FAQs
Why do you use humans to write?
1
When you use AI to write and edit for you, its outputs seldom ring true as genuine communication. AI has a way of flattening human tone and voice, and the writing that emerges from prompts almost always reads as generic and unconsidered. This undermines your reader’s trust in you.
Generative AI can play an important role in drafting, researching and mapping out your ideas - as a “thinking” partner - but it can’t replace the wildness of human creativity and the clarity of human oversight. And, be careful of overestimating your AI collaborator. Fact- and sense-checking are critical when you’re working with AI, as is a strong sense of your voice and organisational (or individual) messaging.
Our position is that these important tasks are still best performed by humans, even if AI is useful for getting the wheels turning.
Do you have any specific subject expertise?
2
Yes! We are especially good in the following subject areas:
Arts and culture
Development and NGO work
Travel
Environment and climate
Africa
We offer services in English and French.
How do you cost a project?
3
We work out either a total project fee, an hourly rate, or a per-word rate. Large and/or complex projects that require a lot of analysis and discussion are usually costed at a flat rate, whereas short copywriting or editing projects are better suited to per-word costing.
What if I need something tomorrow?
4
This always depends on the complexity of the task, but as a guideline, our per-word rate starts at R5 for writing and R1 per word for editing. In other words, to write a 1000 word opinion piece will cost R5000 and to copy-edit the same will cost R1000. A more extensive edit or re-write will be around R3 per word.
Before quoting for editing, we will need to have a (strictly confidential) look at your text.
What are your baseline rates?
5
We can accommodate rush jobs within reason, but urgency is usually factored into our costing. This is because we might temporarily have to push another project off our desk to accommodate yours.
How do we work together?
6
We start off with an initial call to understand your needs, your scope of work and your budget. We then put together a tailored package that addresses these within your desired timeframe.
In order to get going, we send you a simple MOU and we invoice for 50% payment upfront, payable upon receipt. When the work is complete and you have signed off on it, we invoice for the other 50%, payable upon receipt.