Key Takeaway
The quoted rate for a done for you content writing service covers the draft and little else. Your true cost per article adds revision labor, strategy time, editing, tooling and publishing overhead. Track that loaded number and you can compare vendors and in-house writers on equal terms.
What Is the True Cost Per Article?
It is every dollar and every work hour that lands a finished piece on your site, divided by the number of articles that actually go live. The price tag on a contract is one input. The output you care about is published content.
Two vendors can quote $250 and $400. If the cheaper one sends drafts your editor rewrites for two hours, the $400 vendor is the bargain.
The Formula to Run
Use this line:
True Cost Per Article = (Base Fee + Revision Cost + Strategy Cost + Editing Cost + Tool Cost + Publishing Labor) / Published Articles
Plug in real hours and real rates. Pull the numbers from your last 20 articles if you have them.
Which Costs Stay Hidden on the Invoice?
Four items rarely show up: revision rounds, strategy and briefing, final editing and fact checks, plus admin time spent chasing status.
Each one burns hours, so the hourly rate becomes part of the article.
Revision cost
Say your editor earns $45 per hour. One revision round on a 1,200-word draft takes 90 minutes, which is $67.50. Two rounds and you added $135 to a $300 post.
Strategy and briefing cost
A 45 minute kickoff call at $45 per hour costs about $34. Multiply that by every article if each piece needs its own brief from scratch.
Tool and publishing cost
SEO tools run $50 to $300 a month. Publishing takes 15 to 30 minutes per post for formatting, links, images and metadata. Track these too.
Does Publish Rate Change the Math?
Yes. Often more than price does. If you pay for 10 articles and 8 go live, your real cost per published piece jumps 25 percent above the quote.
A low publish rate is a silent surcharge on everything you buy.
What Does a Worked Example Look Like?
Base fee: $300, revision hours: $135, strategy: $34, tools: $6, publishing labor: $15, total loaded cost: $490.
Publish rate: 80 percent, so 8 of every 10 pieces go live.
True cost per published article = $490 / 0.8 = $612.50.
The $300 post is a $612 post. That is the figure to weigh against in-house production.
How Do You Compare Outsourcing With In-House?
Run the same formula on your staff. Salary, benefits, software and management time all count. A $70,000 writer with a 30 percent benefits load costs roughly $91,000 a year.
If that person ships 120 articles, the loaded cost is about $758 each. Outsourcing at $612 wins on paper. Quality and speed settle the rest.
When Is a Cheap Article Expensive?
A cheap article is expensive when it needs a rewrite or when it misses your voice and your editor spends the afternoon repairing it.
Low price plus high rework is the worst combination in content. The invoice looks small and the true cost is large.
What Is the One Number to Track?
Track loaded cost per published article and update it monthly. When it rises, higher revisions or a lower publish rate usually explain why.
How to Lower the Number Without Cutting Quality
Write tighter briefs and fix your approval flow.
Cut revision rounds by defining acceptance upfront. A short checklist beats another round of edits every time.
Lift publish rate by removing one bottleneck. Approvals and late feedback are the usual culprits.
Where to start today
Pull your last 10 articles, add up every hour spent on them and divide by the pieces that published. That number is your baseline.
Then set one target: trim revision hours by a fifth or push publish rate to 90 percent. One move, measured over a quarter.
The First Move
Calculate loaded cost per published article for your recent pieces and compare vendors and in-house writers using that same number.
Read the full guide: Done For You Content Writing Service vs In-House: The Real Cost Comparison