Why do many self-publishing authors undervalue their work?

editing and proofreading

Many self-publishing authors undervalue their work. Before considering why that is, it is illuminating to see how freelance editors set their rates in comparison to average weekly earnings, and then apply that to valuing an author’s work.

Many self-publishing authors either do not understand the benefit of having their work professionally edited or consider it to be of little value. As an example of the latter reason, I was recently invited to submit a proposal to proofread a novel intended for self-publication, with the author offering $7 per hour. This may appear to be an extreme example, but it is not uncommon on platforms like Fiverr and Upwork.

Freelancers

Copyediting and proofreading are skills that must be learned and practised to gain the competency and experience needed to edit a broad range of documents in the five main dialects of English. Reference books and materials must also be purchased and kept up-to-date.

Most copyeditors and proofreaders are freelance workers in business for themselves; that is, they are not salaried.

How do freelancers calculate their rates?

A freelancer’s rates reflect not only the value added to the author’s writing, but also all the costs of:

  • Holidays and sickness absence;
  • National Insurance (or equivalent payroll tax if applicable);
  • Pension provision;
  • Continuing professional development (CPD);
  • Office space and utility bills;
  • Reference books and materials;
  • Software and subscriptions;
  • Marketing;
  • Business equipment and supplies; and
  • A reasonable rate of pay.

This means that a freelancer’s rates are not directly comparable with employee remuneration.

Average weekly earnings

The average weekly earnings of a full-time worker in the UK in July 2025 were $907 ($22.68/hour) before taxes, whereas in the USA, it was $1,165 ($29.13/hour) after tax.

Suggested minimum hourly rates

The UK’s Chartered Institute of Editing and Proofreading’s (CIEP) suggested minimum hourly rates for 2025 are:

  • Proofreading – $41
  • Copyediting – $48
  • Substantial editing, rewriting, and development editing – $55

The rates were converted to US dollars at the time of writing.

The most up-to-date evidence of the rates charged by freelancers in the USA comes from the Editorial Freelancers Association (EFA). Based on its Nov 2023-Jan 2024 survey data, the suggested rates are:

  • Proofreading – $36–$45
  • Substantive editing – $48–$57
  • Technical editing – $53–$62

These rates would be higher in July 2025 because of inflation.

The CIEP and EFA point out that rates can be higher for experienced editors, specific genres, or urgent projects.

Comparing these suggested rates with the average weekly earnings shows that a freelancer needs to increase the average weekly earnings per hour, as shown above, by approximately 50% to cover the cost of running their business. That uplift could rise to as much as 65 to 70% for work obtained through freelance platforms such as Fiverr or Upwork. Many authors do not appreciate that freelancers incur these costs.

Freelancers often convert their hourly rate to a cost per word or per 1,000 words and may add a premium for urgent work. They may also give a fixed price for the job.

Why do some self-publishing authors undervalue their work?

Some authors write for recognition and credibility, while others write in the hope of making money from their work. Whatever the reason, writing incurs a cost: the lost opportunity to do something else. Instead of calculating the monetary value of their work, many self-publishing authors assign an emotional value to it.

The simplest way to calculate the value is to multiply the average hourly rate of pay applicable to the author’s location by the number of hours taken to research, write, and revise the piece of prose. The cost of research material, travelling expenses, and all other incidental costs must be added to this. To keep things simple, I will use the 50% enhancement freelancers need to cover the cost of running their business, but I will disregard the incidental expenses.

Let us say that a US-based author spends 144 hours researching, writing, and revising an original piece of prose. That is the approximate time, spread over two 9-day sessions, that it took Ray Bradbury to write the 46,118 words of Fahrenheit 451. The cost of doing so would be $6,292. The book has sold over 10 million copies.

Why then would they not be willing to pay a reasonable rate to have the fruits of their labours copyedited and proofread by an experienced editor? The reason is that many self-publishing authors do not cost their work, and consequently, they either do not know its value or they undervalue it. The trend toward using AI-generated content exacerbates a situation where the “author” invests little physical, mental, or emotional effort in their manuscript.

Having failed to value their work or undervalued it, many self-publishing authors place scant value on having it professionally edited. When they do, they are often only willing to pay an unrealistic rate for the work. This is tantamount to saying the prose they painstakingly created is not worth the few hundred dollars cost of having it professionally edited. This is false economy. Good authors know it and have their writing professionally edited, while many inexperienced authors, especially those who are self-publishing, do not value their work correctly or at all.

10 Simple Rules for Writing Numbers

editing and proofreading

Writing numbers can be confusing. There are so many style guides and rules to follow that it is little wonder many people get confused.

If you follow these ten simple rules, you will not be confused, and your spelling of numbers will be consistent.

Rue 1: At the beginning of a sentence

Always spell numbers at the beginning of a sentence, irrespective of how small or large they are.

Examples:

Four people were in the car.

Seventy-four thousand spectators watched the football match.

This rule applies to ordinal numbers (first, second, etc.), and fractions (quarter, half, etc.).

For example:

Half of all people entitled to vote in the election did not vote.

Rule 2: In the middle of a sentence

Round numbers, ordinal numbers (first, second, third, etc.), and common fractions (half, quarter, third, two-thirds) that appear in the middle of a sentence should be written. Rules three to nine apply to other numbers.

Rule 3: Whole numbers

Subject to rule 1 above, whole numbers up to one hundred should be written out.

Example:

There are fifty musicians in the orchestra.

Rule 4: Decimal numbers

Decimal numbers should be written as figures irrespective of where they appear in the sentence.

Examples:

Only 33% of those entitled to vote in the election did so.

20% of the votes cast were for the Red Party.

Rule 5: Units of measurement

Spell out whole numbers used with a unit of measurement, such as distance, money, time, etc., but do not spell out decimal numbers.

Examples:

It is twenty miles from the service station.

Tickets to the concert are fifty dollars each.

The bus company increased the minimum cost of a single ticket to £2.50

Rule 6: Large non-round numbers

Use commas to separate the digits into thousands and hundreds.

Example: The stadium holds 74,500 spectators.

Rule 7: Very large numbers

When writing very large numbers that are not round, use a numeric figure followed by a spelled-out qualifier.

Example: Astronomers using the James Webb space telescope have discovered a galaxy that is 21.6 million light-years from Earth.

Rule 8: Two numbers in a row

When two numbers need to be placed consecutively, write out one of them and use digits for the other.

Examples:

Only the first three 10-year-olds will receive a prize.

Only the first 3 ten-year-olds will receive a prize.

Rule 9: Dates

Specific years should be written as numbers, but decades and centuries must be spelled out.

Example:

The Social Democratic Party was formed in 1981 but merged with the Liberal Party in the eighties to form the Liberal Democrats.

Rule 10: Numbers in titles or headings

Numbers in titles or headings are not spelled out.

Example:

10 Simple Rules for Writing Numbers

Conclusion

Following these ten simple rules will ensure your writing is consistent, accurate, and professional. Knowing when to spell out numbers or use numerals allows you to focus on creating engaging content.

Putting the cart before the horse

editing and proofreading,

I have recently worked with several visually creative people. They all created visually impressive content supported by text. Some were online content, and others were dual-purpose online and offline content in PDF format. They all had one thing in common.

Words were not their strong suit. That is not a problem, as there are many talented freelance content creators who could write the text for them. Unfortunately, none of the creatives thought of doing that. Instead, and working with a graphic designer, they ploughed ahead and created the content.

It was then that our creatives noticed a problem. Notwithstanding that they had reviewed their text, there were spelling and grammatical errors, and the text was poorly written. This detracted from the visual content, resulting in a poor user experience.

This is where I was brought in.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet

I improved the readability of the text and corrected the grammar and spelling mistakes in all but one case (more about that later). I worked collaboratively with the creatives and their respective graphic designers.

Since the 1500s, Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet has been used as dummy text to create the layout of a book. In the 1960s, Lorem ipsum was made popular by typeface manufacturer Letraset, who offered pages of Lorem ipsum as rub-down transfer sheets, widely used in the pre-computer era for layouts. This practice was adopted in the 1980s in Aldus Corporation’s Pagemaker software and brought Lorem ipsum into the digital printing age, but none of the graphic designers had done this. None of them had heard of Lorem ipsum dolor!

Most of the graphic designers happily substituted dummy text in their layout so that I could work on the real text. The result was that the text was more readable and free of grammatical and spelling errors.

A tried and tested process

Over centuries of experience, the publishing industry has developed and refined a process as relevant in the digital age as it was in the days of the quill pen. That is, all the text editing stages are completed before the manuscript is sent to the typesetter.

The copy editor’s work informs the book designer of the number of pages in the book, where pictures or illustrations are to go, and how the text fits in with or around them. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet is often used to fine-tune the layout.

The proofreader makes a final edit of the ‘proofs’ the printer will use to ensure there are no grammatical or spelling mistakes.

Then, and only then, is the book printed.

Most, but not all

The advent of desktop publishing and self-publishing are welcome developments enabling many people to self-publish their work, but there is a negative side. The negative is that the several stages of editing the text before design are often omitted or, as in these cases, are an afterthought. The design cart is put before the editing horse. The results are evident in the negative comments about some self-published books, for example, on Amazon.

I said earlier that most creatives and graphic designers were happy to collaborate with me to achieve a superior-quality offering; one graphic designer, however, would not do so. Their design was immutable, including the text, notwithstanding that it contained spelling and grammatical errors.

As it was clear that I could not perform my role to a professional standard, I thanked the creative for their enquiry and declined the invitation to work with them on their project. What would you have done?

The fine line between mentoring and cheating in academic proofreading

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Is it cheating in academic proofreading to improve AI-created text so that it is undetectable?

The following two case studies show the fine line between mentoring the author and cheating.

This ethical question arose twice recently. Both cases involved postgraduate students who had created academic writing using ChatGPT and openly admitted it.

Student #1. This student was a doctoral student. Before submitting a 2,200-word section of his thesis to his supervisor, the student ran it through Turnitin, which is widely used in colleges and schools to detect plagiarism and content created by AI. Several sections of the text were flagged as being created by AI.

The student wanted those parts of the text to be edited and rewritten, without loss of meaning, so that it would pass the Turnitin test.

Student #2. This student was also a doctoral student. He intended to have his 37,500-word article published in a peer-reviewed journal. It, too, had been created using ChatGPT and had been submitted to his professor for review. A number of amendments were suggested as at least some of the AI-generated content had been detected.

The student wanted his entire article edited and rewritten where necessary so that any AI-generated content would not be detected.

What do the universities say?

Most universities actively encourage students to ensure their papers are edited and proofread and have a proofreading policy or guidelines that must be followed. As an example, here’s what the University of Warwick said:

“Third-party academic proofreaders are not expected to actively amend existing, or create new, content in draft work; instead, they should support the student by identifying errors and or making suggestions relating to – but not creating – content. The University considers the role of the proofreader to be more akin to that of a mentor rather than a content producer or editor of the work.”

The difference between ethical academic proofreading and cheating

Ethical proofreading involves the following:

  • Highlighting areas of the discussion that may require fact-checking
  • Commenting on any arguments that do not make sense in the context of the rest of the paper
  • Correcting spelling, grammatical, and punctuation errors
  • Pointing out any material or language that isn’t appropriate, for instance, the use of slang or derogatory terms
  • Identifying areas where the writing is unclear
  • Highlighting citation errors or a lack of appropriate citation
  • Ensuring the paper is formatted in a professional and polished manner
  • Pointing out problems, but not solving them

Essay editing or proofreading is cheating if the editor does any of the following:

  • Performs any type of research on behalf of the student
  • Rewrites sections of text because they are factually incorrect
  • Answers the essay prompt on the student’s behalf
  • Significantly alters the content or meaning of the text
  • Changes the main ideas or arguments
  • Adds citations and references
  • Composes an analysis for the student
  • Significantly restructures the whole essay

How did I approach each case, and what did I do?

Student #1. A careful reading of the text showed that the words used and the language style could be altered without altering the author’s meaning and without restructuring the text.

As it was a case of eliminating filler words, replacing academese with plain English, and using an active voice wherever the context allowed, I concluded that it was ethical for me to undertake the work requested.

The result was that my Plagium check showed that the content had a 0% probability of being plagiarised. I also ran the text through an online AI checker that reported the text to have been human-created.

Student #2. The draft of the 37,500-word article was presented to me with the intention that I should resolve the professor’s comments and suggested alterations, and then rewrite the document as required using a style and language that would pass a Turnitin test.

As is common in articles submitted for publication, there was a declaration that the essay was the work of the author.

Applying the above criteria, it was obvious that I would have to:

  • Significantly alter the content; and
  • Significantly restructure the essay.

These actions would assist academic fraud. Furthermore, if I did the above, the essay would not be entirely the author’s work, and he could not, therefore, declare that it was.

I declined the job.

What would you have done in each case?

Caveat venditor!

editing and proofreading, ,

This article is aimed at sellers, but there are some things herein that buyers should also be aware of.

1. Casting the net wide

The first thing to be aware of as a service provider is that it is common for a buyer to cast their net wide and will usually choose the first offer they receive. Not all buyers say whether they have invited multiple service providers to do the job. So, as a seller, it would be prudent to proceed on the assumption that they have.

There is a variation on this, which again is not often disclosed to the seller at the outset. That is, the buyer wants a backup in case the preferred service provider is unable to do the job for some reason.

This may make sense to the buyer. However, from the service provider’s perspective, there is uncertainty about whether they have secured the work. Because of the uncertainty, service providers are likely to accept a firm offer from another buyer to do work. If that happens, the buyer could find themselves in a situation in which multiple service providers withdraw their offers.

An example

Something along these lines happened to me earlier today. I was asked to work on two urgent documents. The timescale was short. I responded with an offer within ten minutes of receiving the request. A short time afterwards, I was informed that another service provider had been awarded the job the previous day. The previous day! Naturally, I withdrew my offer. Later, the original service provider dropped out, and the buyer placed an order with me, but by that time, I had accepted another brief and was working on it. The buyer was not pleased that he was not at the head of the queue, and not even in second place – caveat emptor!

Helping themselves

Buyers could help themselves by informing prospective service providers that they had invited other service providers to bid for the work. It is unscrupulous to invite bids for work after it had already been given to someone else. If that deal falls through for whatever reason, buyers should be honest and say the work had been given to another service provider, but they had to drop out. Openness helps to build trust and confidence between the parties.

2. Unscrupulous buyers

There are unscrupulous buyers. Although such people form a tiny minority of buyers, as a service provider, you will come across such people at some time in your career. These are people for whom you have done a good job and met their requirements in the provision of your service, but who nevertheless reject your work for some vague and spurious reason. They hide behind the dispute resolution procedure, knowing the platform will take their side and that they get to keep the fruits of their labour without having to pay for it.

I try to protect myself by making it clear to prospective buyers that the offer I made to them is subject to my terms and conditions and that no copyright or other intellectual property right in my work passes to the buyer until I have received payment in full.

I also make a Google search against sections of the work I created to see if the unscrupulous buyer has used my copyrighted work. If they have, I always make a copyright claim. Fortunately, I have rarely had to do this, but it was effective when I did.

I block every buyer who behaves in this way.

Conclusion

Open, honest communication between the buyer and service provider helps build trust and confidence, leading to a successful collaboration that benefits both parties.

Briefs: The top 2 reasons why they are declined

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My experience with other platforms is that there are two main reasons why briefs are declined. To help buyers and service providers achieve the best outcome for a brief, I have examined these reasons in this article. It is not uncommon for a brief to be rejected for both reasons.

1. The brief is unclear

I have seen many instances where a brief has been posted that insufficiently describes what the service provider is being asked to do. This is often due to the buyer not understanding what work they want done or them communicating it poorly. If the brief does not adequately describe what needs to be done, how can the service provder meet the brief?

There are two possible outcomes:

  • The brief is accepted by a service provider who is willing to take the risks inherent in the job; or
  • The service provider seeks more information.

The risk inherent in the first possible outcome is that the interpretation of the brief by the service provider does not meet the buyer’s expectations notwithstanding that they were inadequately formulated and or poorly communicated. Both parties lose in such a situation, but the bigger loser is the service provider whose reputation may be injured and they might not receive payment.

Asking the buyer for clarification of the brief is the better course of action.

If you are a buyer, try to describe the brief is as much detail as possible. If you receive a request for more information from the service provider, you should answer their questions as best you can.

I decline the brief if the buyer cannot describe the work they want to be done with sufficient clarity, or if they do not reply to my request for more information.

2. The buyer’s expectations are unrealistic

There are three areas in which the buyer might have unrealistic expectations:

  • The skill and expertise required to do the job;
  • The time required to do the job; and
  • The cost.

In most cases, the buyer is unrealistic in all of these aspects. This finding is backed up by research conducted by Fiverr.

When I come across unrealistic expectations, I communicate with the buyer to politely inform them that they are being unrealistic. Sometimes, this has resulted in the buyer revising their expectations and a successful brief ensued. However, most often the buyer failed to respond, so I declined the brief.

Skill and expertise

A brief I have often seen is for proofreading and verifying the accuracy of a document translated from another language. This requires three levels of expertise:

  1. Fluency in the original language;
  2. Fluency in the language of the translated document; and
  3. Proofreading and editing skills.

What the buyer really wants is a bilingual proofreader, but they have not limited the brief to such service providers.

I have recently seen a brief that required the service provider to not only proofread an academic medical science document, but for them also to verify all of the references to ensure they were correct as well as their proper citation.

Do not accept the brief if you do not have the skills required to do the job properly.

Time required to do the job

A simple and straight forward proofreading job of a short document can be completed within a few hours, that is not the case for complex tasks and or where additional services are to be provided. Checking references and citations is laborious and time consuming. Plagiarism and AI checks add to the time to complete the job as well as additional cost.

Not all buyers appreciate how much time will be required to do their job. So, as a service provider, you should tell the buyer how long you think it will take you to complete the job and how much it will cost.

However, many briefs are eleventh hour jobs where the buyer wants the service provider to drop everything and complete their task within a few hours – a day at most. Many buyers use briefs as a way of avoiding paying a premium for extra fast delivery. This is unethical.

If the buyer will not allow sufficient time for you to do the job properly, you should decline the brief.

Cost

Buyers who post their job on sites such as Fourerr or Fiverr, for example, often have a misconception that the job will only cost them a handful of dollars as both of these sites started out offering jobs for four and five dollars respectively. This is no longer the case, but the perception will be reflected in the buyer’s budget or the price they are willing to pay as shown against their brief. This is often much less than you would charge for doing the job.

This is the buyer dictating an unrealistic price for the job. It is up to you to accept or reject their price. Instead of rejecting it outright, you could make them a counter offer on your terms and conditions. The buyer then has either to accept your counter offer or reject it.

If I am interested in doing the job, assuming the brief is sufficiently clear, I send the buyer my price and timescale for doing the work on my terms and conditions. They can either accept my offer or they can reject it.

If the buyer will not pay a fair price for you to do the job properly, you should decline the brief.

Communication with the buyer

If you get a brief from a buyer that is deficient or unrealistic in any way, contact the buyer to ask for more information or to suggest how their expectations could be better managed instead of rejecting it immediately. There may be some negotiation resulting in an amended brief that both parties are happy with. That would be a postiive outcome for both the buyer and the service provider.

Good communication between the buyer and service provider is essential to achieving a successful outcome on the brief.

The difference between editing and proofreading, and my service levels

editing and proofreading,

This article explains the difference between editing and proofreading, and the service levels I provide.

Except for academic writing, to which special considerations apply, outside of the printed book publishing setting, there is a clear differentiation between editing and proofreading, most author’s think that editing is part and parcel of proofreading. They are separate, but overlapping, functions.

Editing explained:

As a proactive editor, I will recommend changes and suggestions to improve the overall quality of your writing, particularly in relation to use of language and expression.

After editing, your language will be sharper and consistent, your expression clear and the overall readability of your writing enhanced.

These are some key questions that I will consider when editing a piece of prose:

  • Have proper words been chosen to express your ideas? Does it sounds as if you have consulted a list of synonyms provided by your word processing program? If you have, I will spot it.
  • Have you used an active voice? An active voice is not always appropriate, such as in academic writing, but writing that is too passive does not make for compelling reading.
  • Is the tone appropriate for your audience?
  • Have you used too many words? Using unnecessary, frivolous and filler words can irritate readers. Use as many words as are necessary, but not one more!
  • Have you used gendered language appropriately?
  • Have you used artificial intelligence to create some or all of your prose?

Proofreading explained:

Proofreading is the process of correcting errors in writing, such as grammatical, spelling, punctuation and other language mistakes. Detecting these errors before publication is an important process.

These are the key questions I consider when proofreading a piece of writing:

  • Are there any spelling errors?
  • Are full stops, commas, colons, semicolons, etc., used correctly?
  • Have words that sound like one another but have different meanings, such as there, their and they’re, been used correctly?
  • Have quotation marks and apostrophes been used appropriately?
  • Are there any double spaces, particularly after full stops?

It would be an error to think that eliminating mistakes and inconsistencies in a document is a quick and undemanding job that a friend or family member, or even a computer program, could easily do.

A professional editor is a far more accomplished proofreader than your typical friend or family member and any computer program you may use as a writing aid. Both editing and proofreading take time to do as we have to be meticulous. We may have to go through your prose several times. Friends or family members are often unable to devote the time required to do the job in the way that a professional editor does.

Let me give you two examples:

In the first example, I recently had the privileged of being commissioned to proofread the typescript of a student text book, the main body of which was some 85,000 words. The author assured me that he had read through the typescript several times as had two other people. He thought that having his typescript professionally proofread was just a formality; consequently, he placed little value on it. He was more than a little red-faced when I found well over a hundred grammatical and spelling errors that he and his two friends had missed.

In the second example, I was commissioned by a professional person to edit and proofread an important business report. The final draft of which had been reviewed by no fewer than five other professionals that had helped draft the document. Because of the importance of the document, the lead author commissioned me to edit and proofread it. I found an embarrassingly large numbers of errors. My fee was considered to be money well spent by the lead author.

Both of these are examples of scotomisation, which is the psychological tendency in people to see what they want to see and not see what they don’t want to see. As an editor and proofreader, I am trained to see what the author has written.

A professional editor understands the conventions of English writing and the nuances of the language. They are trained to be methodical; their experience enables them to identify and eliminate the common errors that often occur in all forms of writing from novels to academic papers. In addition, they can also identify inconsistent terminology, incorrect spelling, and formatting errors in your document.

Service levels

As I have more than one service level, it is necessary to give them names so they can be differentiated other than by price, and for the buyer to know what service they want.

Basic proofreading: The editor works with the text line by line to eradicate errors, etc, which is why it is sometimes called line editing. What many authors, especially self-publishing authors, do not understand is that proofreading is the final stage of the editorial process before the typescript is set in print.

Standard proofreading: This is proofreading with editing and light rewriting. This is also known as copy editing.

Premium proofreading: This is greater rewriting and sentence restructuring to enhance the flow of the text than in standard proofreading, plus fact checking. It can be considered to be enhanced copy editing.

Academic writing: This is standard proofreading plus the ethical considerations applicable to academic writing. It includes a plagiarism and an AI check.

Legal proofreading: England and Wales jurisdiction only. This is standard proofreading that requires a knowledge of legal terminology, legal concepts, case citations, and the style and format of legal documents.

Epilogue

Sadly, there are many authors that, having invested a great deal of time and emotional energy in creating their prose, place little value on having it properly edited and proofread. Hopefully, you are not among their number.