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So You Want to write for Expert Magazine – Writing Guidelines

Thanks for your interest in writing for Retail News Magazine! We love connecting with writers who can help us fulfill our mission.

WHY should I write for the RNM ?

Writing for RNM may help you build your reputation and further your career. When you write for us, you become part of our “family.” Not only will you get a lot of exposure and credibility, you have the potential to connect with some of our influential bloggers if they like your post. Our community is a friendly and active group, and we like to help each other out.

WHAT makes a good article?

We get far more submissions than we can accept (this is a great community!). To give yourself an edge, consider these tips:

  • Read our news. Develop a sense of what we publish
  • Write for content marketers. Address their needs, fears, challenges, burning questions, pain points.
  • Have, and hone, a main message. Edit your intro so that the point of your post is ridiculously clear. (Your teachers weren’t kidding about the value of a thesis sentence.)
  • Be prescriptive. Don’t just tell readers to do something. Explain how.
  • Tell a story – like a journalist. Cover who, what, when, where, how, and why. Make it personal. Share things you’ve done and seen, lessons you’ve learned, money you’ve saved (or earned), audiences you’ve grown, problems you’ve solved, etc.
  • Make it concrete. Give examples, details, metrics. Tell and show. Make it real. Deliver aha moments for readers who may be scratching their heads.
  • Make it long enough to engage and enrich readers (and no longer):  We don’t have a word-count goal.
  • Self-disclosure. Please disclose any relationships / partnerships you have when providing examples, technologies, etc. (e.g. if an example comes from a client or your company, indicate this in the post).
  • Avoid or explain buzzwords. Some of our readers feel turned off by geekspeak. If you’re talking tech, help people understand – in a nonscary way – what’s possible and why they should care.
  • Be thoughtful when including links. Posts with too many links back to your domain will look spammy and will be rejected.
  • Self-promotion. Avoid promoting your tool or company in your post. Your author bio is a good place to do that.
  • Use a friendly voice. Say I, we, you. Use contractions as you would normally (you’ll). Write as if talking with a friend.
  • Include high res images (PNG or JPGs) and/or video or infographic embed codes.
  • Incorporate utility content. Share templates, checklists, step-by-step instructions.
  • Give credit. Check your facts and quotations. Cite your sources.
  • Let your heart show. Where appropriate, share your feelings!

HOW do I submit a post ?

Please submit your full draft in a Word doc (preferred) or Google doc format and the information below to editorial@expert-magazine.org

Your bio: Bio should be approximately 60 words and should include your Twitter handle, as well as any other relevant links you wish to display: your blog, LinkedIn profile, Facebook page, website URL, etc. This is a great place to include any promotional or gated links as we generally don’t allow them in the body copy.

Your headshot: We sometimes use a site called Gravatar to manage our author’s headshots. New contributors should create an account there and upload a headshot. Once this is done, we’ll need the email address that was used to register the account, so we can associate your headshot with the author profile we will use in your posts.

Supporting images, interactive content, or videos: Don’t worry about the cover image, we’ll take care of that. But here are tips on the other kinds of media you may want to include:

  • Images (PNG, JPG): Provide any high res images you would like to include within your Word doc. When saving your images, please provide a descriptive name (e.g. content-marketing-personas-image1)
  • Infographics, videos, and interactive content: Include the embed code for the infographic within your Word doc.

Got questions you don’t see answers to? Shoot us an email:editorial@expert-magazine.org

We’ll be happy to help.