Okay. I couldn’t stand it anymore. I receive horrible guest post pitches on a regular basis from people who don’t have a clue how to do it. I used to feel bad that some people just don’t get it, but there is just too much advice online nowadays to still come up with these terrible pitches.
I finally got sick of just deleting the emails and decided to make an evergreen post for the best of the best (or worst of the worst). I will bet that some of you have received similar (if not the same, as most are templates) pitches. If you have some of your own, you can share in the comments or email them to me and maybe I’ll include them next time I update the post.
My God I Hope This Isn’t Your SEO Firm
I completely understand when freelancers from overseas take jobs on Upwork guaranteeing backlinks. I receive these pitches all day long. However, when you are a prominent SEO firm in the United States and doing the same thing, shame on you.
For the sake of not outing the firm (although I should), we’ll just call it “TR.”
You can see from the screenshot above that it starts out like every other spammy guest post pitch: poor grammar, not addressing me personally, etc. The kicker with this one is they send the guest post along with the pitch.
The rest is pretty easy to guess. Yes, they provided the worse anchor text imaginable and didn’t bother including any other external or internal links to their post.
You can see the generic anchor text in the above screenshot. This type of black hat SEO technique went out of style many moons ago. Anyone still using this is uninformed. Any SEO agency still using this (like the one that sent this pitch to me) should NEVER be hired to do SEO work for your business.
So, I get so tired of these I thought I would play along for a while.
First, I would thank the spammer and tell them I would publish once removing the link. This always gets their attention.
Then comes the actual link request (note, still not addressing me by name which is the number one rule for outreach).
And now for the begging.
After telling them I don’t give links, they ask for one in the bio. Then of course no more responses. Hopefully they got the picture (probably not).
This is not Spam. Oh, really?
When you are going to SPAM people, don’t try to tell them you’re not. Be sincere with your email. At least this one could have said “I didn’t read anything about you or your website and I’m just lazily trying to get a guest post opportunity for a quick backlink.”
Sorry, Andy. Answer is, “hell no!” This has the classic sign of not actually reading my blog.
“I’ve been following your website.” No, you haven’t!
If you had been following my website, you would have seen my post on how to guest post pitch which went live exactly one week prior to receiving this email. In that post, I talk about how I do not accept guest posts (at least at the time of writing) and also spell out the failures of how to get your pitch rejected when submitting to those who do. Some of them include:-
- a generic greeting (Hello Friend, when you can easily find my name on my website);
- talking generically about content (as opposed to citing a specific article you liked);
- and, pitching a topic not even related to my site (I deal with marketing, not home security reviews).
Another great fail!!
If You Say Your Post is Quality, Your Pitch Should Be of Quality
If English is your second language and you want to guest post for an English website, I suggest you hire a freelancer to do your outreach for you. It looks really bad when you say you create quality guest posts, but it takes me 10 minutes to read and understand the 5 sentence pitch you sent me.
I didn’t have the heart to email Thelma back and let her know that I don’t accept guest posts. Also, no one tells me what I link to on my website. If I did accept guest posts I certainly wouldn’t do so from someone whose grammar is horrible.
“I’m ready to discuss my contents with you.”
Uh, no thanks. I don’t really want to know what you have inside of you.
“I promise you with unique quality.”
If that is the case, your pitch should be of quality as well. I would also suggest if you state you want to link to your website, yet you’re emailing from a Yahoo address, you may want to mention your actual website somewhere in the email. Just saying!
You’re Going to Help Me? Gee, Thanks!
So this is not necessarily a pitch to guest post on my blog. It is a pitch to help me get exposure on other blogs through link building. What I find interesting about it is that the writing is so horrid, how would anyone decide to use this service?
My favorite part is that they are going to “make all the links manually & as they are all ethical.” I would love to see them reach into the computer and manually make the links. Especially since the links themselves are ethical. I don’t think there are enough face palm emojis to get me through this entire email.
Did You Really Read My “Blog Post About Information?”
One of the first rules about making a great guest post pitch is to personalize your request. Be specific about what parts of the blog you like and present some specific article ideas that fit within the niche of the blog. When you send out a pitch like the one below, it is obvious you have the “spray and pray” theory.
My favorite part of this email is the introductory sentence. “I’ve been reading and truly liked your blog post about information.” I have to thank Sandeep, but I don’t recall ever writing an article “about” information.
“Nevertheless” – Using this term means that “despite” reading and enjoying my blog, they still decided to reach out to me. This is actually an insult to the blog owner but the writer probably does not realize it due to the poor grammar used in the pitch.
Because. Reading is Hard.
And yet another one that failed to read anything about my blog before sending a pitch. Please, at least use correct grammar. And, if you say you read my blog then read my blog. You will find my name – which coincidentally is NOT Webmaster/Owner – written all over the place.
I normally wouldn’t include this one because it is your run-of-the-mill pitch I receive every day, but the author name made my day. I hope Ricky talks to her about how to do outreach.
Lucy, you’ve got some explaining to do!
Thanks For the Relevant Topic
One thing I recommend when pitching your guest post is to ensure you have a relevant topic in mind. Pitching something that has nothing to do with the website is a sure sign that you failed to read the guidelines.
First things first. I DON’T ACCEPT GUEST POSTS! However, if you don’t take the time to find that out, at least pitch me something relevant to my website.
Well, unfortunately I don’t think my audience wants to know about “uniforms” or if they are “really needed.” But, thanks for reaching out, Eva.
Entice Me With Money!
Money talks. Well, not with everyone and especially when it comes to the quality of my content. At least this one is going to supply me with high quality “contents” (yes I noticed that too, unfortunately James did not).
When I receive pitches such as these, I always want to reply and let them know my sponsored posts are $20,000. Then I realize I am wasting my time and it would actually cost me money to do so. I only wish James took the time to read some of my advice on guest post pitching. He would probably pick up more sites without having to pay a dime.
Summing it Up
Hopefully this sparks a fire under you to take the time to craft your guest post pitch carefully. If you don’t want to take my advice on guest post pitching, at least take a look around for what others are saying. Craft your pitch carefully or at least give it a little more thought than those above. Otherwise you could wind up on a post just like this.
What’s the worst guest post pitch you ever received?