a response to me saying that I've explained why I don't wish to post the link? The response to this would to point out once again that my explanation has already been stated, and that explanation gives no reason to think I have anything to hide.


Wrong, the original post was NEVER moved; it was deleted. You can spin until you are blue in the face, but everyone can see that you are acting like a childish moron.

I actually bothered to trace the course of our argument in the last couple of posts I made in the thread in which we were debating this. You never responded. My statements there suffice as a response to what you say here.


The thread in which the posts occur is a relevant factor in what we were discussing. This factor does not come into play in the digital information itself if it is the same piece of information used to put copy a post in one thread and put the copy into another thread.

Actually, you are applying the type/token distinction on levels at which we have not discussed so far. Yes, the distinction can apply at those levels, but that fact is somewhat irrelevant here which is why we haven't discussed things on that level so far. You briefly mentioned it once, but I pointed out that I was not talking about things on that level. We need only talk about the distinction insofar as it applies to duplicate posts in distinct threads. If you feel it is relevant to bring in the distinction on those other levels, then by all means feel free to explain how.


No, what I meant was that the posts in which the debate took place had been deleted. Once I found out that they had been "moved" to another thread, I realized that not only had they been deleted, but had also been copied into another thread. Suppose they went back to the original thread and did the equivalent of clicking "undo" relative to the delete function. Then either the originals would come back or new copies would show up. If they the originals, then the originals cannot also be in another thread. If they are copies, then how could it be that the ones in the other thread are not also copies? So,as for your question above, regarding whether by my original statement I meant the second statement, I only meant the part about them being deleted when I said they were deleted, and I did not say or imply that it was the digital information itself which was actually deleted. As I've pointed out numerous times and you keep failing to understand or acknowledge, the same piece of digital information could give rise to both instances of a post, so it is not the actual piece of digital information that is in question here. Collect your thoughts, review what's been said, and come up with something better if you can.

I don;t feel it was relevant to discuss them at the level you brought them up. This is their natural extension; it might be a "new level" but it does not involve any new arguments. It's just as practically invaluable as your "level" of discussion.


Right. The intended meaning behind your initial statement was false, which you "found out" when I told you the posts had been moved rather than deleted. THAT is when you began this whole debate about what "delete" means in this context. This was and has been my only point--you were wrong, and began to furiously backpedal when your lack of basic observational skills was pointed out yet again.

The binary code, the HTML commands, the pixels on my screen, whatever it is you want to talk about--none of it is relevant to the point I have been making. If you don't understand that at this point, it is pointless to argue with you.

It was relevant to talk about them at the level at which I applied them, because that was the level referred to in my statement, and my statement is what was in question.


I said they were deleted, you said they weren't deleted because they were moved to another thread. I replied that I was still correct because they had still been deleted from the original thread. You then objected that this was false, that they had not been deleted from the original thread. Let's look at this a new way. You keep emphasizing that we should focus on the sense of "delete" that means specifically "make unable to be seen." What's in question is whether the posts were deleted from the original thread. The posts have been made unable to be seen in the original thread. See, if I wanted, I could even grant that my original claim that that they had been deleted simpliciter was false, but that wouldn't change the fact that my clarified statement that they had been deleted from the original thread is true, which is what we argued about after the statement was made.


If what you're getting at here is that you've been talking about the meaning of the posts all along, then save it. That's clearly not what we were debating about, and when you finally put it in those terms and tried to say it was what you meant all along (and you accuse me of backpedaling), I pointed out that it was irrelevant because it wasn't what I was talking about at any point and it's not even something I would disagree with because meaning isn't even the sort of thing that can be deleted. You say it is pointless to argue with me, but I'm the only one who has given real arguments here. You simply make new claims when backed into a corner. You ignore my points, respond with either a completely new stance or a repetition of points I've shown to be irrelevant, and then accuse me of not reading your posts. You change your story in the middle of the argument and then accuse me of doing so, when I actually kept defending one point of view throughout.

And when I figured out what you meant by this--that it was an ontological argument rather than an argument regarding whether or not people were able to view and understand the content of our debate--I told you I was never arguing this point. And you kept arguing anyway. For three days. And now you've started again.

And yet you kept telling me I was wrong even though I just continued to say the same thing.

Anyway, anyone can clearly see I was correct in saying the posts were deleted from the original thread in which they appeared. They were removed from or made unable to be viewed in the original thread, i.e. they were deleted from the original thread. That is all I was ever arguing for, and if you were trying to make an unrelated point the whole time, then you are the one who was arguing for no reason. If you accept that I am correct about this, then you shouldn't have objected to my stating it. It seems perhaps we were each making points the other actually agrees with, but you were the one who objected to what I said for some reason. I think perhaps you were focusing more on what you thought I was trying to imply about the mods intentions in moving/deleting the posts and that you felt that what you thought I was implying was shown false by the fact that the debate, in whatever form, was readable in another thread. However, that is a distinct issue from the actual truth of the claim in question itself. Also, that I thought there was something strange or irrational about the posts being removed did not change when I found out they had been moved or copied to another thread. That action seems equally strange and irrational.

The only reason I can think of for the change was that the discussion was irrelevant to the topic of the thread, but some of the posts were moved into another thread in which they were equally irrelevant to the topic. And why put some in one thread that already exists and put the others into a brand new thread? Why not at least put them in the same thread?


Actually, WritersBeware is the one who brought it up again. I mentioned the debate as an example of something, but WritersBeware is the one who started arguing the issue again. This has no bearing on anything else you said, but I thought we should get the facts straight.

I keep telling you that you were wrong to keep saying the same thing. Which meant that you were still wrong the entire time you kept saying it.

Why is it I am able to make my points in a few short sentences, and you require huge paragraphs to rationalize your thinking?


Repeatedly insisting this doesn't make it true. Remember how I found a respected third-party definition of "delete" that actually supports my interpretation of your original statement? That's the kind of thing that makes arguments rational and not just baseless statements.


You have now vacillated on this point several times. Either you meant your lengthy ontological argument originally, in which case it was your job to clarify what you meant by saying "the mods deleted our entire debate" (because what you claim you meant can in no way be intutited by this statement alone), or you "realized" after posting that the debate appeared in a different thread. You've claimed both, but it doesn't work both ways.


Excellent. I agree. Show me a definition of "delete" that supports your argument.

Gee, I can see an Armageddon going on here.

I would just state that everything is relative and much depends on one's personal preferences. Some people (as I know) take private clients only; some work for companies, and yet some other do a mix of the two.

I don't think there is anything wrong with any of the above conditions. :)

I don't think that this is what the "Armageddon" of posts that come before yours is about. >.<

May be you're right. Honestly I scanned the 30% of the posts than I lost the stamina to move on.

I wonder why most people on the forum so consciously points out others' mistakes, errors...?

One this is clearer than water: Everyone is trying to win over others. There is very little that can be said to be truly constructive.

I think it's called "cutthroat competition."

Any competition which disregards human rights and respect is not a competition but bloodshed.

So, I know you're preaching tolerance for mistakes and everything, but statements that are self-contradictory really stand out.

Pheelyks, is it now between you and me? Are you trying to cyber-stalk me?

Is it necessary for you to uselessly poke into my posts every time just because I have challenged your "Native-Speakerism"?

I really don't care if someone else is a native speaker or not. The problem is when I can quite clearly tell that someone passing themselves off as a writer is not a native speaker. If I couldn't tell the difference, there wouldn't be an issue; it's the quality of the language produced, not the national/ethnic background of the writer that's at issue.

Also, if you respond to my post and I respond back, I'm not "poking into your posts." It's called a conversation, and it's how these forums work. If you can't handle it, leave.

Pheelyks like before I'd repeat. You need to read a bit about recent research done in the native speaker countries ON native speakers; you'll come to know how fluid this concept is.

Ok, thank you. I am leaving..........................the door opens and..............sheeee....thud! You happy? :-(

I understand that there are different dialects of English spoken in different countries. There are also rules that are still insisted upon in academic English regardless of this fact. I have also asked you for titles and authors of these books you keep bringing up, and you can't even list one. That's a) poor research skills and b) poor debating no matter what country you're in or what language you speak.

Ok I will sort out some titles soon and put them here. I have been too busy all this while.

Yeah....not too busy to come make some pointless comments here, but too busy to google the title of one of these books you know so much about....

Again, the language issue is only a small part of your problem. Being stupid must be a lot harder to deal with.

why don't people just set up their own company? i didit and it was simple. stop whining about terrible companies and start your own.