Current Photographer provides educational resources to help photographers Make Better Photographs and Grow Their Businesses. Here they’ll find thousands of tips, tricks, techniques, and inspirational stories to help them succeed.
We’ve had a lot of interest from photographers who would like to submit guest posts and share their expertise with the Current Photographer community. We’re very excited to consider your article for publishing and have put together a few guidelines to help you out.
Guidelines
Topics
We’ll consider just about any topic related to photography including, but not limited to, shooting and lighting tips, software tutorials, product reviews, inspiration, photo business, social networks (as they pertain to photographers), behind-the-scenes of your photo shoots, etc. We also love articles/videos about computers, electronics, gadgets and new web technologies with a photography slant.
The types of posts that generate the most traffic have been tips and how-tos, product reviews and behind-the-scenes videos.
Content
We’re looking for original content and are assuming your submission is exclusively for use on CurrentPhotographer.com. After your article goes live, we ask that you don’t publish it elsewhere, but if you must please wait a minimum of two months from its publish date. There are always exceptions, especially in the case of behind-the-scenes videos and great articles that you’ve already published on your own blog so feel free to contact us to discuss details.
Links
Links to other websites or your own website within the article are perfectly acceptable as long as they enhance the piece by providing additional information, examples, reference, etc. We do not allow affiliate links as they will conflict with our internal systems.
Photos
As creatives, we love visuals; adding photos to your posts is a great way to attract readers. If you have original photos that support your article you can attach them in the submission form. The images should be a maximum size of 1000 pixels wide by any height. We will size the photos accordingly when creating the post. Also, be sure to include a watermark on your image if you’re concerned about protecting your copyright.
Speaking of copyright, please do not submit images that you don’t have authorization to use. If you need an image to illustrate a point and you don’t have an original, please check stock photography sites like iStockphoto.com and purchase the small version. You will need to certify that you have rights to use the images in the submission form.
Word Count
We don’t have a set word count for submissions but we like to use 500 words as an average. In general, shorter articles that get to the point quickly have a greater likelihood of being read. Long articles may look daunting or push the limits of the average blog reader’s available time and attention span. Of course there are always exceptions.
Editing and Acceptance
We may make minor edits to the submitted articles such as grammatical changes, title changes and other small tweaks. Our intent is not to rewrite or change the meaning of your article. If we feel your article misses the mark completely or if it needs improvement, we’ll let you know and make suggestions on how to improve it.
The subject of photography is not as controversial as say politics, so for the most part I don’t think we’ll run into many issues. That said, we reserve the right to not publish articles, videos, etc. that we feel may be offensive or inappropriate to our audience. We run a “G” rated website and do NOT allow vulgarities or nudity in the content.
Videos
We love videos and so does the Current Photographer community. Some of the most popular videos have been behind-the-scenes of photo shoots. Product demonstrations and reviews along with software tutorials have also proved to be very popular. Most creatives are visual people and learn easier by watching a video rather than reading an article. If you have something you would like to share we’d love to see it.
All videos should be HD (720p minimum) and hosted with a service that allows embedding like YouTube or Vimeo. Remember video is only part of the experience; audio is just as important, and a quality microphone can make a big difference.
Article/Video Proposal
We are grateful that you want to contribute to our growing community of photographers and as such respect and value your time. In an effort to streamline the submission process, we ask that you submit an article/video proposal. Please include the topic you would like to cover, highlights of the details, a web address to see a sample of your writing and if proposing an existing video, a link to view it online. After we review the information we’ll contact you with suggestions, questions or approval to begin working on the final.
Article/Video Submission
Once your proposal has been approved and you’ve created your final master piece, it’s time to send us the files. We’ll email you with a link to a submission form that will allow you to include the text, images, links to videos and all of your contact information.
Benefits of Guest Blogging
By now you might be asking yourself, “What’s in it for me?”. Here’s a list of some of the benefits you’ll receive by becoming a guest blogger on Current Photographer.
- Expert Status: Becoming a guest blogger is a great way to brand yourself as an expert in your subject. You may run your own successful blog and have already established yourself as an expert with your audience, but by posting on other popular blogs, it reinforces your branding and position as a trusted advisor.
- Full Credit for the Article: All article headlines will include the “Name of Post: by Your Name” so you will get full credit for the article. Our permalink structure uses the post title so your name will appear in the url of the article which is great for the search engines.
- Bio and Contact Links: At the end of each article there is a bio and contact information section so the reader can learn more about you. You can share as much or as little information as you wish. We suggest sharing links to your website, blog, public profiles and social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, YouTube, etc. The more exposure you get the better!
- Quality Inbound Links: Links to your website from other quality sites is a great way to increase search engine rankings. We’re happy to link to your site and help you gain exposure.
- Free social media promotion: All guest articles are posted to our Twitter account and Facebook page on the day the article is published. We will tweet links to the article two more times the first day and then three times a day for the next two days. If an article really takes off, we will continue to tweet links every few weeks to keep it going.
- Popular Posts: If your article hits it big, we’ll reward you for it by placing a link to it in the right side bar of our site under the “Hot Topics” heading. It will remain there until another post passes it in popularity.
Thank you for taking the time to read our guidelines, and if you have any questions please feel free to contact us through the contact form. If you’re ready to begin, click the “Get Started” button below to submit your Article/Video proposal.
–