How to choose a content writing agency

Every content writing agency can show you a portfolio. The portfolio proves almost nothing, because you cannot tell which parts the client rewrote, which were ghostwritten by a freelancer who has since left, or which were generated.

There is a better test, and it takes ten minutes.

The test: ask for a sample on something you know

Ask for a piece they have written on a subject you understand deeply. Not your industry in general — something specific enough that you would notice an error. Competence is invisible in writing about a subject you do not know, and obvious in writing about one you do.

What you are looking for is whether the piece contains anything an expert would recognise as true but non-obvious. Generic writing is fluent and says nothing you could not have guessed. That is the single most reliable signal, and it is the one that separates a writer from a vendor.

How to spot copy nobody really wrote

• Every paragraph is the same length, and every section has three bullet points.
• Claims arrive without sources, dates or numbers — “studies show” with no study.
• It describes categories rather than making decisions: lots of “there are several approaches”, no recommendation.
• The examples are famous companies rather than ones a reader might actually resemble.
• Nothing in it could be disagreed with. Writing with no position is writing with no author.

None of these proves a machine wrote it — junior writers produce the same thing under deadline. Either way you are buying volume rather than judgement, and paying for the editing you will have to do yourself.

Questions worth asking

1. Who writes, and can I read three things they wrote? If the writer cannot be named, the work is being passed around.
2. Do you use AI, and how? The honest answer in 2026 is usually yes, for research or drafting. What matters is whether a person with subject knowledge is accountable for what ships. Be more worried by a flat no than by a specific yes.
3. What will you need from us? Good writers ask for access to someone who knows the subject. Vendors ask for a brand guideline PDF.
4. How do you handle a draft we dislike? Listen for a process. One rewrite included, then an honest conversation about why, is a reasonable answer.
5. What would you refuse to write? A writer with standards has a list. It usually includes claims they cannot substantiate.
6. Who edits? The most under-asked question. Writing without a second pair of eyes is a draft, whatever it costs.

On per-word pricing

Per-word rates are convenient and quietly corrosive. They price the output and ignore the input, which means they reward length and penalise the research that makes a piece worth reading. The same rate buys a thousand words assembled in an hour or a thousand words that took a day of reading.

If you must compare on rate, compare on what the rate includes: research, interviews, a named writer, an editing pass, revisions, and whether SEO work is inside or outside the number. Our view on the last one is on the SEO content page.

What a brief should contain

Half of the bad content in the world is the client's fault, and the fix is free. A brief that names the objective, one primary audience, the single key message and the approval chain will improve the first draft more than any amount of agency selection.

We set out the whole thing, with a template you can copy, in how to brief a content or PR agency.

When a freelancer beats an agency

Frequently. One excellent writer who knows your sector will outperform an agency that routes your work to whoever is free, and will cost less. The case for an agency is coverage: an editor as well as a writer, continuity when someone is away, and the ability to handle PR, SEO and the website alongside the words.

Our own approach is on the content writing page.