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Most companies in the B2B space consider outsourcing writers at some point. In fact, the Content Marketing Institute found that 84% are outsourcing their content creation now.
Outsourcing writers is common across companies of all sizes and budgets, according to the research. Yet anecdotal evidence suggests that it’s not always an easy path. We hear over and over how companies struggle to find and retain good writers, among other challenges.
As a content marketing agency, we exist to solve these challenges for you. So we thought we’d take a moment to share exactly how we overcome the most common problems that arise from using outside writing help.
Creating great content takes a lot of time and brain space. Outsourcing it is popular in part because it can reduce the cost of content marketing and free up your team. By outsourcing your blog writing, for example, your marketing team can focus more on managing your community building efforts.
While outsourcing writers is an excellent idea, it comes with several challenges you’ll need to manage.
Anyone who outsources content faces the challenge of finding proficient writers who fit your budget, can handle your material, and are available.
Recruiting writers involves two big hurdles: 1) Figuring out how and where to find them, and 2) sifting through the applications. You can place ads on social media, job platforms, and freelance marketplaces, and you'll hear from heaps of applicants – including many unqualified writers. Alternatively, a more targeted but time-consuming approach is to search on Google, review profiles on LinkedIn, and reach out to writers individually. Either way, it’s a tough task.
Over numerous hiring cycles, we have come up with an efficient process that yields great results for us and our clients. First of all, we don’t hire a lot of writers like some agencies do. Instead, we add a few new writers every couple months, carefully choosing those who we think will best support our growing base of clients.
We continually attract high-quality writing talent through our permanent jobs page on our website. When we want to inject fresh talent, we use job ads that we’ve tweaked over time on platforms frequented by the types of writers we want to hire.
Once interested writers are in our system, we use a spreadsheet to whittle down applicants to those with the characteristics that fit. During our hiring cycles, we review all applicants against a list of criteria that has proven to yield valuable new team members. We often have writers complete a paid writing sample before we move them into active rotation.
If your content does not meet a certain threshold of subject matter expertise, you run the risk of damaging rather than building your brand. But it's challenging to find content writers who are subject matter experts.
Some marketing teams prefer to hire a good writer and hope they can learn the industry. We think it’s more efficient to find a knowledgeable writer who can jump into specialized assignments from the get-go.
Our client base consists of businesses using the SaaS model and related industries in the technology space. Since these industries require specialized knowledge, we only hire writers with relevant experience. They must understand what’s different about writing for a SaaS blog, and they must be able to discuss concepts that our clients care about.
Because we insist that our writers bring subject matter expertise from the start, we have a base of talent that can handle tough assignments from day one. Then, we have a few mechanisms that help elevate our whole team’s knowledge of your industry.
For more details on our writing process and how our team works together to master tough subjects quickly, see how we research blog posts.
Anyone outsourcing writers will have to deal with a lack of availability at some point – usually when it’s most inconvenient for you. Just like other humans, writers get sick or need time off. Or they might take on more than they can handle and then back out of a commitment. Worse, sometimes their work deteriorates or they just drop off the grid.
You need writing assignments completed reliably so you can use them in your campaigns. A freelancer’s sudden lack of availability can sideline your blogging goals, for example.
Delivering your content on a reliable schedule is one of the basic cornerstones of our business model. We do everything we can to ensure that your content reaches you on the promised date.
On top of our hiring practices, we continually evaluate our active writers and assign work based on their performance. We only assign work to writers with a track record of delivering on time, and we confirm the writer’s availability and commitment to submitting the assignment when due every time we assign an article.
Of course, things can still happen. If a writer suddenly becomes unavailable, we can reassign the piece to a suitable replacement. Our editor makes sure that you don’t feel a difference in the finished product. Having a roster of vetted writers on our team means you will receive your content when promised, in a consistent voice, and at the expected level of writing.
The day-to-day management of freelancers can take up a lot of time. For starters, you have to prepare assignments, confirm and stay on top of turnaround times, process their payments, and be available for questions.
Keeping up with all these details is challenging. These processes eat up quality time that you should be investing in other aspects of your business.
We deliver blogs and other writing assignments consistently while handling all the details behind the scenes. A simple, predictable monthly subscription takes care of it all for you.
Our dedicated coordinators assign work, manage deadlines, deal with questions, and process invoices. Our editor works with writers on tone and structure before we submit articles to you. As a result, our clients don't need to spend energy on any of these time-consuming tasks.
Successful blogs have a defined style, with every post following a consistent tone.Your blog can start to feel like patchwork when it's written by multiple people or a freelancer who has other priorities.
Every writer creates content with a different "voice" naturally – that is, the tone and style of their work. When you outsource content writing, you will have to spend significant time editing to achieve the consistent brand voice you’re looking for.
SaaSpirin produces content following a unique blog process. Our content coordinators provide writers with a brief for every assignment, which includes notes on your style and goals and links to your content. Then, our editors work closely with writers to ensure every piece of content maintains your consistent style. This way, we remove the headache of editing for you.
See our unique blog process in action.
Writers are best at writing. Content strategy and other parts of the pre-writing process will fall to your internal team. But many businesses struggle to develop content strategies and brainstorm topic ideas, for example.
To have a successful blog, you’ll need to coordinate some (or all) of the tasks like content planning, topic ideation, and keyword research when outsourcing writers. This can be a time-consuming and daunting undertaking.
Regardless of the content plan you choose, we help you create a content strategy and pitch the topics that will support it. Our strategists, coordinators, writers, and editors ensure that every piece of content we deliver aligns with your goals, effectively lifting much of the pre-writing burden from your shoulders.
Learn more about how we approach content strategy, including an example roadmap and topic pitches.
Want to save time and money on your content marketing and still see positive results? SaaSpirin can help! You don’t have to struggle with the challenges of outsourcing writers. Get in touch with us to set your content marketing on autopilot.