How Do I Hire A Ghostwriter? 3 Important Steps
How Do I Hire A Ghostwriter? I hear that question a lot.
The process can seem overwhelming. The moment you start searching on Google, you’ll find hundreds of individuals and businesses, all claiming to be the best. Undoubtedly, a few of them are great. Some are average, and others are not-so-great. How do you separate the good from the mediocre from the bad?
Finding a Ghostwriter
The first task is to find a ghostwriter. That may be more difficult than you think. Oh sure, there are plenty of people out there who claim to be good writers and will gladly take your money. But, how do you find a good one?
- You can contact me. Set up an appointment for a free consultation and we’ll discuss your project.
- Search for ghostwriters on Google or other search engines.
- Search Reedsy or other content mills.
- Work with a ghostwriting agency to assign a staff ghostwriter to your project.
- Ask for one in writer’s groups.
The Free Consultation
The first step to hiring a ghostwriter is to set up an appointment for your free consultation. Any reputable ghostwriter will be happy to give you a free consultation of 30 minutes to an hour. Click here to set up one with me.
During the consultation, take as much time as you need to explain your project, your goals, and anything else that’s pertinent to your book or other written material.
Be ready to talk about your book, articles, or whatever you want written.
Some questions asked during the consultation include:
- What is the book about?
- Is it fiction or non-fiction?
- If the book is fiction, what is the genre?
- Why are you creating it?
- How does your book help you further your goal?
- Who is the audience for your book?
- How do you want to publish the book (self-publish or traditional)?
Don’t worry if you don’t have the answers for these questions. We will discuss them during the interview because the answers are important to how the book is written. For example, if the audience is engineers who are highly technical, the book will be written very differently than it is intended to be read by high school students.
The interview can be done via phone if you’re based in the United States. Outside the United States, Zoom can be used. This tool allows teleconferencing at no charge.
The interview may be recorded with your permission.
If you interview with me, you and I will wrap our arms around your book project. We will determine the word or page count for the finished book, the number of chapters, the style is to be written (technical or casual, for example), and other information.
The Ghostwriting Contract (or Statement of Work)
Always insist on a written agreement from your ghostwriter. Any professional ghostwriter that doesn’t work based on a statement of work (or contract) is an amateur.
A statement of work should cover the following things:
- Deliverables – what is the ghostwriter going to deliver?
- Schedule if applicable.
- Charges and rates. These can be by the word or hour (or both), or by the page.
- Responsibilities – who is responsible for what?
- What is NOT included in the engagement.
- Limits such as number of revisions allowed, number of interviews, and so on.
- Additional charges when limits are exceeded.
- How can the agreement be terminated?
- What is the down payment? What are the progress payments?
How Do I Hire A Ghostwriter?
Once I’ve got a good grasp of what the finished book will look like, the ghostwriter should be able to put together a statement of work, which will contain a quotation, and send it to you for your review. Once you sign the contract and pay the down payment, work can begin. Hiring a ghostwriter begins once the SOW is signed and the down payment is paid.
This entire process of interviewing and coming up with the quote can be completed in 24 hours.
For more information about “how do I hire a ghostwriter?” see this article.
