Guest Post Requests: Separating the Gems from the Junk

What is a guest post? A guest post is an article written and published on someone else's website or blog.

Oh, you wouldn't believe the silliness I've seen in my Gmail accounts when it comes to requests to post on my blogs. I use the word "silly" loosely, the laziness is so rampant it's actually rather maddening.

Thankfully, I've sharpened my radar and can separate the gems from the junk.

3 Easy Things . . .

When I receive a request to guest post on one of my blogs, here are a few things I look for:

• The requestor actually read the blog. A claim to be an avid reader falls flat with the suggestion that,"Don't Break Your Diet When Ordering Pizza" would be a perfect fit for the site. Liar.

• The pitch is customized. A claim to have post titled "xxx" prepared soley for this blog falls flat when the same claim shows up in the two separate email accounts I maintain for each of my blogs. Caught.

• Grace. Arguing with me when I respond that a submission does not align with the focus or direction of the site or speak to readers the way I want it to is fruitless. It's my blog.

If I receive a request that I believe is sincere, I will respond but if the requester is not going to take their request or my time seriously I will not.

 . . . . To Help Me Help You Help Me

Here, on this blog, guest posts do not occur without a personal connection and smart content. It wasn't always that way but I've learned the difference between quantity and quality and, for now, this works for me.

Now, Women of HR is a different story. As a multi-contributor blog, Women of HR exists because of our regular writers and guest contributors. Some of our best contributions started with a cold-email. It can be done. But you have to be serious about it.

I need you for your voice, your ideas and your diversity. Whether it be for exposure, a place to write or a community to join, you need me too.

You don't have to have your own blog to submit. You don't even have to think you are an awesome writer (hint: you are better than you think you are). If you have the desire to write, are willing to work with me and my suggestions, we'll get a post up that will be well received. Guaranteed.

Write from the heart, do your homework and it could be a match made in <blog> heaven.

Photo credit: iStockphoto

How To Inspire Others When You Are Uninspired

You are engaged, tooling along, whistling while you work and then, without warning, psh, it happens. Just like that, you've lost your inspiration.

You begin to wonder. Where did you last see it? What were you doing when you lost it? When did you first notice it was missing? Was it really there one minute and gone the next or was it a long, slow leak?

You've been there before, I've been there before and we will be there again. Not only can self-motivation be a challenge in this frame of mind, so can inspiring others. That's a problem and it's a problem worth solving. I set out to solve it right here in this very space.

I carried my Modo & Modo black Moleskine journal around with me. I wrote, I erased, doodled, I cut, I pasted, I pondered and I wondered, "how do you inspire others when you are uninspired?"

I got nothing.

How about you?