Should you consider hiring an editor? What are the benefits, and how do you choose the right one? Former literary agent and publishing insider Mary Kole answers all your questions.

Ready to take your writing to the next level? Get access to a whole library of resources from the experts, including videos, workshops, handouts, tips, and exclusive content for writers like you.

Hiring an Editor Transcript

Hello, this is Mary Kole with Good Story Company. Here I am today to talk about a topic that is very near and dear to my heart, which is that of hiring a freelance editor. Now, surprise, surprise, I have spent the last seven almost eight years working as a freelance editor. Before that, I was a literary agent. Of course, I'm an author of a book, "Writing Irresistible Kidlit." I teach thousands of writers and work with them directly on their manuscripts but also all sorts of other different considerations from career advice to moving on from an agent, all of this stuff. So, that's why I'm talking to you today. Now, I am also an editor, and that comes back to everything that I do. I am also an editor, and you can hire me, and I would love it if you hired me, and I would love to work with you one on one. That being said, of course, this video is going to have some sort of preconceived idea that I benefit from advising writers to hire an editor, right?
Because as an editor, if you hire me, I stand to make money.

That being said, I do fine. I work on 500, 600, 700 projects a year sometimes, which boggles my mind to even say it. I'm okay. So, the advice that I give, I want to give as objectively as possible, and I want you to know that I'm not trying to hustle up a sale when I give this advice. So, a lot of writers are curious about hiring an editor. I would say that the absolute nugget of truth in the advice to hire an editor is that you do need another set of eyes on your manuscript. Whether they're a paid set of eyes from an editor or the eyes of a beta reader, a sensitivity reader, a critique partner, a writing partner, you need another set of eyes on your project. Why? Because writers are famously unable to be objective about their own work. And I think even writers who have, you know, hundreds of books published, they still use outside advice and outside input on their projects, because it's just...it's very, very difficult. I won't say impossible.

So, I'll say very, very difficult to be objective about something that you've written, you have an emotional connection, you wrote it for a reason, you hope it achieves XYZ for you, you've poured XYZ into it. It's very, very hard to sort of step away, divorce yourself and comment on it as if it's somebody else's piece. So, whether or not you do it through an editor, I would highly recommend that you get another set of eyes. Now, I have founded a writing forum called Crit Collective (now the Good Story Learning Discord channel.) It's where you can find beta readers, sensitivity readers, writing partners and critique partners for your work. It's like online dating for writers. I would recommend everybody kind of post themselves on there. And maybe somebody will come around that is intrigued by what you're doing and wants to help. Or maybe you find somebody else's posting, that is a great and easy and free way of connecting with another writer. Usually, there's some kind of exchange. As part of the process, they'll read your stuff, but the expectation is that you will read their stuff and comment as well.

The good news there is by commenting on somebody else's piece, you also sort of internalize some insights that you may be later...unfortunately, this part of the process works for you slowly, you may be later able to apply to your own work. Now, the trade-off with hiring an editor, of course, is that it costs money. There are some people who will...to minimize their financial investment, they will invest time, and that is a perfectly valid way of doing it and going about it. You invest time by working with a critique partner and giving critique, receiving critique. You invest time by going to conferences or reading books or learning about the writing craft, or you can invest money. The savings there is usually time. You give your project to an editor. Ideally, the editor is somebody who has relevant experience to your type of project, to the field you're writing in, to the category you're writing in, to the genre. You are able to trade some of your hard-earned money. But the learning that you might get might be more in-depth, it might be coming from a more experienced place, it might happen more quickly.

And so you are able to maybe put yourself a little bit ahead of your own learning curve by investing in paid services, like those of a freelance editor. Now, how do you select an editor to work with? Well, you need to keep a few things in mind. So number one, very, very tangible is price. Everybody has a budget, and I would highly recommend trying to find somebody within your budget so that there's no unnecessary anxiety. It's always gonna be a little anxious to offer up your work for feedback. But I would say if you're stretching above your budget, then that just adds more anxiety to sort of the stew of feelings within you when you work with an editor that may not necessarily need to be there. So, I would say pick a budget. There are many different levels of editorial work and also different budgets within those levels. Be very, very sure what you're getting, whether it is simple proofreading on your manuscript, or copy editing, line editing. I'll pop a link into this post about the different types of editing. I do developmental editing and sort of everything down from there.

But developmental is my specialty, which means the really creative input on character, plot, writing style, word choice, pacing. All of those kind of higher-order creative things is what I specialize in. So, you wanna be sure what you're getting, how much you're getting it for. I have a resource on my website as well for average prices for editorial services. I'm on the high end personally, and I'm very, very open and honest about that. There are a lot of people who price lower than me. But this leads to my second point, which is experience, and I mentioned it briefly already. So, you wanna work with somebody who is actually going to help you bring your craft forward. That is, after all, why you are exchanging the money for the potential time savings, the leap forward that you're looking to make with your project or with your writing holistically. So, what are you getting for that money? And different people have different levels of experience. Some people have an English degree, which is fine and good, but I would say kind of the bare minimum.

Maybe they're just getting started, maybe they don't really have a lot of experience in the industry or doing editorial for clients yet, they're growing their client base. This will usually correspond with the lower price point for their services. Maybe they have experience just with clients, maybe they have experience on the backend insider experience in the industry. This is one of the reasons that I price the way I do is because I spent many years working not only with a publisher, but as a literary agent myself. And so that insight into the behind the scenes of the publishing industry is something that I bring to the table. But, basically, you really wanna try and find a good match for what you've written, because the likelihood of you getting the exact feedback that you need is going to go up if you find somebody that specializes in that. So, let's say you're writing picture book. Well, you wouldn't necessarily hire a medical textbook editor to work on your picture book, because very likely they will be able to clean up your manuscript, but they may not have those creative pieces of feedback that a picture book editor would have.

So, you have to take experience into consideration, but do know that usually the more relevant experience somebody has and the higher level of experience somebody has, the more that they feel comfortable charging, and so they kind of go up in the price tiers of editorial services. There's also, I would say, legitimacy for that editor. They should have a nice-looking website. They should have very clear terms and policies on their website. They should be able to offer you a free sample if it's the right kind of project. For example, if they want you to sign with them for a novel, and they haven't offered a free sample, and they refuse to, that to me would be a red flag. I don't offer free samples for everything. Like a picture book, if I do one page, that'll be sometimes 50% of the project. And that's too much for me to offer on spec given the volume of business that I do, but I always offer novel samples to anybody who asks. How they react to your emails, how they respond, are they timely or relatively timely? I would put myself in the relatively timely category.

Do they come off as professional and organized? Are they able to offer you a client agreement that sort of covers the scope of the working relationship? I have a 13-page client agreement that might seem like overkill, but I'm also very thorough and very detailed and very transparent in everything I do, because I feel like it creates an atmosphere of trust. And I think when working with a writer and working with their product, you know, their heart's creative output, I think trust is always a wonderful thing. Social proof, you wanna look and maybe see if they have testimonials, Facebook reviews, any kind of data that they've been able to get from clients. I don't know about you, but I'm at a point in my life where I'd rather not be somebody's guinea pig necessarily. So, if it's an editor without any kind of social proof that anybody has hired them or anybody's been happy with their services, I would probably keep scrolling just because I am at a place in my life where I really value my time, and I value my money, and I'm only going to commit to people who can sort of...who I am fairly certain that they can help me get to where I wanna go.

And then there is just an X factor, a secret sauce. I recorded a video a couple of weeks ago where I really made the point that this business is so subjective. And just because you may not necessarily agree with somebody doesn't mean that somebody else wouldn't. And so I would just say feel that editor out and see if they're a good fit and see if you feel something in response to that editor, that person that you're thinking about hiring. There are a lot of editors. I belong to the Reedsy marketplace, and I think there are over 900 freelance editors in that marketplace alone. So, it's a marketplace of publishing service providers, and they're just for funsies, and that's not even all the editors that are out there in the world, because Reedsy is, you know, whatever piece of the market. So, there are a lot of editors out there. If somebody is not for you, they may be for the next person. If you are not finding somebody, keep looking, because another editor will fall out of the sky sometimes. But I think that that personal relatability factor, your feeling about that person, don't discount them.

So, these are sort of my criteria for hiring an editor, and if you like what you see here, obviously you're welcome to inquire with me about editorial services at marykole.com. I spell my last name with the letter "K." And this has been a video for Good Story Company. Here's to a good story.

Want even more Good Story Company content? Become a member! Get access to tips, workshops, handouts, resources and videos for writers of all levels—all for less than your Netflix subscription.