The Right Way to Ask to Guest Write

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Guest writing is the act of providing articles (you write original content) to website that isn’t yours generally for free. You might be asking why you would you want to give others your free articles that you could use on your own sites. The simple answer is, exposure. By picking the right sites to guest write for, you can build your brand, get your product, service, or website introduced to your niche, increase traffic to your site, and build backlinks to your site, products, and articles.

How to Ask to Guest Write for a Site

If you are new to guest writing, there is a right and wrong way to ask to guest write for a site. Sadly most of the writers that ask to write for Evolutionary Designs, can’t even follow the guidelines I have set up for the site. They are simple, easy to follow, and they should be followed if you want your articles to be successful. But for the writers that do follow the rules, their articles are successful and most have come back and written more articles for Evolutionary Designs. Image Source: Flickr

As for those that ask to guest write for Evolutionary Designs, most get that wrong as well. Today I would like to share with you some tips that will get your article published or at least get a response from me or my editors if you can write for us.  These tips should even help get a response from other sites you want to write for.

The Wrong Way to Ask to Guest Write

Generally you can tell the difference from an automated request, a copy/paste request, those don’t read your site request, professional writer request, and those that truly want to write for your site.  Generally, if you request to write for Evolutionary Designs or any site that I manage, I will ignore your request if I can tell it’s a an automated or copy/past request. There are few other things, I will ignore when you send me a request. Below are few examples of emails I have gotten that were ignored.

Example 1

“Dear Editor,
First of all, I love the site.  There is a lot of beneficial material here.  I am writing you, however, not for the sole purpose of flattery.  I’d like to add to the material on your site with a piece on e-commerce . I have a headline I’m working on:

[insert some headline about technology and smartphones] If this sounds appealing, please let me know and I would be more than happy to send over a sample, or examples of past work.

I look forward to hearing from you.
Best,
[insert name here]”

Here’s what’s wrong with this request…

1. He hasn’t read any of the current articles. He requested to write about a topic Evolutionary Designs doesn’t cover. If he came up with a topic that was related to new media, technology, and smartphones then I might be interested in his article. This would be a great topic on a technology site.

2. He didn’t address the request to me. A lot of auto generated requests will use “editor” in the name trying to make it look personal. At least he used editor, a lot of requests I get don’t even get that.

3. No examples of previous guest articles. If you don’t have any, explain why or if you have some articles on your own site, then send me links to your best articles on your site.

4. Didn’t bother to fill out their website information or at least what site they are representing.

I believe this to be an auto generated email from a guest writing service with a writer that doesn’t even have the time to research my site, give me some references, and personalize his request to me. Because of these reasons, I ignored his request.

Example 2

“Hi,
I like your site – http://www.evolutionarydesigns.net/.  And I am interested in writing a guest post on your site. I have article that has not yet been published. It would be discussing about  the relevance of business brochures.
—
Website: [insert website link here]”

This is an example of typical auto generated request.  I get these all the time and find them quite annoying and funny as well. Most of the time, I treat them like spam, especially those that were translated in English. You can always tell when you get those types of emails.

1. The request is short and to the point.

2. The topic is about business brochures. We do talk about business brochures but I already have a guest writer that works for a company like this and she doesn’t really write about this topic and she sticks to design related articles. She only slips in links to her company if the topic is related and they are also in her author bio. (Each guest writer for Evolutionary Designs gets two free links (non affiliate links) in their bio plus two links in their articles if they are related to the topic.

3. The requested email writer doesn’t even sign the email. I do not know who this person is and he didn’t leave a link to their site. If the person can’t even sign their email, I can’t believe they will be a good fit for Evolutionary Designs.

This type of email is a sure way to get your email sent to the trash folder. Spend a few minutes personalize your emails. Your email is not only asking to write for a site, it also first step in selling yourself to website owners and editors.

The Right Way To Ask to Guest Write

Below are several example of good guest writing requests. If you follow these formats you should be granted access to guest write for most sites. Image source: Flickr

Example 1

“Hi, my name is [insert name here], the owner of [insert name of website if you have one or company you are representing here]. I visit your blog regularly (hopefully this is true ), and recently decided that I wanted to start sharing some valuable tips with other readers. I therefore write to inquire on the right step I should take to get my guest article published. I can write around the social  media trends but can also research and write on any topic of your choice.

Thanks, [insert your name here]”

1. Although the writer did not mention my name or editor, he personalized the email.

2. He did not send me samples of his guest writing skills, but he did send me a link (in the body of the email) of his website where you can see his blog and his writing skills. After checking out his website, I know he can write.

3. He also offered to write about topics that Evolutionary Designs covers or even research a topic of my choosing.

4. He asked for the next step in the process to getting access to writing for Evolutionary Designs.

Example 2

“Hi,
I am very interested in writing for your blog. My client, [insert website/company here], is looking to gain more exposure through guest blogging, and your site seems like a perfect fit. Below are links to some of my published work:

[Listing links to her published works. All articles are on high traffic sites and well written. ]

Thanks for your consideration! I look forward to hearing from you soon.
—
Website: [insert your website here]”

1. The writer explains up front that she has a client wanting more exposure and she wants to write an article on Evolutionary Designs. She then listed the company and link to that site. After looking at that site, I had to agree with her that her client’s site would be a good for Evolutionary Designs.

2. Next, she listed at least five different links to her latest guest articles. All articles were in the same niche as mine, hard to guest write for sites, and all high traffic sites. Plus each article was well written and each article showed where she responded to the readers when they asked her questions. I love it when I get these kind of references. This a good way to get your chance to write for Evolutionary Designs or any other site that offers guest writing.

Final Thoughts

Guest writing should be fun, it’s a great a way to exposure for you and your brand. If you are planning to do some guest writing, make sure you find the write sites to do it on. Pick sites that are in your niche, a mixture of new and old sites and sites that have medium to high traffic. Sites that have low traffic isn’t always a bad thing. If you check their traffic reports and see them going up, then its only a matter of time before they get more traffic. At some point I will go into details on guest writing but for now these are just a few quick tips on guest writing.

As for asking to guest for a site, always choose the right way to ask to quest write. If you hire a writing service to write your guest articles for you, make sure they are picking the write sites to guest write on, they are content is good, and they go about asking other sites to publish their guest articles the right way. If they do any of it wrong, it makes your site look bad.