How I Make $7,500 a Month Writing For the Financial Services Industry
All the ways you can make money as a financial writer + how much I charge.
If you’ve ever explored getting paid to write, chances are you looked into the highest-paying niches.
Finance is, routinely, one of those niches.
Except figuring out just how expansive the industry is — and how much you can realistically charge for services — takes a lot of trial and error. I finally figured this out and started making a comfortable living. (After making $2,622 a month in 2021, I’ve averaged about $7,500 a month in 2022.)
So, I decided to compile a list of all the ways I’ve made money as a financial writer, including the types of companies that need financial writing and how much I’ve managed to charge for specific services. Shoutout to Tony Yiu for the post idea.
Before we dig in, let’s first explore the types of companies in this ecosystem.
Who Needs Financial Writers? A Lot of Businesses
Finance is such a broad sector. Think about all of the subcategories and perspectives of finance — anything and anyone that touches money in some way is tied to the financial field. So, it should be no surprise that many, many types of companies need content writers and copywriters. Here’s a non-exhaustive list:
- Publications (e.g., NerdWallet, The Points Guy, Insider)
- Banks
- Online lenders
- Captive lenders
- Credit unions
- Financial advisors
- Accountants
- Private equity
- Venture capital
- Fintechs (which is really any company that combines money and technology)
- Payment processors
- Insurance companies
- Cryptocurrency (which has its own web of subcategories)
While their writing needs won’t always overlap (a financial publication probably wouldn’t need a pitch deck), each of these company types relies on writing in some shape or form.
And, if you can find the right clients, they’ll pay you well.
8 Ways to Make Money From Financial Writing (And How Much to Charge)
I outlined each way I’ve made money from financial writing, including how much I’ve successfully charged and how long it takes me to complete each service.
Keep in mind, rates and time inputs depend on numerous factors, such as post length, research requirements, your experience, the project’s timeline, and the client’s budget. (For the record, I know the answer “it depends” doesn’t provide much value, so I’ll try to give examples and specifics when I can so you have a benchmark.)
Blog posts
The bread and butter of any content writer. Blog posts are pretty self-explanatory, even in a technical field like finance. They’re primarily educational, although they may feature a somewhat salesy CTA.
Generally speaking, your standard blog post for a financial company or publication will range between 1,000 and 2,000 words and feature a light to medium level of research. It takes me anywhere from two to seven hours to write a blog post that falls within these parameters. On the lower end, I know the topic very well, so there’s minimal research involved. On the higher end, I’m not as familiar with the topic and there’s extensive research involved (maybe even interviews).
I charge either a fixed rate or a per-word rate for blog posts, depending on the type of business — $500 to $800 for B2C companies and $1 per word for B2B companies.
Website copy
A website is a business’s online hub. It also functions as an extension of a company’s sales staff, promoting products and services 24/7. Fortunately, not a lot of financially savvy individuals are also competent writers, which means they need someone to flesh out their websites. That makes website copywriting a valuable skill.
Although it can fluctuate for certain pages, I typically charge $1,000 per web page. If the company is bigger or relies on search engine traffic for leads, you could charge a premium.
The number of web pages drives the amount of time required to get the job done, as well as whether you’re writing from scratch or you have an existing template to build upon. And don’t forget about research and peer analysis. All in all, set aside 10–20 hours for a website.
Landing pages
A landing page is a standalone web page whose sole purpose is to convince visitors to take an action. For instance, if you’ve ever accidentally (or maybe even intentionally) clicked an ad on a website or YouTube video, you were likely directed to a landing page. Here’s a random example — I just went to YouTube, clicked a video, and this was the ad.
Landing pages vary in payment and length, depending on how much “selling” you need to do to convince someone to buy, sign up, submit a form, or whatever action the page promotes. The Google Fi example I linked to is a pretty standard format — pricing, features, benefits, peer comparison, etc. Also, it may not seem like a lot of copy, but trust me, every word was meticulously chosen.
Much like my website pricing, my rates for landing pages vary by project. I charge a similar amount for landing pages as I do for websites — $1,000 per page or a standard hourly rate of $125. The same goes for execution time — it can vary from a few hours to a dozen hours if it’s long-form copywriting.
Sales collateral
Sales collateral (also known as sales fliers, one-pagers, two-pagers, and probably some other random jargon) help businesses convert leads into clients. This type of marketing material would highlight the benefits and use cases of a product or service — in the financial space, that could be a brokerage account feature that helps financial advisors manage their client accounts.
For this kind of work, it can take time to explore and understand what you’re selling, so I typically charge my hourly rate. That said, it’s not unrealistic to expect anywhere from $700 to $1,000 for a single sales flier, which takes me about 5 and 10 hours to finish.
Investor presentations & pitch decks
Businesses frequently need investor presentations to either raise money or update shareholders.
It can take a while for a business to turn a profit. So, in order to grow and cover costs in the meantime, startups and other budding companies need outside capital to fund their operations. When they meet with potential investors or lenders, they often present their cases in the form of a PowerPoint (otherwise known as a pitch deck).
Public companies have quarterly and annual reporting requirements. When they share their recent operating results, they typically compile a presentation for their shareholders. Larger companies often have their own in-house marketing team, but smaller ones may not have the funds to payroll this sort of staff. This is another potential opportunity for financial writers.
I’ve never been handed a blank presentation and told, “Make a pitch deck.” Instead, there’s usually a rough draft or, at the very least, a general outline and plenty of sources to refer to for information.
As you can imagine, pitch decks come in all shapes, sizes, and complexities, so nailing a fixed price down is a challenge. That’s why I typically provide a ballpark estimate at an hourly clip of $125. They could take anywhere from 10 hours to 20 hours to complete, maybe even longer.
Email campaigns
If you can write a killer email, you can make a good bit of money as a financial copywriter.
On one hand, you don’t have a lot of digital real estate to entice a reader to take action, so it can take a while to strategically craft the right message. On the other hand, the 1:1 connection makes it a valuable method of communication/advertising. So, companies are willing to allocate a lot of money to their email campaigns.
Campaigns consist of multiple emails — there’s no hard number, but it often ranges between 6 and 12. Moreover, the typical email ranges between 75 and 150 words, although that depends on the email’s purpose in the sequence.
In terms of pricing, I’ve earned anywhere from $150 to $700 per email. That said, there’s a bit of a caveat — emails that fall on the higher end typically include one or two alternatives for A/B testing and plenty of subject lines and preview text ideas (not to mention revisions). As you’d expect, this takes more time. In my experience, a high-caliber email with multiple alternatives can take anywhere from two to five hours to write.
White papers
You don’t have to be an expert on a subject to write a white paper about it (although, being one makes it a lot easier). To give you an example, one of my first white papers as a freelancer had to do with healthcare legislation. Prior to that project, I knew next to nothing about healthcare or policymaking. Now, I do — after hours and hours of research.
I’ve written a handful of white papers, covering topics like the growth of Buy Now Pay Later as a payment method and the integration of fintech into financial advisory services. These documents are thousands of words and require extensive research — including interviewing experts, reading academic studies, and finding relevant stats from reputable sources. Expect a white paper to take at least 20 hours, as a general guide.
If you’re good at simplifying and diligently researching difficult concepts, you can write white papers on anything. And that work can pay off handsomely. I’ve made between $2,000 to $3,000 for my white papers, but, honestly, you can probably get away with charging more.
Ghostwriting
In case you aren’t familiar, ghostwriting is the practice of writing for someone else under their name. That could be blog posts, newsletters, or social media posts. While ghostwriters don’t get the credit — at least, publicly — they’re usually compensated more for their anonymity.
Ghostwriting can be quite lucrative, especially if you manage to land noteworthy executives or thought leaders as clients. (Yes, there’s a certain irony there.) People are willing to pay you top dollar if you can help them grow their audience, brand, and/or business. (Seriously, it made the news recently.)
These arrangements will vary based on the frequency, volume, and type of content. In general, I tack on a $100 to $200 premium for ghostwriting services. However, as the above article points out, some people earn as much as $700 per hour writing for LinkedIn influencers. Alas, I have not landed such a gig.
Financial Copywriting: Tough, But Worth It
To recap, here are the eight ways I’ve made money from financial writing and how much I charge:
- Blog posts: $500 to $800 for B2C, and $1 per word for B2B
- Website copy: $1,000 per page
- Landing pages: $1,000 per page or an hourly rate of $125
- Sales collateral: $700 to $1,000
- Investor presentations & pitch decks: $125 per hour
- Email campaigns: $150 to $700 per email
- White papers: $2,000 to $3,000 per report
- Ghostwriting: a $100 to $200 premium on top of the typical charge
Financial copywriting can pay very, very well. That doesn’t mean it’s an easy path to riches though.
It took me almost three years to make $100,000. Granted, my strategy was a bit unconventional, considering I prioritized personal projects over client work, but still.
On top of that, many aspects of finance are technical and, therefore, not necessarily intuitive. It can take quite a while to build proficiency in certain subject areas, or at least enough know-how to write about it.
For context, I have a background in finance — I worked in investment banking for three years. I only mention this because I don’t want to give off the impression that financial writing is easy to pick up and master. That’s simply not the case.
However, a passion for personal finance and a basic understanding of financial concepts can go a long way, if you’re willing to hone your skills.
Want to learn how I got started in this niche? I literally outlined my every move.
