The new websites are working. So are the contact forms, which makes my life easier, although I’m still getting too much spam. I’m getting positive feedback and informational requests from possible clients.
I’m also getting lots of demands to host paid guest bloggers and for re-design.
That’s right, not a pitch or a request. Demands.
Not only do most of these idiots make it clear they can’t write a coherent sentence, they haven’t bothered to look at the site, comprehend the content, or craft a reasonable pitch.
What they guarantee is that I won’t have anything to do with them, and if anyone else asks me about them, I won’t have anything positive to say.
“what content to do you post and how much do you pay?” is not a pitch that gets you the work.
First of all, look at that sentence. All in lower case. No salutation. At the bottom, was the individual’s first name only, again in lower case letters, and no website. No credentials, no pitch.
If this person took a look at this particular website, he would see that Fearless Ink focuses on the business and marketing aspects of my writing. Reading the Welcome page and the Navigation Menu give an idea of what the site is about and what I do.
This blog, Ink-Dipped Advice, is clearly about how I approach business writing. There are no posted guidelines stating I am looking or accepting guest posts. If I want a guest, I’m going to go and invite one. There are no posted guidelines about payment.
At this point, this blog is not a paying market. I’m not trying to lure fellow writers to work without pay. I may do trade invites with fellow freelancers, provided we are all comfortable with the situation.
If this blog becomes a paying market, I will post guidelines and state payment. And any pitches that don’t meet said guidelines will not be accepted and paid.
That’s the way it works.
The above pitch isn’t a pitch — no research, no ideas, no background, nothing. Not someone I would invite to guest or with whom I would contract to guest.
The same individual sent the same one-line post on ALL the contact forms on ALL my sites. If you look around at the sites connected with the books I write, you know that those are sites about the books, not sites that support or invite guests. They are about MY WORK. That is their purpose and their focus — to give readers and potential readers of my books interesting content beyond and around the books themselves.
The sites also have a contact form for the press, which means if someone wants to do a story on something I write, that’s the address through which to funnel it. There’s nothing about hosting anyone.
I host fellow authors on A Biblio Paradise, but that is by invitation-only, and there is, specifically, no contact form on that blog.
No hook, no research, no understanding of what I do, no information. That equals no invitation.
It’s not even the virtual equivalent of a cold call, because professionals who cold call actually dig up information about the business before they call.
It’s insulting.
Other emails, which go directly into the Trash or Spam folders, are from people who call themselves “designers” or say they edit photos. They send short emails berating the look and content of my sites and DEMANDING that I hire them.
No specifics, mind you. Nothing about the specific site. Just a vague email full of insults and demands.
Do I believe my sites are perfect? Of course not. They are a work in progress, organisms that grow and change with my work.
But why would I pay someone who insults me?
Especially, again, when it’s obvious they haven’t done the least bit of research on what I do or what I need.
When you pitch to guest on a blog:
Read the blog. Or, if you’ve come across a website and you want to write content for them, read the site. What is the tone and the slant of the content? What are the topics? What’s the length of a post? How many links or other resources, on average, in a post?
Read the guidelines. Does the blog accept pitches for guest posts? What should the pitch include? What should the post include?
Follow the guidelines. Submission guidelines are there for a reason. They streamline the process. They are a good indicator if the person pitching/querying is a good fit. They are a good way to weed out the unprofessional, who tend to be the ones who think they’re too talented to bother with pesky guidelines. They’re not.
Craft a great pitch SPECIFIC to that market. Include a salutation, hook, one-paragraph ACTIVELY WORDED pitch. Add a few sentences with your credentials, and why you wanted to pitch to that particular site. Sign off with your name and your website.
Be positive and polite. Even if you believe you can write better than those currently writing for a site, don’t insult them. Pitch yourself as an addition to the team, not that you’re so great they should fire everyone they already have. You don’t yet know their story or their dynamics.
Proofread. When I worked for a publisher in NYC, part of my job was to screen unsolicited submissions, aka The Slush Pile. If I found something good, I wrote up a report and sent it up the editorial/acquisitions chain. However, in addition to content guidelines, the rule was that if there were more than THREE errors in the entire submission package (query letter, synopsis, sample chapters), it was rejected. That was especially true of the author obviously didn’t know the difference between a possessive, a plural, and a contraction. I still use those rules.
I know I’ve lost gigs because I sent off the pitch/query package too quickly and, only later when I filed or logged the submission, did I catch the errors. And the editors were right not to hire me. I did not demonstrate the proper care in my pitch.
Track your pitches and submissions. I have an entire Topic Workbook called Setting Up Your Submission System that tells you how. This is important. You need to know when and where you sent material.
Know when to follow-up, how to follow-up, and when to let go. Again, read the guidelines. They often give response time. Do not nag during that time. If you’re doing simultaneous submission and get a bite elsewhere, then, yes, definitely let the other markets know. But if the guidelines say four months, don’t start demanding a response in a week. In fact, because most sites are overworked and underpaid, I usually give an additional two to three weeks outside of the stated response time before follow up.
Be polite when you follow up. That should go without saying, but there you go.
Don’t argue if the answer is no. Arguing, threatening, insulting is only going to get you a reputation as unprofessional and not worth the work.
Precise, polite, professional. That’s how you craft a positive pitch and land the work. It TAKES work to LAND work.