How to not get published!

1. Underestimate your audience

A great way to make sure your audience and journalists will not want to read your content, is by underestimating them. Providing information that your audience will likely know, explaining the obvious or straight out belittling your reader will ensure your content will be put away. Never treat your reader or viewer as an equal. Don’t only provide context and clarification where needed, going overboard with your explanations will drive your audience away quite successfully.

2. Don’t understand the preferences of your audience

Is your audience mostly consuming content quickly and on their mobile devices, or do they prefer to read long form content on paper while enjoying a relaxed morning coffee? That makes quite the difference in format, tone, length, subject and medium you may choose to use. To make sure your content will not be consumed, ignore all information you might be able to gather on the audience's preferences. Do not segment your target audience to get to know the preferences of each segment separately, you will risk creating content in ways your target audience wants to consume!

3. Don’t adhere to the style and guidelines of the media outlet you are sending your content to

When you are sending out a press release to journalists or a guest blog to an external website, do not follow to the style and guidelines of the media outlet you are approaching. Running a website, magazine, newspaper or show costs quite some time and journalists are usually quite swamped already. If you want to be sure your content will be ignored, offer them content that needs a whole lot of work before it can be published to their outlets. Sure thing, they will not invest the time to change the content to meet the needs of the media outlet they are working for.

4. Don’t use sources to back up your claims

Bold claims and provocative headlines are successful ways to create interesting and compelling content. There is, however, a great way to undermine these efforts and drive readers away instantly. Do not back up any of your claims with sources. Create an atmosphere in which it is difficult to follow and believe your claims, and make it difficult to check any of your statements. This ensures you will come across as untrustworthy and dodgy.

5. Miss your deadline (and don’t communicate about it beforehand)

Journalists, bloggers, and producers work on tight time schedules. When a piece of content is being expected, it is unforgivable when the deadline is being missed. Especially when this has not been communicated beforehand (and timely). Miss your deadline and don’t communicate about it, it will surely get you shunned from this media outlet!

Image source: 6 Data-Driven Strategies to Get Your Content Published on Influential Sites

6. Write promotional content only

Most platforms don’t post promotional content unless it is being paid for. A great way to make sure your content is being ignored, is by creating promotional content only. Do not provide valuable insights, do not dig deeper into the subject and do not elevate from a promotional piece to ensure your content will be tossed by journalists and your audience.

7. Don’t use an understandable structure for your content

A start, middle and end to a piece of content is completely dispensable when you are trying not to get published. Paragraphs that address one clearly defined subject that relates to the other paragraphs, title and overall subject is totally overrated when trying not to reach your audience and get journalists to publish your content. Stay away from sub headers, bulleted lists, images, white space and a clearly defined structure of your article.

8. Don’t use a headline that introduces the content of the article

Always use a headline that has no apparent relation to the subject and discussed elements in the piece of content. Make sure your audience is confused when reading the headline and article. This way it is easy for journalists and other readers to ignore your content.

9. Create content that is superficial and unoriginal

With the internet being filled with innumerable pieces of content, a great way to be ignored is to create content that is superficial and unoriginal. Content that has no new angle, insight or information adds no value at all to a journalist or reader. Repeating existing content, insights and claims without adding any value is a foolproof way to guarantee your content will not be published.

10. Argue about feedback or suggested revisions in your piece

When you, despite all of our tips, found a journalist or blogger who wants to publish your content, there is one final way to assure this will not happen. More often than not, journalists and bloggers will provide feedback on guest posts and press releases. If you want to be positive your content gets rejected, handle the feedback like an angry teenager; be negative, don’t accept the feedback, don’t respect the authority the journalist or blogger has, communicate aggressively, show no signs of understanding and compassion, and by all means make sure they know you feel attacked. Chances are this is the first and last time you will cooperate with this journalist or blogger.

So, how to not get published?

Obviously we mean none of what we say above. In fact, if you do want to get published in the media (despite all of our valuable advice), then reverse the tips we mentioned. The best tip is to focus on who you are communicating with. You are not writing for yourself, your brand or your business objectives – you are writing for your audience. Keep that in mind and you will surely create content your audience wants to consume! What are your best tips to ensure getting published and read?

Read more about writing great press releases or check out our examples of effective press releases to feel inspired.

Sources:

8 great ways to make sure your content never gets published

Why No One Wants to Publish Your Content

6 Data-Driven Strategies to Get Your Content Published on Influential Sites