An Open Invitation to Guest Post on the Urban Chicken Podcast’s Blog

I am happy to announce that I am now accepting submissions for guest posts on the Urban Chicken Podcast’s blog!  It is my goal to eventually host one guest post per week.

That being said there are certain guidelines and requirements that must be followed to make this a successful and enriching partnership.  The original intent in founding the Urban Chicken Podcast was to provide valuable, actionable and interesting information and education on the topic of keeping chickens for amateur flock masters, like me.  Consequently, all guest post submissions must be in keeping with the Urban Chicken Podcast mission.  Ultimately, I want this to be a good experience for you [the guest writer], for me [top chicken in this establishment], and most of all enjoyable and edifying for the Urban Chicken Podcast audience.

Before submitting your post for consideration, here are some following rules and guidelines:

CONTENT

• Your post must be about keeping chickens. If you are familiar with my podcast and blog posts, then you know “chicken related” can cover a wide range of topics, including, but not limited to: chicken health, chicken science, chicken stories, chicken gadgets, chicken history, eggs info, recipes, personal chicken tales, foods chickens like, gardening for your chickens, etc.

• Let me be unequivocal, all submissions must be chicken related in some way or form.

THE COLD HARD RULES

• The Urban Chicken Podcast is an empire and I am its dictator.  I reserve the right to reject any submission without explanation.

• You will not be paid for any submissions as a guest writer to the Urban Chicken Podcast.  Though I might like to compensate guest writers the simple truth is that I lose money each month keeping the website and podcast up and running.  Paying for guest articles is simply not feasible.

• The Urban Chicken Podcast will retain an interest in all of the material published on its website requiring that all guest posts submitted for publication on the Urban Chicken Podcast Website must be original and cannot be republished elsewhere later (either in print or on the web).

• I reserve the right to edit any guest posts for publication on the Urban Chicken Podcast website.  Edits will be judiciously made focusing on grammar, punctuation, spelling, syntax, etc., rather than substance.  If I make any substantive changes (unlikely), I will email the post back to you for your approval before posting.

GENERAL SUBMISSION GUIDELINES 

• Submit well-written, informative, engaging material that is relevant to the Urban Chicken Podcast and its mission to theurbanchickenpodcast@gmail.com with “Proposed Guest Post” in the subject line. This is a one-woman operation, so it may take me 2-3 weeks to get back to you.

• Your post cannot be an advertisement for your product or the equivalent of a sponsored post. (If you’d like to advertise your product on the Urban Chicken Podcast website, please email me at theurbanchickenpodcast@gmail.com with “Advertising” in the subject line and we can discuss that as a possible opportunity.)

• All submissions should be (ideally) between 500 – 1,000 words.  (To help with this point, please see handy word counting tool at: http://www.wordcounttool.com/).

• The use of topic headings, bullets, lists and shorter paragraphs is encouraged as it makes reading easier.

• Submit your guest post using Word .doc format.

• If you are submitting a photo or image to be consider for use with your post, please ensure the following:  1) That you have rights to use the image/photo; or 2) If using Creative Commons images/photos, please include the URL to the image/photo owner’s Creative Commons license (such as the Flickr page, wikimedia URL, etc.); and 3) submit only images/photos which are high resolution and sized at least 800 pixels wide. Height should not exceed 600 pixels.

• By submitting any original images/photos that you hold the right to use, you are granting the Urban Chicken Podcast a royalty-free, non-exclusive, perpetual license to use such images/photos.

• Include a short bio (100 words or less) at the end of your post. Feel free to include a links to your website or other social media outlets (e.g. Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.)

• Review and edit your articles before submitting them.  We all make mistakes and miss typos and minor error.  But for my sanity, please take the time to at least use Spellcheck before submitting your guest post.

• You may include a link or two in your post, if they point to relevant, valuable material for the reader.  Any links deemed to be irrelevant to the main idea of your post will be removed without notice. Likewise, any non-working links will be removed without notice.

• You cannot include affiliate links.  Let me be clear:  all affiliate links are verboten!

• Please be sure to credit all sources used in your submission.

• Your post must be original and not previously published either on the Web or in print. Any published guest posts may not be later republished elsewhere. This rule has been already mentioned but it is an important one, well-worth restating.  If I reject your post, you are obviously free to do whatever you want with it, including publishing it elsewhere.

• I may provide a short introduction or conclusion to your post to provide context or the rationale as to why I think the post is important. 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.

SOME TIPS AND RESOURCES

Here are some instructive articles on how best to write a guest blog post.  I personally think there is some great advice in these blog posts:

• “Anatomy of an Effective Blog Post” by Michael Hyatt
• “9 Ways Become an Exceptional Guest Poster” by Darren Rowse
• “Seven Steps to Writing a Successful Guest” Post by Jeff Goins.
• 7 Crucial Tactics for Writing a Radically Successful Guest Post by Blog Tyrant (via CopyBlogger).

CLOSING THOUGHTS

I am very excited to hosting new ideas, fresh points of view and unique stories through guest writers on the Urban Chicken Podcast.  It is of paramount concern to me that the Urban Chicken Podcast and its supporting blog continuously provide this sort of high-quality information to the backyard chicken enthusiast community. I look forward to your submissions!