staff writers, freelancers or agency
Who should you delegate to write texts about complex IT products? Should you trust contractors or build your own editorial office? Should you hire freelancers or a content agency? Are freelancers different too? I’ll tell you about my experience and compare solutions, as a person who has been both in the role of a customer and in the role of a content author.
My name is Vlad Motroshilov. It so happens that I have been on both sides of the content creation process. Previously, I worked as a product marketer in IT companies and acted as a customer of texts, and then I left the workforce and decided to fill the shortage of authors in a narrow niche.
I've had to do a lot of writing and editing myself before. Often this was due to the fact that there was simply no one to delegate some content tasks to. I spent a lot of time searching through hundreds of copywriters on the market and finding more or less suitable specialists to write marketing texts about technical products.
After talking with my colleagues in the workshop, I realized that the problem of selecting personnel and contractors is more acute than I imagined. It continued to be a pain for IT product marketers, and I decided to help them save time when searching for authors:
Filled the empty niche of services for creating high-quality B2B content
Compared alternative options and proposed solutions to personnel problems
For comparison, I have identified 4 groups of content authors. I divided freelancers into two groups: copywriters and B2B authors. You'll soon find out why.
Copywriters
Who is this
Freelancers who write texts professionally. They work with one-time or regular orders from several clients. Can be combined with main job.
What problems do they solve?
Suitable for writing simple B2B materials on detailed tasks. They write articles on business topics based on similar materials from the Internet. For which you do not need to deeply understand the product and collect high-quality texture.
How much are
300-1000 rubles per thousand characters, 3-10 thousand rubles per material.
Where to look
Freelancer exchanges, specialized telegram channels
pros
They are inexpensive
They write quickly
They write a lot. One copywriter can produce 10-15 articles per month
Minuses
They don’t understand B2B specifics
Do not understand IT products
Do not immerse themselves in industry specifics and professional vocabulary
Large amounts of time spent on selection and editing in several iterations
Cooperation experience
In the management accounting service, I managed to solve the problem of blogging on Klerk.ru with the help of copywriters found in specialized telegram channels. It took 2 months to select and adapt several authors who wrote articles on assignments from the content plan. From approximately 200 responses, we were able to select two freelancers with experience in financial topics, who answered almost all questions about writing articles for business.
In a marketing service for e-commerce, with the help of copywriters, we solved SEO problems for broad, near-target queries. They did a good job with this. We received detailed tasks from a SEO specialist with references to similar materials and provided unique texts. But they were unable to write product articles and customer cases based on the collected invoices.
There was a total lack of understanding of the technical side of the product, its use scenarios and industry specifics. The materials required actual rewriting, so I ended up continuing to do them myself and started looking for a contributing editor on staff.
The conversion was approximately the same as in the first case – 1%. To select 2 copywriters, we had to sift through 200 responses and check about 20 test tasks.
Conclusion
If you need B2B product materials, I don’t recommend wasting your time looking for rare diamonds in the copywriting market. Most likely, you will not solve your problems this way.
If you need a lot of content on assignments and do not require immersion in the product, marketing and industry specifics, then this solution may be optimal. If Chat GPT doesn't do it for free.
Staff Writers
Who is this
Full-time copywriters and contributing editors who make up the company's internal editorial team.
What problems do they solve?
They maintain blogs and social networks for the company. Participate in the creation of brand media. They write cases, product materials, useful and entertaining content.
How much are
80-130 thousand rubles per month.
Where to look
hh.ru, specialized telegram channels.
pros
Working full time
Study the product in detail
Keep track of product releases and events
Use internal company knowledge
Communicate informally with experts on the team
Minuses
Full-time specialists are expensive. High taxes
Significant expenditure of resources on selection
It is necessary to create an editorial structure
Complicated dismissal and replacement procedure
Cooperation experience
The problems of finding authors were about the same as when selecting freelance copywriters, only even more dramatic. There are specialists on the market who write well, but finding people with marketing knowledge and experience in B2B IT is not easy.
I spent 9 months looking for a writing editor for a marketing service blog! Several times I posted a vacancy on hh.ru and in telegram channels to search for copywriters. I went through hundreds of resumes and conducted dozens of interviews. The first editor was fired 3 weeks after starting work. The second one came up and continued working after I left the company.
It may be a coincidence, but colleagues from a friendly B2B service spent exactly the same amount of time selecting an editor.
Conclusion
If you are creating a large brand media, in-house writers are the most reliable solution for regularly producing quality materials. But be prepared for a significant investment of budget and time to build the system.
If the volume of work is small or irregular, it may be worth considering other ways to collaborate with authors.
Content agencies
Who is this
Specialized content agencies.
What problems do they solve?
They maintain blogs and social networks for the company. They write articles in the media and case studies. Develop content strategies.
How much are
20-130 thousand rubles per unit of content, depending on the agency. The budget is calculated individually. There are restrictions on the minimum order – for example, in one of the agencies it starts from 150 thousand rubles.
Where to look
Search engines, ratings, recommendations
pros
They offer comprehensive services: strategy, promotion, design, websites
Many authors. Ready for large volumes immediately after opening an order
Can quickly deploy an external edition
Have experience working with popular content resources
Minuses
They are expensive and there are minimum order restrictions.
Prefer to work with large customers
Authors and editors may not understand B2B topics and IT products
There is no direct contact between the customer and the author
The authors are not immersed in the product and do not follow releases
Stream work with clients
Cooperation experience
Since I always wanted to build internal newsrooms, my only experience was working with a content agency that specialized in IT texts. I decided to test writing an article about one of the products of the marketing platform. As a result, after two interviews and three iterations, the author still did not understand the topic and the agency gave up.
Conclusion
I will not conclude from a single experience that all contracting agencies are not suitable for IT companies. I follow several content agencies that have interesting cases in promoting their brand. Perhaps some of them will be a good solution for you if you don’t have time to build an internal editorial office and work with freelancers. You need to look at specialization and the availability of cases with B2B products.
It confuses me that the final authors in content agencies are the same freelance copywriters, whose poor qualifications we discussed above. The agency pays them 3-10 thousand rubles, the rest of the amount you pay for editing, service and the agency’s brand. Perhaps they are better at selecting and training writers to work with B2B tasks, but for me this is an asterisk question.
B2B authors
Who is this
Specialists with real marketing and product experience working inside B2B IT companies who, for some reason, decided to go free and create content for colleagues.
What problems do they solve?
They write product articles and customer cases. They create marketing materials, texts for websites, and develop value propositions. They maintain company blogs.
How much are
30-100 thousand rubles per unit of content. There may be restrictions on the minimum order – for example, I have from 150 thousand rubles.
Where to look
Linkedin, telegram channels, recommendations
pros
Understands IT products and industry vocabulary
Have experience working on the Customer's side, speak the same language as marketing specialists
Know the specifics of B2B marketing and sales, the target audience
They immerse themselves in the internal kitchen of the company, follow product releases, communicate with the team
There is personal contact between the customer and the author
Understand the company’s goals and offer solutions to marketing problems
Small number of clients, lack of flow and individual approach
Minuses
Piece specialists, few offers on the market
They are expensive
Limited orders
Selectivity by industry and product
There are no ready-made editions for scaling
Cooperation experience
I had no experience working with such specialists on the Customer’s side. I talked with colleagues when they applied for the vacancy of a B2B blog editor at hh.ru in 2022. The level of understanding of product and marketing tasks at the first meeting impressed me. Some of them previously completed freelance content tasks in the Russian offices of large IT companies.
I can refer to my own successful experience of working as a B2B author with IT clients: SaaS services and software companies. I do cases, conduct interviews, write articles, texts for marketing websites, special projects. Clients are happy.
Conclusion
If you manage to find such a specialist and a match happens, this is a good replacement for full-time writers. You can hire a content specialist who is not available full-time for one-time orders or for part-time work. You will have more experience in marketing IT products, but no less immersion in the product.
You'll get a writer with B2B, IT and marketing qualifications not available to agency writers and editors at similar prices. If you do not need in one window: a large volume of materials, an integrated approach and the rapid creation of an external edition. In this case, contact the agency.
Summary
Choose a solution that suits your needs. For example, you have great content marketers and editors, but you don’t have enough hands to implement all the projects. Or the company has no content creation competencies at all.
If you need product materials, I don’t recommend wasting time looking for rare diamonds in the copywriting market
For product content, cases, website texts, a B2B author may be more suitable
In practice, solutions are often mixed depending on the level of tasks and the availability of resources. Marketers can collect internal and external newsrooms. Hire freelancers for mass tasks, content agencies for comprehensive promotion, and B2B authors for product materials.
If your IT company needs quality B2B content, write me. Let's discuss your tasks.
