How to successfully pitch blogs and articles to editors

If you're going to the effort of writing a regular blog, then why not try to get as much mileage out of it as you can, and get it featured in your local or industry press. Editors are constantly looking for fresh content and the less they have to write themselves, the happier they are! In this month's blog I want to give you my top five tips for successfully pitching your words of wisdom to an editor. 

Here goes!

My top five tips for getting your blog published:

1. Make sure it's relevant - When you’re pitching your blog to an editor, make absolutely certain it is relevant to the publication or website. Your industry might have many publications, but each one will have a slightly different audience and angle. If you keep sending articles to an editor that aren't relevant to the publication, they'll stop opening your emails. Thorough research is essential!

2. Offer them exclusivity - Most editors want exclusivity and won’t publish articles that have already been published elsewhere. Putting your blog on your own website first is usually ok, but don’t circulate your blog to a bunch of editors at the same time. Choose the one publication or website that you really want to target and send it to them first. If they’re not interested then you can pitch it to your second choice.

3. Follow it up - Editors receive a LOT of emails, so copy and paste your blog into the body of the email so they can simply scan read it. If you don’t hear back from them in a few days, follow it up with a phone call. This gives you a chance to pitch the article to them personally, which will hopefully peak their interest. My top tip - prepare your pitch in advance and sound really entusiastic and passionate about the subject!

4. Don’t attach images - Images will fill up the editor’s inbox and they generally don't encourage it. Let the editor know if you have images available. They'll ask for them if they want them. Remember if it is for printed media, they will require high resolution images.

5. Link to your website - If your pitch is successful and your blog is featured on another website, then make sure the editor includes a link from the article to your website. This will not only drive traffic to your site, but will build links to it, which Google rewards!

Want to know more? Get in touch. I'd love to hear from you.