Create a content upgrade for the site owner → ask for a link credit
For this approach, you create an infographic, PDF, worksheet or checklist that's relevant to an authoritative article. Then you can offer it to the site owner or content marketing manager to include in their article in exchange for a back link credit.Hey Site Owner or Content Marketing Manager,
❶ Been following your site for a long time - finally a blog that backs up their points with scientific studies, not just their personal experiences!
❷ I recently created an infographic that illustrates every NLP technique and how to apply it in real life:
[image link]
❸ I think it'd really help readers of your article on NLP have a visual reference to understand each technique.
❹ Let me know if this would be a good fit?
Signoff
❶ Provide one meaningful comment about their website.
❷ Mention you created an infographic (related to a topic they have an article about) and provide an overview of what the infographic shows or teaches.
❸ Mention which one of their articles the infographic would be relevant for and reiterate a key learning they'd get from your infographic.
❹ Ask if they'd be willing to share it with their audience.
Offer a popular website an informative infographic to earn a link
Luke from Pest Pro App earned a link from Life Hacker by offering them an informative infographic on insect identification.
Luke <[email protected]>to Patrick
I really liked your article on Identifying Dangerous Spiders. Great stuff!
You actually inspired me to take this a step farther and create something even deeper in the subject of insects & spiders.
I thought I'd reach out to you because I just published an infographic on Insect Identification and I thought it might interest you. It covers 28 of the top insects & spiders that bite. All based on research and I have the sources to back it up.
Would it be OK to pass it along? I'd love to get your opinion on it.
Either way, keep up the good work with Lifehacker.
Best,
Luke
Luke <[email protected]>to Patrick
Was you interested in that infographic I mentioned? I forgot to post the link within it.
You can find that here:
blog.pestproapp.com/the-top-28-biting-stinging-insects/
Regards,
Luke
How to pitch a popular website your infographic idea before even creating it
Kaloyan from WooGuru pitched Kissmetrics his idea for a co-branded infographic and only created it after Kissmetrics' content manager agreed to feature it in their blog.Kaloyan <[email protected]>to Kissmetrics
Sean Work referred me this email in regards to the blog of Kissmetrics.
I just wrote a post on eCommerce Sales with some ingenious social media tactics and growth hacks. We're currently working on turning this post into a professional killer infographic that will have the core information from the post.
I'd like to offer this infographic to Kissmetrics blog so you can publish it exclusively. The infographic will contain the Kissmetrics logo, too of course.
Is this something you might be interested in? Please let me know so I can show you the infographic.
Cheers,
Kalo WooGuru.net Founder
Implement an influencer's advice → ask for a share
Hey Influencer,
I've been following your blog for the past 3 years, so many great insights!
❶ Your recent post about radical honesty really resonated with me. I followed it step by step and I found it dramatically reduced my day to day stress levels.
You can read my post about it here: [link]
❷ Would you be open to sharing the results with your audience as a success story in your article?
❸ I can write a paragraph summarizing its highlights so you can easily adapt it for the article.
Either way, thank you for sharing your can't-find-anywhere-else tips with the community.
Signoff
❶ Create a post detailing the results you achieved by implementing an influencer's advice.
❷ Share the link with them and ask if they may be willing to add it to their article. A success story helps boost its credibility.
❸ Offer to write a paragraph introducing your success story to make it easy for them to this section to the article.
Ask influencers for quotes to include in your article → ask for shares
This is how Kyle from GrowthBadger earned social shares from online marketing influencers including Tim Soulo from Ahrefs and Brian Dean from Backlinko. Kyle asked them for reaction quotes to the results of a survey he conducted and after the article went live, the influencers shared it with their large audiences. This is what Kyle calls the 'Double Survey Technique'. Kyle also discovered that you get a lot more replies by asking busy influencers to react to one single key point or survey finding instead of asking them to react to your entire article. In his first email to each influencer, he asked them "Mind if I send you the chart?" (a survey result for them to react to), instead of sending the chart upfront. This is a much easier ask to say 'yes' to and once the influencer does agree, they are much more likely to follow through and provide the quote. Most people don't want to be someone who reneges on their words. :)
Kyle <[email protected]>to Brian
Thanks for responding to my comment on yesterdays post. That was an awesome article.
I'd love to quote you in an upcoming article I think you'd be interested in.
It's about the results of a new study in which I asked 1,117 bloggers what's working for them right now: article types, monetization methods, etc.
Specifically I'd love to get a reaction quote from you on how bloggers say they view the importance of a good domain name.
Even just a sentence or two would be awesome.
Mind if I send you the chart?
Thanks!
Kyle
Brian Dean provided Kyle a reaction quote and after the article went up, Kyle let Brian know and he shared the article on Twitter.
Kyle <[email protected]>to Brian
Your quote and the full results post from my blogging study just went live:
https://growthbadger.com/blog-statistics/
It turned out great -- lots of interesting new stats.
If you have a minute to share it, that would be awesome.
Either way, thanks again for your excellent contribution! And if I can ever help you with anything, please let me know any time.
How to pitch a guest blog article
Hey Site Owner or Content Marketing Manager,
Been following your blog for a while.
❶ Really enjoyed your recent article on study motivation. What worked for me when I was in school what visualizing what was possible after I graduated and how I can apply or benefit from what I learned.
❷ I have an article idea that I think would be really helpful for your student audience. It's about how they can create their own super effective study guides by turning complex concepts into visual memory aids.
1) It can be difficult to understand technically challenging concepts like coagulation by reading textbooks' walls of text. Instead you can find videos that animate and explain these concepts.
- How to use Google to find publishing companies' high quality explainer videos
- Which parts of the video to screen capture and annotate for your study guide
2) How to organize and summarize your screenshots
- How to summarize every key idea into one sentence
- How to find diagrams and pictures to reinforce aspects of the concept the screen captures you already have may be lacking
3) How to use table of contents and Headings to organize your notes and screenshots
- How to use table of contents to enable quick jumps to different sections
❸ Links to a few articles I've written in the past:
[Link]
[Link]
❹ Love to know what you think!
Signoff
❶ Praise one recent article on their site and share your thoughts about it to show you really read it.
❷ Pitch a story idea relevant to their audience. Break it down by key sections and provide a list of major points you'll cover for each. This conveys the value of the article for their audience.
❸ List a few articles you've written in the past to show them your writing quality. If you don't have any published articles yet, you can link to your blog articles.
❹ Ask them for their thoughts about the article idea to open the conversation.
Feature another website's content or article → ask for a share
Hey Site Owner or Content Marketing Manager,
❶ Your article on how super busy people declare email bankruptcies and manage their inboxes was really interesting. Including the fact Beyoncé changes her email once week! ❷ I featured it here for my business audience who writes a lot of emails:
[link]
❸ The rest of the article shows how to write effective emails to super busy people and how to follow up appropriately to get a reply.
❹ Let me know if this would be a good fit for your audience?
Signoff
❶ Provide a meaningful comment about the article you featured.
❷ Mention that you featured their article to a relevant audience.
❸ Briefly describe the key value of the rest of your article.
❹ Ask them to share your article, framed in terms of if it would be a good fit for their audience.
Tired of worrying about how to get new clients?
You've probably heard this before: polish your website, become a thought leader, set up ads, compete on job boards, network...What do all of these have in common? You have to wait for leads to come to you. The reality is, when we need a new client, we typically need one asap. Instead of waiting and watching the bills stack up, it's actually it's possible to proactively reach out to your ideal clients and get hired. A lot of people think cold email doesn't work because most of the best practices aren't well suited for getting new clients. So when they tried it, all they talked about was what they do, their benefits or past results. This may check a few copywriting 101 boxes but no matter how great your benefits or results are, the prospect has no clue how you'll actually be able to apply your skills and experience to help their business. The key to overcoming their skepticism? Come up with a few valuable improvement ideas related to your services tailored for your prospect's business and share this in your first email to them. This is what I call the VIU (valuable ideas upfront) approach. Now you’re not just offering them skills and experience prospects have to figure out how to put to use (they just won't reply), you’re offering them ready-to-go solutions to improve their business. Here's an example of this approach in action:Hey Prospect,
❶ I came across your comment on Product Hunt about LeadBot.
❷ In terms of attracting leads to the website, I found this process works well for coming up with content topics that brings in a lot more ready-to-convert leads:
- ❸ ・ What would someone who needs my product be searching for? For example, for an online design tool, specific topics include: how to make video thumbnails, Facebook image sizes.
・What do the top ranked articles for these topics cover? Enter each topic into Google and see what points each of the top ranked articles cover. If there are key points that most or all of the articles miss about one of these topics, this is great opportunity for you to create a 10x better article to attract more visitors and leads.
・Offer a downloadable resource related to each content topic. From experience, leads are much more likely to leave their email address to receive a contextually relevant resource and this opens the door for you to nurture them about your product.
❹ Would you be open to a 15-min brainstorm where we can come up a few high converting content topics for Swerve?
Signoff
❶ In one sentence, mention where you discovered this prospect to open the conversation.
❷ Mention that you'd like to share your process for achieving a goal related to their product and related to your services.
❸ Break down 2-3 key steps in your process. To demonstrate your value and expertise, share steps that are insider knowledge, someone who doesn't do this for a living may not be privy to.
❹ Ask them for an initial call, framed as a brainstorm session so the prospect of taking away valuable ideas entices them to join. The call will give you a chance to further demonstrate your value so they would want to hire you to implement your process and achieve results for them.
Skyscraper: create a better version of an article they currently link to → ask them to link to yours too
Hey Site Owner or Content Marketing Manager,
❶ I was running experiments on hiring freelancers and I noticed you mentioned one of my favorite guides on the topic: [link].
❷ I tested its steps and found great success with Reddit as well. Especially when you use a "no brown M&Ms" clause to weed out people who don't read your entire job description.
❸ I just published a more in depth guide laying out step by step how to find, motivate and pay freelancers with results from my experiments. Also mentioned your article on the topic:
[link to your article]
❹ Let me know if this would be a good fit for your audience?
Either way, keep up your great work!
Signoff
❶ Use backlink checkers like Open Link Profiler or Ahrefs to find what articles influential relevant websites are linking to. For this approach, create a better more comprehensive version of one of these articles.
To start, simply mention you came across their existing link to the article you created a better version of.
❷ Briefly describe the context of how you created the article or the research that you put into it.
❸ Mention you created a more in depth version of what they're currently linking to and provide a few details about what it covers the article they currently link to doesn't.
❹ Ask them if your article would be a good fit for their audience, which subtly implies "would you be willing to link to it?"
Approach credit: Brian Dean's skyscraper technique
How to ask people who posted your link in the past to share your new content
To see who shared you content, simply search your site link on Faceook and Twitter. For example, I would search for 'artofemails.com' for my site:
