7 Free and Easy Tools to Help You Work with Freelance Writers
Building relationships with freelance writers takes time, persistence, and a sense of clarity about what they need and how they work (see here for a starter course). While there’s no magic trick that can help you pull this off, there are many tools that can simplify the process. Today, I’m rounding up seven tools I use regularly, and that you can, too. Each can aid your pitching and help you to develop strong working relationships with freelance writers—that will ultimately help you gain more placements for your clients or business.
SimilarWeb
This resource is useful for checking out website traffic statistics, but it also comes in handy for another use: When you strike out pitching a freelance writer for one publication, you can search its URL here and view its top competitors. Then, browse those competitive sites and find one of their freelance writers to pitch.
LinkedIn Contact Info
Don’t message a freelance writer on social media to ask for their email address unless you absolutely can’t find it anywhere else. Do some Googling first to see what you can come up with—any writer worth their salt will have their email listed on their personal website (if they don’t, see Hunter tool below). Another underrated way to find contact information is through LinkedIn’s “Contact Info” button right below an individual’s headline. (Be sure to update your own information there, too!)
Boomerang
If a writer responds to your pitch and says it’s not a fit right now, but asks you to follow up later, don’t miss out on that potential opportunity by forgetting to actually follow up. Download the Boomerang extension for Gmail that allows you to automatically set a specific date for an email to return to your inbox, reminding you to email that writer again on the same chain.
Dropbox
This is a tool that’s extremely easy to use, yet so many publicists don’t. Dropbox is the most efficient way to send photos to freelance writers. I’m putting it nicely when I say we don’t enjoy massive email attachments (or heaven forbid, 10 emails to send 10 huge photos). The basic version allows up to 2G of free storage.
Hunter
If you don’t have this extension on your browser, add it immediately. I use this multiple times a day to hunt for email addresses associated with websites. If a freelance writer only has a contact form on his or her website, try clicking on the Hunter icon (once it’s installed) and it will reveal the email address associated with the site. It’s also useful for finding editor emails on their respective publications’ websites.
Tweetdeck
Twitter is an excellent place to discover and connect with freelance writers, as many often post what they’re working on and what they’re looking for (editors, too). An easy way to keep track of everyone you’re following is to use Tweetdeck to add columns for their handle or a particular hashtag, or to follow a group (that you or someone else has created) without having to search for each one individually.
MuckRack
Many freelance writers share who they write for on their personal website—but sometimes they may list publications that they haven’t actually contributed to in several years, or more. (Also, some writers are just slow about updating their site with current articles.) A better way to see what writers have actually had published lately is to search “[their name] + MuckRack” on Google, which will pull up their most current bylines under the MuckRack database.
Do you currently use any of these tools? What am I missing here that could prove valuable to other publicists when pitching freelance writers? I’d love to know in the comments.