Last week, I wrote down the 10 top tips for pitching guest posts and asking bloggers to review your product (you can read the article here). I wrote that from the point of view of somebody who receives requests to host guest posts and review stuff All The Time.
It can be time-consuming replying to these emails and messages, but if you’re anything like me, you welcome genuine and relevant content (and interesting book review requests) and don’t like to be rude, unless something’s obviously spammy (in which case, I’m only rude enough to ignore the message!). So, in this article I’m sharing the two methods I use to allow me to respond to pitches quickly, easily and politely, which also have the effect of weeding out the time-wasters.
1. Have a policy for guest posts and reviews
I’ve got a guest post and review policy on both this website (visit it here) and my book review blog (visit it here).
It’s standard practice to have a policy – it sets things out and allows you to filter out approaches you don’t want. Of course, I don’t know how many people this filters out before they contact me, but it must get rid of a few.
This is also hugely useful for when you respond to pitches. When I send my automated email (see point 2 below), I include a link to my policy in my email. This means …
a) The pitcher has to go and look at a web page before they respond (filtering out people who were blanket-bombing blogs and probably won’t be relevant to you)
b) I can change my policy once, on this page, without having to remember to update my standard pitch response email.
c) If a pitcher replies to my email and clearly hasn’t looked at the guidelines, that’s a clear indication that it’s time to terminate the conversation.
2. Create a standard automated pitch response email
Most email providers allow you to create standard replies which you can select and send out without having to type out a new email every time. In Gmail, you can set up something called Canned Responses (and you can find my instructions on how to set them up here).
This saves you loads of time responding individually to pitches for guest posts or product reviews. I tend to get more of the first category for this blog, and this is what my email says:
Thank you for your enquiry about posting your content on my blog.
Before we go any further, please read my Terms and Conditions on Guest Blog Posts and Sponsored Posts, make sure that you can answer the questions posed there, and then get back to me with your suggestions. Best wishes,
Liz
This really does cover most eventualities (and for the few that it doesn’t cover, I can easily add a bit to the email). It takes about three clicks of the mouse button to reply and send, and, to be honest, it usually puts people off! But then, that’s the idea …
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Using both of these methods has speeded up my response time to pitches and allowed me to sift out the wheat from the chaff, the genuine opportunities for cooperation from the spammers trying to insert their link onto every website and blog going.
I hope you’ve found this article enjoyable and useful. If you have, please take a moment to share it using the sharing buttons below, and I always appreciate relevant comments!
Relevant posts on this blog
Guest blogging 1: how to be the host with the most
Guest blogging 2: how to be the perfect guest
10 top tips for pitching your guest post or asking a blogger to review your product
