As a webmaster of some twenty-odd websites, I get the occasional email asking me to publish a guest post. I am very open-minded about publishing anything, if I have a good spot for it, and I think its worth reading. But too often, I get some emails that make me just click the delete button. Although, I must admit, sometimes I save one just for the sheer entertainment value, as you will see in a minute.
I will list some sites I am working on at the end, so if you are looking for a website to publish your writing, I’ll post my list. But I wanted to show some real examples of emails I have received from writers or webmasters.
Here is the one I just got this morning, which gave me the idea for this article:
hello, i am writing guest post for website please hear my idea because your reader will benefit from this informations. it is very helpful to your traffics to.
That’s it, no name, no mention of which site, no mention of what exactly his (or her) great idea was. Sadly, this kind of email is more common than a good one.
Then there’s this one:
Hello Webmaster,
i recently found your website from google.com I have visited your site and would like to keep a post on automotive cars in your site as a guest postIf you are agree with my proposal, please look me back.
Again, bad English, no mention of which site they are referring to, and no real idea for a story. Plus, no signature. And this was the subject title of the email- “Want A Guest post”. If you are gong to capitalize the title, then capitalize it all.
Sometimes they even follow up with another email, where they reply to their own email, like this one:
Hi,
Good MorningI read the blog post (they mentioned one of my articles here) on your blog (linked to it here) and loved reading it . I know you’re a busy person, so I’ll keep this brief.
I wanted to reach out to see if you would allow me to do a guest post. My initial thought is writing about (something boring), but if you have a better idea, I’m open to it!
You can reach me any time via email: (email here), I look forward to your thoughts
Warmest regards
I received about ten of these exact emails (above) within just a few days. Some of them mentioned a different article, but most were the same article- the first one on my site. Everything else was identical, except the email at the end was different. So, right away I smelled a rat- a canned letter. But one of them followed up with worse English.
I had sent my Article.
Hope you have received it.
Please confirm your interest by replying back to this mailRegards
Hey, of all the other canned emails, at least this person tried harder and sent a follow-up email.
How to properly inquire about writing a guest post:
Enough of the bad stuff. Next, I will show you a really good one I got, and this is my favorite all-time guest post inquiry email I ever received…
Hi ken,
I saw your submission guidelines on (my site link). I’m not that great a writer, but I would like to take advantage of your willingness to publish random people. So, I was wondering, since I can’t write, if I pay you $75 would you place my link on this page of yours- (a link to one of my pages).
Thank you for your consideration,
Here’s what they got right:
1. My name.
2. They read my submission guidelines.
3. They seemed genuine. No phoney “I love your site” crap.
4. They offered money. The site in question is a PR3, so those usually cost, unless the article is outstanding.
5. They got straight to the truth- a link is what they want.
There was a name at the end, but I removed it. Anyway, those are the ones I really like. But I will publish them for free if they are worth reading. In fact, sometimes I’ll even publish a bad-English piece (after I edit it).
OK, enough making fun of people. Here are my sites below, and their keywords/topics.
I will list them in order of page rank or domain authority, and include some keywords to help you find the right site to publish your article.
- Big City Driver: Trucking, city driving. PR3, DA 24.
- Simple Website Layouts: HTML templates. PR2, DA 19.
- Backward Times: Conservative/Christian opinion, news. PR2, DA 17.
- Directsite.net: Internet, tech. PR2, DA 22.
- Flu News: Anything related to influenza. PR1, DA 10.
- Driver Story Magazine: True stories of road rage. PR1, DA 17.
- Driven Autos: Anything automotive. PR1, DA 14.
- Freightraters.com: Freight/shipping news. PR1, DA 13.
- SystemCash.com: Money making ideas. PR1 DA 12.
- NameLeak.com: Domain name investing. PR1, DA 11.
- FreeWPHosting: WordPress tips. PR0, DA 11.
- 777crash.com: Airplane crash videos and stories. PR n/a DA 12.
If you’d like to have your guest post published on any of these sites, please email me here- skaggmo@yahoo.com.
*Pictures by Picture Youth. Visit their website here- Picture Youth. They don’t allow most of their photos to be used for free. But these two were available through a Creative Commons license. They do some excellent work!
BIO:
Ken Skaggs is a 30-year veteran trucker and safety professional, who has always been a writer, and an entrepreneur at heart. Since 2000, he’s had 150+ articles published by Ten-Four Magazine, Careers in Gear, Driver Story Magazine, and dozens of websites.