Want to Write a Guest Post?

Raise your profile and get exposure for your brand
by being featured on this blog

1.  Aspiring Guest Writers: Please read this first

Thank you for your interest in writing a guest post for this blog.

Please ensure you read this entire page before submitting anything.

Guest posting offers a fantastic opportunity for a win-win situation by providing value to the readers of this site while enhancing your authority, creating exposure and generating business leads for you.

For that reason, a good fit must exist between
   (a) your article,    (b) this site, and     (c) your site (or the site that you wish to link to). 

I love to help fellow content creators and develop new relationships with interesting individuals and businesses. However, I take great care to ensure that all published content maintains a tight focus on the theme of the blog.

Unfortunately, many requests I receive are not a good fit because quite frankly the content is irrelevant, boring, generic or completely unrelated to the content of this site.

If you have something legitimately interesting, entertaining or informative to share, and it passes my BS filter, I'd love to hear from you

I am always open to the idea of collaborating with, or cross-promoting complementary products, services or businesses.

If you are comfortable with the content and style guidelines below, then please follow this process to contact me with your guest post idea.  

This simple sequence provides a first-level filter to weed out the lazy ones who perform blanket email blasts using a scraped or guessed email address or contact me through the standard contact form with a generic email proposal template. Each step that is not followed reduces your chances.

1.  Please send to guestpost |at| officemastery.com. Obviously, change |at| for @.

2.  Address me by name (Jason).

3.  Put "I have read the guest post guidelines. Here is my proposal' in the subject line.

4.  Where applicable please state the webpage address(es) or website address(es) that you intend to link to from your post. I will cross-check these for 'good fit'. 

5.  In 1-3 sentences introduce yourself and state why your proposed article / website / product or service is complementary to this site and would provide value or benefit to my readers.

6.  If you were "reading through my site and found it interesting/intriguing", I would genuinely love to know which post that was, and why. Please don't write it if you don't mean it!

7.  Pitch me your best idea for an article (or up to 5 ideas) for consideration.

8.  For each article idea, craft a good title/headline that would stop an interested reader in their tracks and make them click.

I respect the time it takes to write a good article. If accepted and if necessary, I will work with you to refine it to ensure you are putting your best foot forward while making the article as good as possible for the site. 

I will not waste your time. I ask that you do not waste mine.

Please re-read the guidelines on this page again, as a checklist, before you email your submission.

2. Content Guidelines

1.  Above all else, the content must provide value and benefit to my readers.

2.  Your article and website must be relevant and closely related to the theme of this site (Microsoft Office), but you have some scope to be creative. For example you might have some useful templates, software tools, resources or services to offer, or some useful insight into computers, IT, cloud technology, security etc, or a case study of how Microsoft Office helped to improve the quality of your product or service.

3.  Your post cannot be an advertisement for your product or the equivalent of a sponsored post, although you can include an offer link in your bio (see below).

4.  The post type can be a 'how to', a case study, a comparison / review or an opinion, story or idea derived from your own personal experience. 

5.  Your post should be between 750 and 1,500 words..

3. Originality and Exclusivity

1.  Your post must be your own original work.

2.  The article must not have been previously published on the web or in print. Google penalises duplicate content.

3.  You agree not to publish the same or similar article anywhere else, including your own blog or web site or as a guest post on another web site.

4.  You may, however, create a brief 1-3 paragraph summary on your own site that links to your post on this site.

5.  If an image is not your own, you must have a license to use it (e.g. purchase the image from a reputable stock photo site or ensure the image has a creative commons license). It must not infringe an owner's copyright.

4. Style Guidelines

1.  Use the Heading1 style for the title.

2.  Only use Heading2 style for major headings and Heading3 style for sub-headings. Do not go beyond these 2 levels.

3.  Use default paragraph text and single-level numbered or bullet lists for the main content.

4.  You may apply bold, italic and underline.

5.  Do not use different fonts, font sizes, font colours etc, as your content will be re-styled to fit the rest of this site.

5. Bio / Byline Guidelines

1.  The combined author bio and byline links must not exceed 100 words.

2.  Please include a 1-2 sentence author bio and 2 good quality images of yourself. 

3.  You may include byline links for any/all of the following:

  • your own blog or web site
  • your Bio page or About page
  • how people may contact you (email, twitter, facebook etc.)
  • one special offer for our readers, such as a product discount or useful resource. Discount codes must be 'officemastery' and special offer URLs should end with '/officemastery/' 

6. Outbound & Reciprocal Links

You may provide one link to your own website.

You may also provide up to 3 additional links to other websites, where appropriate. For example if your article is a listicle, review, or comparison, you may provide links to those sites.

The link type of all outbound links will be set to FOLLOW. However, I urge you to take care when selecting which sites you wish to link to, because just one low-quality link (based on my sole judgement) may result in your entire article being rejected.   

When considering your guest post submission, two key questions are considered.

1.  Does your post provide value or benefit to my readers?

2.  Is your website a natural fit with this website and does your outbound link provide value or benefit to my readers?

If these criteria are met, then I have no hesitation in providing an outbound link to your site.

Of course, if you want to provide a link from your site to mine, it's always appreciated but not obligatory. Only do so if you want to. You are invited to link to your own guest post or any other posts, services or products on this site that you consider useful to your own readers.

I have no interest in spammy link building.

I play the long game, part of which means publishing good content. Building authority and developing a reputation . Building the right connections with like-minded business owners. Working together in a mutually beneficial way to enhance the value we both provide. 

If you're good with that, then I look forward to receiving your submission.

7. Submission Guidelines

If your post meets the above guidelines:

1.  Please submit your guest post in docx or html format.

2.  Attach a zipped folder containing all images used. Alternatively, provide a link to a shared cloud drive. Name each image starting with the image number within the post (e.g. 01) followed by a short phrase or description. This simplifies the process of uploading and inserting the images into the post.

3.  [Optional] Include your monthly audience size (blog post readership,  podcast listeners, youtube subscribers and views etc.). The figures will have no impact on whether or not your submission is accepted (I'm just interested). All requests are considered.

4.  Please confirm that you are willing to engage with my readers in the comments about your post. This is non-negotiable.

5.  I will often approve or decline your post within 1-2 days but it may take me up to 7 days to respond. Your patience is appreciated.

6.  If I decline your post, you will receive a response outlining the reason. You are then free to do whatever you want with it, including publishing it elsewhere.

7.  If I accept your post, I will likely edit your copy for grammar, punctuation, spelling, etc. 

I may provide a short introduction or conclusion to your post to provide context or opinion. I will make sure that my comments are set off from yours stylistically, so that my readers are clear that these are mine and not yours.

If I make substantial changes, I will email the post back to you for your approval before posting.

8. Fees

There are no fees to have your guest post appear on this site. This means free exposure for you..

Sponsored Posts are not currently used on this site. That may change in the future and appropriate fees will be charged at that time.

9. Disclaimer

With a few exceptions, good quality posts that follow the guidelines above are nearly always published, at my sole discretion. However, writing a post and submitting it to me does not obligate me to publish it.

Thank you for your interest.

Jason Morrell blog signature

Jason Morrell
Founder, Course Creator & Chief Decision Maker
Office Mastery | "Helping you leverage the power or Microsoft Office"
Office Legends Academy | "Creating Office Legends"

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