CURRENT FEED · April 19, 2024 · 00:28:25
How to Charge More for Ghostwriting
Alice Sullivan explains how she moved from low hourly editing rates to $150,000 ghostwriting engagements—and why pricing, specialization, responsiveness, and the willingness to hear no all work together.
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Open in Spotify ↗When Alice Sullivan told me she charged $150,000 for a ghostwriting engagement, I wanted to understand the path—not just the price. How does a writer move from low hourly editing rates to premium, six-figure projects without pretending the fear disappears?
Alice had spent 23 years in publishing when we recorded this conversation. She began inside traditional publishing, later went freelance, and gradually raised her ghostwriting fees from roughly $5,000 to $10,000–$12,000, then $30,000, $50,000, $65,000, $75,000, $95,000, $125,000, and finally $150,000. What stood out to me was that each increase changed more than her revenue. It changed her client pool, workload, boundaries, and confidence.
In this conversation, you’ll learn:
- why pricing conversations with peers are essential;
- how a higher price filters for a different kind of client;
- why fewer yeses can still create a healthier business;
- how Alice practices saying a new rate without negotiating against herself;
- why specialization makes premium positioning easier; and
- the simple Reedsy habits that became a six-figure lead source.
Stop Pricing in the Dark
Alice’s earliest freelance rates came from the only reference point she had: what her publishing employer had paid freelancers. She had also absorbed a workplace culture in which people were discouraged from talking about compensation. When she went independent, that silence followed her.
The turning point came when her lawyer reviewed her contracts and told her that she was charging less than half what comparable professionals charged despite having more experience. Alice did not suddenly become more skilled during that conversation. She gained better market information.
That challenged me because my instinct is often to ask whether the work itself has changed enough to justify a higher fee. Alice’s story shows that the existing price may have been based on incomplete information in the first place.
For freelancers who have no benchmark, Alice pointed to the Editorial Freelancers Association rate chart as a useful starting reference. It is not a ceiling or a rule, but it gives a writer something more substantial than guesswork.
Raise Rates in Stages—and Expect Discomfort
Alice did not leap from a $5,000 project to a $150,000 project. She raised her fee repeatedly as her experience, process, and confidence developed. The jump from roughly $10,000–$12,000 to $30,000 felt especially uncomfortable, and it cost her clients.
That loss was frightening because freelance income was paying her bills. But one or two clients at $30,000 could replace the revenue from four or five lower-priced projects. She was able to earn the same amount—or more—with less work and more attention available for each client.
“It only takes one or two yeses every time.”
The lesson is not that every ghostwriter should copy Alice’s number. It is that a price increase changes the business model. Measuring success only by the percentage of prospects who say yes can make a healthier model look like failure.
Price Is a Filter, Not Just a Number
One of the ideas I kept returning to was price as a filter. Every positioning decision attracts some clients and repels others. Price does the same thing.
Alice said she regularly received eight to thirteen inquiries in a month, yet sometimes only one—or none—was a fit at her price. She did not need all of them. She needed the right engagement. One prospect even told her he chose her because she was the most expensive writer he found and expected excellence from someone with her experience and fee.
I have seen a version of that at Dinosaur House. Some buyers do not want the least expensive way to make a book. They want to remove uncertainty. A premium price, supported by professional work and a clear process, can signal that they are hiring someone who will carry the project responsibly.
A no is therefore not always evidence that the fee is wrong. It may be evidence that the filter is working.
Confidence Is Something You Practice
Alice did not describe confidence as a personality trait that appears before a price increase. She practices saying the number. She writes it down, visualizes the sales conversation, says the rate aloud, and then practices being quiet.
That last part matters. When a freelancer feels uncomfortable, it is easy to state the price and immediately begin explaining, discounting, or negotiating against it. Alice rehearses the pause so the prospect can respond to the actual offer.
Then one client accepts the new price, and the abstract possibility becomes evidence. The confidence grows after the action, not entirely before it.
I admitted that even after several clients had paid $10,000 for Dinosaur House projects, I could still feel the insecurity after a sales conversation. The practical takeaway for me was that uncertainty does not mean the price is dishonest. It may simply mean my self-concept has not caught up to the business yet.
Alice’s Reedsy System Is Simple—and Selective
Roughly a third of Alice’s leads came from referrals, a third from Google, and a third from Reedsy. Her Reedsy results were not built on accepting every inquiry. At the time of our interview, she estimated that nearly 600 messages had led to only about eighteen or nineteen signed projects.
That conversion rate sounds low until you look at the outcome: she said the platform generated more than six figures a year for her while taking about twenty minutes a week.
Her method was straightforward:
- Complete the profile. Show the depth and range of relevant work.
- Respond quickly. Prospects notice responsiveness and enthusiasm for their story.
- Stay selective. Decline projects that do not fit the work, budget, or relationship.
- Ask for reviews. A strong response rate and consistent five-star feedback improved her visibility.
- Accept that most inquiries will not close. The economics work because a small number of excellent-fit projects are valuable.
A Practical Plan for Writers Considering a Rate Increase
- Gather real benchmarks. Talk with peers, trusted advisors, and professional associations instead of relying only on old employer rates.
- Define the work you do best. Specialization makes it easier to explain the value and refer away poor-fit projects.
- Choose the next believable number. You do not have to jump to the final destination in one move.
- Rehearse the conversation. Practice saying the fee clearly and stopping.
- Track fit, not only conversion. Notice which prospects the new price filters in and out.
- Strengthen the experience. Make the process, communication, boundaries, and delivery worthy of the positioning.
- Build referral paths. A prospect who cannot hire you may still be well served by someone you trust.
My biggest takeaway was that premium pricing is not one courageous declaration. It is a system: better information, narrower fit, practiced communication, reliable delivery, and enough patience to hear many noes while waiting for the right yes.
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Read the complete episode transcript28-minute timestamped transcript
COMPLETE EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
How to Find $150K Ghostwriting Clients
This timestamped transcript was generated from the original Writing Better recording and lightly edited to correct names, organizations, and obvious transcription errors. Use the audio player above to hear the conversation in its original form.
0:02What's up Writing Better? It's me your host Timmy Bauer and my guest today is Alice Sullivan. Alice Thank you so much for being a guest on my show. Thank you so much for having me pleasure to be here the topic that we were talking about today is how do ghostwriters find success using Reedsy and You have a very interesting thing. You charge a hundred and fifty thousand dollars per client And I know so many ghostwriters that are not charging nearly that price so I want to talk to you about how does a ghostwriter get to that point where they are able to charge so much and then
0:40When we talked in our last conversation You were you were like, well, I'm not charging a million yet. So I'm excited to pick your brain So but before I do that, could you just give some context? Um, how long have you been a ghostwriter? How did you get into this? Like what's been your journey like as a ghostwriter? Sure, so I have been in book publishing for 23 years now. I was hired Right out of college by one of my professors to edit his content um And then when I realized oh my gosh, I can make money doing this giving my opinion and you know helping people
1:18Um correct their papers and their books I started to uh apply to you know every place locally and Nashville is a big publishing hub So I started writing for magazines. I started working at a children's publishing house I was eventually hired by Thomas Nelson publishers, which um several years ago was uh purchased by HarperCollins and that is where I got my true and official start Um being mentored in the book publishing in traditional book publishing 13 years ago. I decided to go out on my own and I've been a freelancer ever since so that's my journey
1:58So 13 years ago when you went out on your own, what were you charging for ghostwriting back then? So I was doing more editing when I left the corporate world and I was charging you know probably $18 an hour $15 an hour Um, and I was charging that because when I worked at the publishing house Those were the rates that I was paying as a managing editor. That's what I was paying the the editors So that's that's all I knew What does that break out to per project for like a typical book?
2:37So yeah, gosh, it depends but Um You could get paid. I don't know 500 to 700 A book at that rate Okay, it's okay Yeah, I think most people would say that's like way too low Depends on the work you're doing Yeah If it's if if it's developmental stuff and you're really in the work and you're having to move stuff around that's not near enough if you're just Proofreading something that's already been typeset and designed and you're picking out missing commas And you know headers that are wrong then that's maybe okay, but
3:15Yeah, that's all so when did you when did you start ghostwriting? I started ghostwriting in 2003 Okay, I was picked up by the publishing house Strictly to do ghostwriting before I even knew that's what I was doing And then when you went out on your own you were mostly doing editing I was mostly doing editing and some ghostwriting But I will tell you like my very first two ghostwriting projects that I was hired For the publishing house were twelve hundred dollars apiece Hmm, and I I'm pretty sure that the very first book I did on my own was five thousand
3:51I remember many years where my rate was between ten and twelve thousand Yeah, okay. So you hung out in that price point for a while. Yes, and then Um, when did you start increasing from there? Eight years into being a freelancer I I had a conversation with my lawyer And she was reviewing some contracts and I just sort of off-handedly said hey, by the way I know you do a lot of entertainment law and IP law Are my rates competitive with my peers and she said no you're charging less than half and you have twice, you know
4:29Twice the experience. So that was my big shock like oh my gosh But I had I had not had any of those conversations before because coming out of the The corporate world I had already gotten my hand slapped twice For talking about salary You know, there was this I think it's illegal now But back when I was working at the publishing house, you were not allowed to talk about how much you made because they paid everybody different prices and notoriously the men were paid more than the women and Just all sorts of craziness and they didn't want you to have conversations
5:05And so when I left and became a freelancer, it never occurred to me that that rule no longer applied I just didn't do it And so it wasn't until my lawyer said what she said that I was like gosh I need to start having these conversations with my peers because I have no idea what they're charging Yeah, I don't think that's a thing anymore But it definitely was a big deal for a while and one of the great things about contract work is there's no such Uh You don't have to like no I'm gonna ask everybody like I I ask everybody on this that comes on this podcast What they charge because I want to get a feel for what's common in the industry for me personally like my story
5:43When I came up with the idea for Dinosaur House, which is my children’s book production company I started off. It was just me and an outsourced design team And that I was paying a subscription price for and I was like, okay So I'm gonna ghost write their children’s book off of a Zoom call And then I'm gonna send the work, uh with the illustration notes to the outsourced design team And then what I get back is going to be the children’s book and then I package that and publish it and that's the service I had no idea what to charge for it And friends of mine were just like just charge a premium for your time Like how much does how much time does it take you to do the project?
6:18And I was like I was like, uh a few hours. Honestly Um, they were like just charge 500 bucks I was like who's gonna pay 500 bucks and then like literally like I was in a group of people They were like I'll I'll buy one I'll buy one I'll buy one and somebody else was like I'll buy two And so my first price was 500 dollars and then every client that I got from there Would sign on and then they would say I'm in and also you're charging way too little Like but but give me that price, but your next client needs to pay a lot more And then I just steadily increased my price from there Yeah, that's really what I did too after I had that conversation. I
6:56I remember the big like a big thing for me was I I moved up to 30 000 and that felt It felt uncomfortable because I was hanging out in the 10 to 12, you know, but I moved up to 30 From 30 I went to 50 then I went to 65 then I went to 75 95 125 and now I'm at 150 so it has been a gradual progression over many years um, but with With more time in the industry with better processes um
7:32I feel far more confident now at what I'm charging Than I ever have Yeah, um I've talked pricing with so many different people because um in when you run a business The like like a business where you're like paying employees or contractors or whatever. It's um And you're in circles of other people that are also doing that pricing is like a regular conversation that you're having And everybody the the folk it's very funny because In the people that I hang out with everyone is trying to encourage everyone to charge more
8:08um but But not because they would pay that money that money. They're like well someone will someone will pay that Um, and it's just very hard I think when you are either an entrepreneur or a solopreneur To get your head around this idea that there are people out there that will pay these prices that you you wouldn't even think about paying Right. And so maybe you could speak to that a little bit like when you jumped from 12 ish k to 30k How did that affect your business? Well, it alienated a lot of people. I had some uncomfortable conversations because
8:46The first thing that happened when I started telling people what my rates were I lost a lot of clients Um, and that was terribly scary, right? Oh my gosh, because now I'm dependent on On this freelance gig to pay all my bills and I'm losing a lot of clients So there's a lot of anxiety but What I found is when I was confident in saying that's what I charged and I already had experience to show what I had done It only really took me one or two people to say yes at 30 and I would have been doing the same work of taking four or five people
9:21So I was making the same money or more with half as much work and so It you know, it took me having more conversations more people said no than than who said yes Um, but that's how it's gone every single time every time I've raised my rate There have been far more people who have said I can't afford you. I'm sure you're worth it. Can't do it So but it's far more noes than yeses, but it only takes one or two. Yeses every time Yeah Um, what would you say to somebody that's on the fence about this? They've been feeling the squeeze for a long time
10:01about their price But they're afraid to increase it Um, and there's a lot of different reasons that people are afraid to increase it and I'd be really curious to know what your reasons were That you were afraid to increase it But like some of the ones that I can think of would be like having a bunch of clients say no, um feeling like you're ripping people off like feeling like you're Your this is one that I felt which is like if I know that I can do this service at 3k How am I not ripping someone off if I charge 10k? So like that's a that's a mentality. I'd be curious to hear what you would have to say to that
10:38You know what? I've never had that specific worry at all. I think a lot of my issues around money Coming from uh, you know a woman raised in the church in the south. There's all sorts of Beliefs wrapped up into that one of which is you should be glad you have a job at all Um You should I've heard this line several times from people In the faith-based spaces is that you should give me a discount because we share the same faith or something like that You should be doing me a favor
11:15And then of course just made me mad But I think for me I just realized I know that I Am capable and I give excellent work and excellent service And it's a dishonor to myself to not charge an appropriate rate When I know I can deliver excellence and it took me a long time to get to that point But that's where I am right now, how does someone figure out what an appropriate rate is So it's about having those conversations
11:51Um a great place to look is the EFA, the Editorial Freelancers Association If you have no idea where to start, that's a great place They have a drop down on their website that talks about current prices for various, you know, everything editorial for writing editing typesetting Um, I personally think their rates are a little bit low and outdated, but if you have no idea What to charge that's a good place to start and If you ever have somebody who comes back to you and says you're charging too much You can show them like this is an association and this is what they say. I should be charging um
12:29Yeah, so You know, everybody is going to come to their own pricing in their own time Some people will never feel comfortable charging half as much as what I do and you know what that's okay There's really no difference between me charging what I charge now and 250 I just haven't gotten there yet in my head. I'm gonna still deliver the same Excellent experience. I'm still going to you know deliver the same work This is of course my opinion But I I think that's the only difference when you get up there and the numbers is are you know
13:06Are you still giving great service? The difference is more so in your confidence and what you feel comfortable charging Yeah, um, oh man, so many things to talk about um All right. So okay this this last thing that you said 150 no difference between charging that and 250 like um That's what I'm talking about. So like for me personally my own hang up around that is I go like um How am I not like how can I get behind this? if Um, like if if the quality of my service is not increasing
13:44Uh, you know, how how can I justify going from 150 to 250? I don't know. I think that's a personal thing Like I would I would like to say that every book I write I learn a little bit more I get better with my processes. I get better with my timelines Um, you know, and I would say the same thing. Yeah. Yeah and some of my clients I will I'll throw in a cover design or I will throw in you know, uh A few calls with a marketing person so there There are various things you can do
14:21depending on the client's needs that add value another big thing that I do is a lot of coaching a lot of hand holding honestly because I do a lot of trauma memoirs And it's not just helping somebody tell their story. I'm helping them relive some pretty crappy stuff and that takes physical time and emotional energy and so that is you know, all of that adds into what I'm able to offer I'm creating a safe space for them. So Yeah, I mean to the to the question. What's the difference? I don't know that there is a difference really I I know there are
14:59I know of somebody another writer who charges 350 And I I've seen that person's work and I won't disparage it, but I know that I can match it Or do better and and the only difference is The numbers that we're saying Man, so what's it gonna take for you to get there in your head and then start start quoting people that price? um, so for me when I Decide on a price If it says 150, hold the boundary. I have to start manifesting I don't know if that sounds weird or not. I've started thinking about it like, all right when I have the conversation
15:38This is what's going to come out of my mouth mouth. I practice having these conversations with like the wall I have to be comfortable With saying what my price is and then being quiet because I have a tendency to To say my price and then try and talk myself out of it And you never want to do that, you know, yeah, so I start saying it. I start visualizing it. I write it down I think What I've already sort of decided in my mind is that next year at some point I'm going to tip 200 And it only takes one person what I've discovered
16:15It only takes one person to say yes at my new rate and then I have all this confidence because I thought well somebody said yes Yeah, yeah, I wish I could say the same thing but I have charged so currently I charge 10k for Dinosaur House um, and uh And I still have struggled I even though I've gotten I've gotten four clients at that price point Yeah, I still struggle with the confidence of like hey, this is what I charge now Yeah, I don't I I don't know what it would take for that to change
16:53I don't know. I don't know. I mean you can practice with family members, I guess but do you think it's also well, I think it's also Finding your niche like the the clientele. So yeah when I lost a ton of people at 30 000 It was just I had moved beyond that specific clientele and there's nothing wrong with that like There are plenty of people who would I think that's yeah, I think that's another thing So I'm probably not giving myself enough credit here because it's not like in Sales conversations my confident my lack of confidence is showing it's more like just um kind of after the conversation or whatever
17:35Um And each time someone closes it does boost the confidence of going like okay. Okay. There are people that will pay this price um But uh, but I I there is an interesting phenomenon and I think you're probably the perfect perfect person to speak to this Of price as a filter and I try to tell ghostwriters this which is like price We're all we're all doing different things that filter in or out different types of customers And we don't tend to think about price itself as a filter like when you charge a certain price And someone says oh my gosh, you're crazy
18:13All that's happened is you have filtered out somebody that you don't want to be working with anyways, right? And when someone agrees to that price you have filtered in somebody that is a match for the kind of people that you want to be working with Um, and then those people Well, I don't know if this is the case for you But those people tend to know other people that are also that type of person and so you you have filtered For the kinds of clients that just by just by changing your price you have filtered for the kinds of clients That will pay that price. Yes. Yes
18:49So consistently I have received between I think eight and thirteen um Connections every month people finding my website messaging me, emailing me And of those, you know eight to thirteen there may only be one if if any who I'm even a match for at that price range So again, it's a lot of no's But I only need one. Yes, so it's fine um, and in fact, I just had a conversation with somebody last week this guy said I chose you because you were the most expensive that I found online and I have
19:27You know if you've written this many books and you charge this I'm expecting excellence and I was like, yep I had a sales conversation yesterday where I was talking to somebody that was shocked that I was charging so much money and I just told her I was like The kinds of people that I am selling to they are turned on by how much money I'm charging Because the kinds of people that I'm selling to they want to buy something that they're not going to have to worry about They essentially want to pay a price that is like at this price They're they're set they they are working with somebody that they don't have to worry about getting shoddy work or anything like that
20:04And they feel that the higher price makes them feel that sense of confidence of like, okay I am paying for a true professional that is going to give me professional work I don't have to worry about anything going wrong. This is the highest priced person in this market and um and for somebody who Three thousand dollars and ten thousand dollars are both a minor portion a minor fraction of their net worth There's no difference in their minds between those two prices other than one's more and one's less And like you said they're attracted to the one that's more How does it feel for you though having to go through so many no sales conversations
20:46You know, I don't mind because I'm always able to refer them to somebody else and that can be a whole Um a whole new wing of residual income, you know if you have referral fees with all these people So it's very common in publishing Both the writing and the editing and everything else if I refer a client you know, there's a A referral fee that's paid if you, you know have that agreement with somebody And I you know, I don't I don't do children's books. I don't do political books Like there's a whole range of books that I'm just not the right person for But I know people in each of those categories and I am so happy to say like hey
21:24Thank you so much for contacting me. I'm not the right fit for this and here's why but here are two or three people That I vouch for and they're great and you know, wish you the best So I don't mind that at all What's great about what you just said too is just how you've niched down So you've niched down to the one kind of book that you are That you are one of one at that you're just extremely good at you're very efficient at you like doing them and um, that's another thing I just did a pre-interview yesterday with a ghostwriter that was saying that There essentially is no such thing as writer's block writer's block Is just you trying to force yourself to do a project that you shouldn't be doing and I I think you know
22:04Whether she's right or she's wrong. It's an interesting take and obviously her like her overall take is writer's block is a signal to you that you need to be Choosing different projects But it's hard when you're charging a lower price to be choosy about the projects that you pick because You know versus if you if you've got a large price and you're having tons of sales conversations and most of them are noes um You're getting you're you're zeroing in on the the exact kind of projects that you want to be doing with the exact type of clients That you want to be doing. That's another thing
22:39I wanted to ask you about is type of clients How have you experienced that your clients have changed as you've gone up in price? So I would say overall my clients now are all either Are they all CEOs? I think they're all CEOs right now. Yeah, so they're all like C-suite clients. They Have bigger budgets they Are very familiar with you know running businesses? And so when I lay out a process to them, this is how the writing is going to go. They get it instantly They are far easier to work with because yes that they're not micromanagers
23:17No, the higher contract. Yeah the higher the dollar amount The more they want to be told what to do right and and the more The more freedom I have in the project because In my contracts, I lay out all the deliverable dates and what that means what you're getting from me when And all I have to do is meet those and and that's it. You know, I'm I'm abiding by the contract and And that seems to be perfect So anyway, they have been for the most part easier to work with What I have discovered is that people in my own experience
23:53When I've had conversations and people have really focused on the money as it being like Oh, I don't know That might be too much for me. I'm worried about my finances I have to send three kids to college all those things like those are all valid But when they bring them up in conversation to me And I have still gone forward with the book. There are always issues Because I think they were hesitant to begin with Yeah, good point. Good point Um, oh man, there's so much that we could talk about about this But we're pretty much out of time and I didn't ask you about Reedsy. I want to ask you about Reedsy
24:31Yeah, so for so so when we talked in our our first conversation I asked you to break down like how your clients come to you and you said about 33 percent of them are referrals About 33 percent come from Google search which you hired, uh an SEO Contractor to to help you with and then the other 33 percent come through Reedsy So I would love if you could talk about how a ghostwriter gets successful at using Reedsy to get clients So I have been on Reedsy since 2016 And I made sure that my profile, you know is completely filled out. I have all the you know, a huge list of books I've worked on
25:14What what I continuously hear is that when somebody sends me an email through Reedsy I respond quickly And I don't know if that is always what seals the deal because sometimes Most of the times I'm on the higher end of the budget But people appreciate responsiveness and enthusiasm when you're emailing them back about their story And that's a very tiny thing, but it really does make a big difference. And so In the years that I've been on Reedsy I counted it up once and so now it's probably close to 600. I've had 600 separate messages from them different potential clients
25:54And I think I've only signed Maybe 18 or 19 at this point so you can imagine that's a lot of no's Yeah But it's worth it because every year I you know, I make over six figures through their system So, I mean, that would be a yes to me. I think it's worth it just to just you know, sometimes you just decline. Sorry It's not for me and sometimes you have a conversation or several conversations And at the end they say hey, I love I love what you do and you sound amazing. I just can't hack that budget Well, that's okay It's just a small amount of time out of my day
26:31to potentially earn Top dollar what's your time investment? How much time are you putting in Reedsy? Maybe 20 minutes a week Oh my goodness. Okay, that's so low Yeah, it's it's very low Um, is there anything else that you think you might be doing that is helping you to get clients through that platform through Reedsy Um Encouraging my clients to write a review when the project is done again, a very simple
27:07Part of their analytics, but I have a high response rate And I have a lot of five-star reviews And so when you type in ghostwriters in Reedsy I'm one of the top ones that pops up because just because of that Are you on any other platforms because I feel like Reedsy might be well known in the ghostwriting space But I don't know that the average person Knows about Reedsy Maybe not and no I'm not Okay, interesting. So it's Reedsy. It's Google and it's referrals. That's it I
27:42Love it. Uh, you you're such an interesting person to talk to Alice And I would imagine I would imagine that a ghostwriter who's listening to this probably has questions that they wish I would have asked If you're listening on Spotify, there is a way that you can write in a question And then I'm sure that I could reach back out to Alice to ask the question Alice, where are you most active that listeners could connect with you? Ooh, well if you have LinkedIn, I'm on LinkedIn Okay, Alice. Sullivan. Yeah Awesome. So that's Alice. Sullivan. S-u-l-l-i-v-a-n Alice. Thank you so much for taking the time to be on my show
28:21I appreciate it