Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Deseret Digital Media wants you write content for them for free


Lately, I've gotten a lot of emails from companies asking me to write for their blog or website - for free. There's a time and a place to write for free, but if I complied with each of these requests, I'd have no time for paid work. The latest one really ticked me off, and it prompted me to respond to the company. Read on:


Dear Debbie,  

I work for Deseret Digital Media, and I wanted to know if you’d be interested in writing for an exciting, new family-based website launching this fall. We are looking for exceptional mommy bloggers who want to build their fan base and share their expertise with the world.

FamilyHow.com will provide practical answers, ideas and solutions to help educate families. (E.g. “How to be a good listener”, “How to deal with a picky eater”, or “10 things you should never say to your wife”.) Selected articles will be translated into 25 different languages and published on 100 country-specific sites.

This is a unique opportunity and outlet for writers to gain exposure to huge worldwide audience. The Deseret Digital Media sites have more than 4 million unique visitors and 200 million page views each month. Through social media, we already also have access to 11 million readers, and at launch, we anticipate that FamilyHow.com will be highly successful.

Contributors can chose how little or how much they want to write. We do not compensate for articles, but we do provide bylines for contributors to link back to their websites to drive traffic and build their Google ranking.

If you are interested, please contact (content editor) for more information!

(Signature)

MY RESPONSE
Dear (content editor) - I'm very honored that you want me to write free content so that your site can make money. Last time I checked, my mortgage company and phone company didn't accept "exposure" for payment, even if I was exposed to international audiences. Maybe one of those readers will actually click through to my site and I'll make a penny from Google Adsense!

If you manage to find some spare cash from all those 200 million clicks a month, I'd be happy to talk about blogging for pay, as I've done for several corporations who actually value my writing.

All the best, Debbie

TO MY SURPRISE, THEY RESPONDED
Debbie - Thank you for your response. I can understand your frustration, and I respect your need for needing to make a profit. Our goal for our site is not to make a profit at all, but to help and reach hundreds of millions of families worldwide  with their struggles and problems. In all honesty, we are just trying to break even. Our project is heavily subsidized by generous donations. We are extremely grateful for those people, and the thousands of writers who chose to give up their time to make a lasting difference in people's lives. I don't want you to have the impression that we are out to make a lot of money — because we're not. 

I'm sorry that you've taken offense. 
(Signature)

I DID A LITTLE RESEARCH, AND RESPONDED AGAIN
(Content Editor) - I very much appreciate your response and found it quite interesting. Given the plethora of quality parenting websites and blogs out there, I find it difficult to understand how any large media company only wants to break even on a new site aimed at families. There's certainly no lack of information out there - and some of it is actually quite good.

However, upon doing a little research I see that your company is owned by the Mormon Church**, so it looks like the Church and Mitt Romney's tithings are bankrolling your project. Maybe you want to make that clear to the writers you seek to provide you with free content. 

All the best, Debbie


Not shockingly, I did not hear back from said content editor. However the next day, someone else from their company contacted me with the same email as the first, only they didn't even bother to put a subject line on. I forwarded her the correspondence, and...crickets. Ha ha!


7 comments:

  1. "Mommy blogger"! Right there I would have given them a piece of my mind.

    Good for you for responding the way you did. And excellent investigating, Sherlock.

    --Kara, who can't figure out your "comment as" thingy. Won't recognize my Google.

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    1. Yeah, I definitely stumbled over that line too. Decided to stick with one argument instead of several!

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  2. I'm waiting for the day that someone calls Mark Cuban a "Daddy Blogger".

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  3. OH MY GOD. You had me rolling with your first response but the second one just killed me. Good JOB. So were they claiming that they were a non profit or that they were not making any money YET>>>>... So sad that many bloggers "mommy bloggers too" might fall for this thinking its great exposure when in fact they would get little in return if even a click through to their website as you said.

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  4. Who cares if they "break even" or not? I'm sure that content editor and other staffers are receiving payment for their services. Why shouldn't the writers? Good for you, Debbie!

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  5. Debbie,

    Interesting that they're heavily subsidized and just hope to break even. Why the need for subsidization then? Whatever the case, I'm glad you posted this. Will tweet this post.

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  6. I am thinking if *I* were heavily subsidized, *I* could write "for free," as well...

    Right?

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