Blog Improvement – Adding New Writers
We’ll be writing a series of posts with tips to improve your blog, which we hope you’ll find useful if you are looking at a blog as a significant vehicle for your online business (or if the blog IS your online business).
In the most general sense, blogs are all about content. But sometimes it can be tough to find the time to write all the things you want to write. Nobody says you have to do it all yourself, however. And a common method of producing more content is to simply hire a writer.
In the spirit of quality content, we promote hiring writers whose passions or expertise are similar to your own. With that in mind, let’s look at some of the advantages of adding new writers to your blog…
Why should I do it?
- SEO - As I discussed in a previous post, with regard to search engine rankings, Content is King. With additional writers, you will be able to generate more content for your blog.
- More Value to your Readers – One measure of a blog’s success is the number of regular readers it pulls. Adding new writers improves the quality of your blog in two ways: More Content and Deeper Coverage. With more writers, you should be able to cover hot topics in more depth, from various perspectives.
- Time – If you have someone doing the writing for you, then it leaves you more time to do other projects to improve your business, or even write more about the topics you enjoy most.How should I go about doing this?
Just like hiring any contractor, there are several ways to get new writers for your blog, and you should always consider the age-old art tapping your friends and colleagues – people whose expertise you know and respect. But let’s look at some popular methods for finding people outside your immediate social network:
- Ask your readers – If you already have a number of readers, you can ask your readers to contribute. People are often interested in writing about the subject matter about which they like to read. You can ask for submissions based on which you choose people who you deem fit for writing for your blog.
- Hold a Contest - You can hold contests for posts on your blogs in which winners’ posts are published. As opposed to the approach above, the idea here is to collect contributions for which the winner will not necessarily become a regular contributor.
- Post on Job Boards - This is a popular method mostly because it does not depend on your own site’s popularity. Anyone can post a job. There are many free and paid job listings where you can post openings, including Elance.com, Writerlance.com, Performancing.com, ProBlogger.net, and even the ever-popular Craislist.org. A lot of freelance writers frequent these listings and you are bound to get some good resumes.
Of course, none of the above methods are mutually exclusive. You should mix and match. Nor is the list exhaustive, so if you know of other great ways of finding bloggers for hire, please leave them in a comment on this post.
Why would anyone write for me?
There are at least two reasons:
- For Money – You pay them, of course. You should assess what you can afford versus what kind of return you expect to get from the investment. Like many other services, you get what you pay for (blog post quality may be of high importance to you, and good writers often charge more). Generally, freelance writers may charge anywhere from $.02 to $.25 per word or more, although pricing for regular work will probably be on a per-post basis (For example: $10 per 200 word post).
- For Recognition - A lot of people will write simply to getting their name published or to get a link back to their own blog. The more popular your blog the more of this non-monetary compensation you have to offer. Leverage it where you can.
Some Important Considerations
Here are some points that you should consider when adding writers to your blog:
- Decide on a mode of payment first. PayPal is the one of the most convenient and best adopted mechanisms.
- Decide on payment terms. You should figure out whether it will be a weekly payout or a monthly payout; you should agree on the amount to be paid per post, and the approximate length of each post.
- Finalize a process for submitting posts for the writers. This process should be designed with an eye toward minimizing the amount of effort required for all parties involved. This helps ensure that frequent posts actually save you time. Also, let the writers to post directly to your blogging system (you can start of with letting writers post drafts which you review and publish, and as you become comfortable with their work, perhaps let them publish directly).
- Finally, let the writers know what you expect from them. Be clear in describing your target audience and recommend at least an initial list of topics and ideas about which you would like them to write.
Assess what your needs are for your blog. If you generating more content is a big challenge for you, and you’re ready to have others join your team, consider taking advantage of their valuable perspectives.
As always, please share your experiences or questions in the comments for this post.
