How to write an email for a guest blogging proposal?

How to write a guest blogging proposal email

How to write a guest blogging proposal email?

A typical guest blogging request email reads like this:

Hello and greetings!

I’m a great fan of your blog. Your posts are wonderful and highly useful. Do you accept guest blog posts? Then I would like to contribute. Here are some suggested topics:

At the first glance, there seems to be nothing wrong with this message. That is, if you get such messages once or twice a month and you are eagerly looking for people to write guest blog posts.

But, if you get such requests regularly, it often becomes difficult to reply to messages that have not been specifically written for you. I will explain what happens.

On and average I receive 3-4 messages offering to write guest blog posts for my blog that is, I won’t say very popular, nonetheless, decently popular.

A majority of the messages are not personal. I can immediately make out that they have sent out a mass email without even going through my blog. I normally don’t reply to such messages unless there is a compelling reason.

On the other hand, there are certain messages that are quite direct and targeted. Take for example a message like this:

Hello Amrit

While doing research for a blog that I’m working on I came across your link {the link is mentioned} and I was thinking of writing something that can add value to your blog. If you’re open to the idea, I can send you some topics.

Here are some links to give you an idea of how I write:

{links are mentioned}

Best,

Such a message shows that the person has actually gone through my blog, and even if not the blog, then at least the link he or she is talking about. He or she has got a basic idea of what sort of content I publish.;;;

Obviously, I reply to such messages.

How to write an email when you’re offering to write a guest blog post?

Make it personal. Begin with the name, something like “Hello Amrit”.

Quickly go through a few blog posts on the blog to get an idea of what type of content is published on the blog and how you can add value with your guest blog post.

Then mention it in the email that you have gone through a few blog posts and you have gotten the hang of what sort of content is accepted and published. Accordingly, make some suggestions.

Keep your email conversational. Don’t try to impress because a successful blog publisher receives anywhere between 10-20 (even more) guest blogging proposals. There may be plenty of people trying to impress. Just be original. Just be yourself.

Make sure the topic suggestions that you have made are in sync with the content being published on the blog.

For example, my blog is about content writing, copywriting and sometimes, content marketing & SEO. These are the topics I’m interested in. Not how to sell real estate in Tokyo.

Of course, if you can write on a topic like “How to promote your real estate business in Tokyo through strategic content writing”, this is quite acceptable.

In the case of my blog, one of the main topics (content writing, copywriting, content marketing, and SEO writing) must be there in your guest blog post idea.

Don’t blast off a template message to multiple blog publishers. It is immediately clear that you haven’t even visited the blog you are proposing to write a guest blog for.

How to generate more leads with strategic content writing?

Strategic content writing to generate hot leads

Strategic content writing to generate hot leads.

You publish content to generate new leads.

Leads can manifest in multiple forms. There are hot leads and cold leads.

Hot leads are those people who contact you for the purpose of buying from you or hiring you.

For example, if someone submits my contact form for the purpose of hiring my content writing services, that person is a hot lead.

But if someone subscribes to my newsletter, he or she is a cold lead. Or if someone shows interest in my content writing services on a social media platform but right now doesn’t hire me, he or she is a cold lead.

When you are writing and publishing content to generate more leads, you need to be careful of what type of content you are publishing.

When I had a web design website – in my previous life – I ended up attracting the wrong traffic because although I was writing and publishing lots of content and consequently, generating lots of traffic, the traffic never converted. I was not generating the right leads.

Back then I was smitten by educational content. I didn’t put my energies into explaining my services as a web designer. All my content writing consisted of teaching people how to achieve things using HTML, ASP and JavaScript (back then I didn’t know PHP, which I know now).

How to strategize content writing to generate hot leads?

You need to find out why people are searching for you, when they are searching for you.

Obviously, people who are looking to buy something, or hire someone, or use a software service, are not looking for educational content, at least not knowingly.

For example, if you are looking for someone who can help you improve your search engine rankings and you are not aware that optimized content writing can help you improve your SEO, my blog post titled 5 reasons why content writing is important for SEO can reveal something that you  don’t know.

For that matter, even a blog post like 10 SEO content writing tips for your small business can be quite helpful.

You may ask, if all I am doing is teaching people why content writing is important for SEO or how you can write content for your small business to improve your SEO by yourself, how am I generating hot leads for my own business?

Even if your writing is seemingly instructional content, you need to write in such a manner that the central message – your open for business – shouldn’t be lost.

To generate hot leads, you need to create precise web pages, landing pages and blog posts. There shouldn’t be any ambiguity. You shouldn’t club multiple messages under the same web page. When you club multiple messages, the central objective of your content is diluted and people end up getting confused.

Seriously consider search intent to generate hot leads

Not all type of search intent gets you hot leads but writing and publishing content keeping search intent in mind can definitely improve the number of hot leads your content generates.

What is search intent? You may like to read What is search intent and how knowing it improves your SEO.

Most of the information about search intent that I have published on my website and blog is about improving your search engine rankings, but writing your content centered around the appropriate search intent can also help you generate more leads.

Writing content for searcher intent helps you be with your customers and clients throughout their buyer journey.

Again I will give you my own example.

Someone is researching for ways to improve search engine rankings and comes across my blog that talks about how content writing can help you improve your search engine rankings. The person has been informed.

The search intent here is informational. The person isn’t looking for someone to hire. He or she simply needs information that can help him or her improve his or her search engine rankings.

Once a person has read my blog post on how content writing can help improve search engine rankings, he or she finds out that I provide such content writing services, through another web page or blog post. The other web page or blog post has been written keeping “commercial intent” in mind.

These days I’m getting lots of traffic for “content writer for accounting services” or “content writer for life coaching services”. These searches are carried out with commercial intent.

Accountants or accounting companies are looking for a content writer. People providing life coaching services are looking for a content writer. The intent is clear. Search traffic generates hot leads for me

On a related note: do hot leads always convert?

Not necessarily. Hot leads are people who are ready to do business with you but they haven’t yet committed.

Maybe they won’t like my samples. Maybe they won’t find my rates acceptable. Maybe after contacting me, they come across someone else who they think is a better match. There are multiple reasons why even a hot lead may not convert, but that’s a different matter.

Writing content for a Mass Control Bait digital asset

Writing content for Mass Control Bait digital assets

Writing content for Mass Control Bait digital assets.

Digital marketers often talk about Mass Control Bait. What is it?

Although the phrase “Mass Control Bait” sounds quite ominous, it is simply an offering that you make to people so that they share their email ID with you.

Many websites entice you to download that awesome e-book or white paper but before you do that, you need to fill and submit an online form with your company details, contact information, designation, and profession.

They are gathering data from you and in return, they allow you to download something that you think may be useful for you. In return, they ask for permission to subscribe you to their email updates or send your routine marketing messages.

What are different types of Mass Control Bait digital assets?

Mass Control Bait can be anything you can offer for which people will gladly provide you their contact details.

As mentioned above, it can be an e-book or a white paper carrying useful information or industry data.

It can be a poll result that can reveal crucial market trends or user behavior traits.

It can be a webinar or a workshop recording that was previously exclusively available to paid members, but you are offering it to all those people who subscribe to your mailing list.

It can be an auto responder course. I remember a few years ago I used to offer an auto responder course in SEO content writing to all those people who subscribed to my newsletter.

How to write effective content for your Mass Control Bait digital assets?

First of all, create a digital asset people would desperately want to download.

Your piece of content must have the ability to make a real difference in people’s life otherwise, they will not download it.

In the past couple of years, I have written multiple e-books, case studies, and white papers for Mass Control Bait campaigns.

In most of the cases clients come up with their own content ideas and unless they are paying me, I do not interfere much except for doing my best writing for the topic.

Two things are very important for creating effective Mass Control Bait digital assets:

  • The topic (so that they give you their email ids).
  • The quality and relevance of the content (so that they remain your subscribers).

Some people think that they can create a very attractive and irresistible and once people have submitted their email ids, they should not bother much about the quality of the actual content. Wrong approach.

Do not consider Mass Control Bait digital assets as an actual “bait” to collect email ids. You do not want to spam people. You want to build relationships.

Offering them to download a Mass Control Bait digital asset is like giving them a gift to agreeing to keep in touch with you.

If you give them lousy content, they will make it a point to not only unsubscribe themselves as fast as possible, but also make sure that all email messages from you go to their spam folder. Much deserved.

Take your Mass Control Bait digital assets seriously. They represent your brand.

When people read your business e-book or white paper or a report, they are forming an impression of you even when they do not realize it.

For example, if I ask you to download an e-book from my website, the sort of experience that you have with the e-book will reflect on the attitude you have towards me or my content writing services.

Hence, writing content for your Mass Control Bait digital assets should be taken as seriously as you take the content writing of your main website.

Content writing advice: Do not cram too many keywords when writing web pages and blog posts

I have observed that many clients want to incorporate as many keywords as possible when they are sending web page or blog post specs.

Even when I tell them that I will focus just on a couple of keywords and not more, they send me LSI keywords.

Using LSI keywords is not an excuse to use more keywords; LSI keywords are alternative keywords for the main keywords. But they think that LSI keywords can also be used to incorporate a greater number of keywords.

Although sometimes it is possible to use lots of keywords in a web page or a blog post contextually, in most of the cases, they end up diluting the main topic.

Want to improve your search engine rankings through strategic use of keywords?

Do not use highly competitive keywords – use longtail keywords comprising at least 3-4 words.

Use keywords such that they help you write about the main chosen topic with greater clarity and focus.

The more divergent keywords you use, the more you dilute the SEO power of your content. This adversely affects your search engine rankings.

 

Can you publish high quality content on a shoestring budget?

How to write high-quality content on a shoestring budget

How to write high-quality content on a shoestring budget.

Yes, you can.

When it comes to publishing high quality content on shoestring budgets, I have experienced two types of clients:

  1. Those who have a genuine problem with cash and right now, really cannot spend much money on my content writing services.
  2. Those who think that spending money on content writing is not worth it, and they must squeeze as much content as possible with as little money as possible.

The focus of the current blog post are the clients of the first category – who really need to publish high-quality content on a shoestring budget.

Frankly, if you want to publish a 2500-word blog post that is well researched, you will need to spend money on a content writer.

It is like, when you go to the Domino’s and you want to order a large pizza, you are going to have to pay for it. Cannot pay? Too bad. Find alternatives. Go for another fast food that may be equally yummy and appetizing.

When my clients do not have enough money, I don’t cut corners.

I either don’t take the assignment because sometimes even I cannot afford to work on lesser paying assignments, or I offer an alternative.

The trick is, publish as much high-quality content as possible. Do not, do not compromise on quality even if you get to publish less content. Less content does not mean bad content. It simply means less content. There is nothing wrong in that.

This is how you can publish high-quality content on a shoestring budget

Publish small blog posts and web pages

In my previous blog post titled How to start blogging right now I have written that most of the clients think that if they need to publish their blogs, they need to publish at least 1000 words.

Yes, there are definitely benefits of publishing longer pieces of content. The advantages of long form content are well proven. Long form content enjoys better search engine rankings, and it also gets shared more compared to shorter pieces of content.

But right now, in the beginning, when you are working on a shoestring budget, do not worry about publishing long form content. You cannot afford it and you don’t want to compromise on the quality of your content.

The benefits of publishing small blog posts and web pages is that you can publish them almost immediately. Instead of worrying about the number of words, you focus on the message and the quality of your content.

Deliver the central message and then be done with that.

Even if you need to pay your content writer, since your content writer will be writing smaller pieces of content, he or she will not charge much, and you will be able to collaborate with him or her within your shoestring budget.

It is not like once you have published web pages and blog posts you cannot come back to them and expand them. You can go on adding new content as and when you can afford.

For example, in the beginning you publish a blog post of just 200 words. You publish it and then submit it to the Google Search Console. It will get crawled and indexed. One important job is done.

After a month, you can add another 400 words and then resubmit your link to the Google Search Console. Now you have 600 words, and the content is crawled again.

Publish content iteratively

I have covered this topic in the above-mentioned point. Publishing content iteratively means publishing it in stages. You publish the bare-bones version for the first time and submit your link to Google.

Then you can go on visiting the link and keep on adding new content to it.

Please remember that the problem is not with how much content you have, the problem in the beginning is the lack of it.

If you keep on waiting for the time when you will be able to publish blog posts and web pages of thousands of words, you will either compromise on quality or you will go on waiting, and this will cause harm to your business.

Instead, publish module, smaller chunks of content and then let them grow over time.

Re-purpose existing content

Have you already got a few web pages and blog posts? Maybe you can take out some chunks and reuse them?

These days when I don’t get time to add new content to my blog, I randomly pick up (relevant & useful) paragraphs and sentences, make them into a quotable image, and then share the image on LinkedIn and Twitter.

Curate useful content

This was the initial essence of blogging I remember. Someone posted something, and then scores of people linked to the original piece and shared their own opinion on it. This is how blogging grew and millions of blog posts got interconnected.

There are many content segregation platforms and apps you can use to gather useful links in your industry.

I use them for gathering high-quality updates on content marketing, content writing and SEO from other blogs and websites.

I choose a link, link to it from a new blog post, and then write a few paragraphs either explaining the contents of the original link, or expressing my own opinion.

You do not always have to agree to the link that you have found. You can also disagree. For example, recently I found a link extolling the benefits of long form content and according to my experience, sometimes you can achieve the same results by publishing shorter blog posts. I wrote about that.

Just make sure that when you are disagreeing, you have a valid reason, otherwise, it becomes counter-productive.

Share quick tips and tricks about your business or expertise

Again, these tips and tricks don’t need to be very long and comprehensive.

Take for example this blog post – Content writing advice: In the beginning it is important to associate your name with what you do or offer.

I was having a conversation with a client, and it occurred to me that the advice that I was giving to him, I could also write and publish on the blog. I did. It hardly took me 10 minutes.

As I mentioned in the beginning of this blog post, some clients are simply miserly and don’t appreciate paying for good content, and some clients have a real problem. These clients know the value of high-quality content. They wouldn’t mind paying for it. It is just that right now they need to work on a shoestring budget.