Why Good Technical Writers Can Earn $90,000/yr.

Companies pay a very high salary—for the right kind of Technical Writer. The ones who make $85,000 to $95,000/yr. have worked in high-tech companies like Oracle and Cisco, as technical writers, and have sample printouts of manuals and online Help they can show. The more sample manuals they have, the more money they can make.

In their previous positions producing instructions for programmers, database or network administrators, experienced technical writers did learn about application program interfaces (APIs), network protocols such as ATM, SONET, and TCP/IP. They also learned to use FrameMaker, RoboHelp, and similar applications technical writers use on a daily basis.

Contract technical writers must have the same work experience. With that, they can charge clients $50-$60/hr.

So with the right experience, personality, work ethic, and writing ability, this job pays very well right now.

Beginning technical writers just have to get that first, lower-paying job, and work their way up over the course of three or four years. It all depends on how many samples they produce, save, and can show, and the writing quality of those sample manuals. That’s why in our online course on this Web site, ‘How to Do Tech Writing,’ we teach you how to write real manuals, then edit them, so that you have two good samples to get started.