Oh shoot Dan it’s time for The Copy Corner. Oh hey Terry we better film our video today.
Yeah man what’s going on, how you doing? Good good how’s today treating you, Terry?
Today is treating me great, it’s my favorite part of the day when I get to talk to you and to everybody else out there for doing another episode of The Copy Corner and this is our little corner of the Internet where we start talking about different copywriting tips, freelance tips, things that can help you write better and grow a business that you love and today is a great topic Dan that I’ll that you start off with.
Yeah sure thing so today we’re talking about how to write for top publications you know as freelance writers,. This is a question that Terry and I get a lot so we wanted to kind of cover that, go into the benefits of guest blogging and why you should do it. Right yeah absolutely and we get this question a lot from writers, that they’re just starting out or they have written articles before but they want to keep getting their name out there and get higher paying clients and one way to build up that portfolio and reputation is to guest post and there’s a lot of publications out there you know that are looking for articles, that are looking for help.
You know I’ve had some success doing this, you’ve had a lot of success you know you were telling me a story about how you got in Entrepreneur Magazine even when you weren’t a writer which is great and it’s also proof that you can do this. Right I think you know most important thing is the publication just wants a great story that’s gonna resonate with their readers so if you have an idea and they haven’t done it yet and you can pitch that to them they’re gonna be all about it.
Yeah so Dan, go through your, you know best formula for how to approach this for the writers out there who are interested in guest posting.
Yeah absolutely so I think one of the biggest mistakes people make as they pitch the wrong people like right off the bat you know they have this awesome article idea, they want to get it in Entrepreneur or Founder or Forbes or wherever it is, but they just don’t know who to contact to you know send that pitch to so I think you know step one is you know whatever publication that is you want to write for come up with a topic and a story idea that you think is gonna really you know connect with their readers and then first you know do some research on their website, make sure that hasn’t been covered yet cuz a lot of times right yeah these big publications have already written it. So if you’ve got a killer idea then you need to kind of do some digging and research on their website or if you can’t find contact info there, go to LinkedIn but you want to find the contributing editor, that’s typically the person that kind of fields all those guest posts inquiries and decides what does and doesn’t get published, so find that contributing editor, get their email address and send them your pitch to see if it’s gonna be a good fit.
I love that and one thing that I did too was I found I could not find a contributing editor right away for a site but I was seeing the the author author and I could go on Twitter and find them and email them like find their contact information and they can lead you the right way as well. Again a lot of content writers, a lot of us want to help each other out as well so don’t be afraid to reach out to them to try to get that right contact especially if they already have you know that reputation in that relationship too Right absolutely Terry yeah and playing off that, I think it’s important if even if you’re not actively pitching or looking to guest publish, connect with editors on LinkedIn for publications that you do read and you do want to eventually contribute to because if you can follow their stuff, like, comment, message, you know and get really familiar to them that’s gonna be a really helpful and kind of getting your message accepted when the time comes that you do have something to offer.
Yeah I love that. Dan can you quickly go into your pitch email so when you once you find that email address and that contact information, then what is that next step, how do you approach this? Yeah definitely and I think if people want some pretty specific info on this we can, you know have them reach out and we can kind of send them some ideas and some templates, but yeah essentially the biggest thing is short and sweet right? These editors I guess, you know, at least at the larger you get with the publication, they get sometimes hundreds of guests pitches a day, so you want to make sure that you’re really short to the point, pitch the story idea, tell them why you’re the one to write it and then let them make the decision from there.
Yeah, I love that.
Short and sweet definitely helps with emails like this and you know, I’ve even seen people do it where they already have the article written, so if you’ve done your research and let’s say maybe you’ve done a guest post before, you know, go at it with confidence and be like, hey my name is Terry Schilling, I’ve written this article post about blank that I think would be a perfect fit for you, let me know what you think, here’s some more information on me as my writer or as a writer you can look at my website, that’s it. Say I look forward to hearing from you, best Terry. That’s it. Right. You know it so you don’t even be afraid to write your article first and send that out to a few other publications and see who gets it first.
That’s true, right good point. I mean if they don’t want it somebody else likely will so don’t throw that away if you put in the effort to write the piece.
Yeah and I know a big question, Dan, people get as guest posting, I won’t get paid for it or I won’t get paid much and what would you say to somebody who tells you that? Yeah so I think it depends. The bigger guys, right, definitely are not going to pay you because they’re, in their opinion, the exposures, the trade-off, which I totally get that.
I think that every writer should have at least a few big logos in their portfolio because it’s gonna build instant credibility with that next client. They’re clicking on your website and they go wow they’ve written for you know Wall Street Journal, New York Times or whatever, they automatically know you’re a good writer because you’ve had work published there so if it’s good enough for them, it’s gonna be good enough for what they need from you.
So I think it’s worth the trade-off to have that awesome portfolio builder. What do you think Terry? Yeah I’m with you, you know I think it’s great to have those logos on there and build social proof and just look at this as a catalyst to build your own business so if you have a website you’re bringing traffic to your site, maybe you’re getting more email list, maybe you have other exclusive articles in products you know, free downloads, things that you pay for, you can do that and plus a lot of people make advertising dollars on their website.
You know the more articles, the more eyes you get to you, the more you know, ad spend that you can have and have that passive income you know blogging is definitely a lucrative business if you’re consistent with it and a big start of that is you know doing all these guest posting so I think it’s very beneficial and that’s why we wanted to talk about it today because we think it can be super helpful for you guys, you know, if you take the right approach.
Right I think every writer should have this as a tool in their arsenal right whether you do it all the time or not, if you at least have a little bit of experience doing it to kind of have that portfolio builder but highly recommend for sure. Yeah I mean if you get in Forbes or Entrepreneur Magazine, you know, think about you know how you’re gonna feel after that seeing your name under, by you know Terry Schilling, by Dan Marzullo.
It’s a great feeling. It’s definitely motivating to keep writing and doing more and again it builds so much social proof and there’s a lot of other people out there who are really good at this and we wanted to give them a shout out.
Dan and I were talking before you know, Aaron Orndorff is a great one. I’ve read his stuff on Copy Hackers and heard about how he you know makes a ton of money from guest posting, it was really his catalyst. Jim Jacob Macmillan is another one, really smart with SEO and content strategy you know, reach out to him for a lot of information you know on guest posting, and Dan you got anybody else? Yeah I would say you know, Terry, me and you were kind of joking about this earlier today is Kaleigh Moore, she is everywhere.
Every time I read something on the internet, Google something, there’s an article written by her on it, so she’s got a ton of exposure through guest posting.
Yeah, she does a great job, and she has a lot of great resources on her site and her email list is awesome, too. So yeah check out those three people though those are great resources for you guys and Dan that’s it for today on, you know, how to guest post even when you think you’re nobody, you can have success with it, so take those tips, you know tailor it to your strategy and best of luck to you. I think it will work out for you. Right yeah and I think, Terry before we sign off here, we’ve got some exciting news that we wanted to share with the viewers yeah so yeah you definitely want to tell them about this cool new podcast that’s coming out. Yeah absolutely and thank you to everybody who have been watching and supporting us and even asking, I really love what you guys do with The Copy Corner podcast and it’s not technically a podcast, it’s a video series.
We wanted to start out with video but more of you are asking if there’s a podcast version, so we are working on that right it will be out soon so stay tuned for that, and of course, follow The Copy Corner hashtag. That way you can get you know notifications when the new videos are out and of course then when we announce that we’re launching the podcast. Alright everybody thanks you so much for watching, love what you do, proceed with passion, we’ll see on the next episode of The Copy Corner.
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