FirefighterWife.com is YOUR community. A place for the firefighters and their families to connect and support and love on each other. And when we share our own real life stories and struggles and successes, it is incredibly inspiring for the entire fire service community.
Since we’ve been around, we’ve seen so many fabulous topics, stories and advice. And many of you asked “How can I do more?” You can keep sharing your stories in a more permanent way! We are always looking for guest blog posts. Your stories matter and inspire others.
Do you already have your own blog? Whether or not its fire related, we are happy to welcome your guest blog posts and give you links back to your website.
Don’t have a blog but just have something to share? That’s great too! Blogging can be overwhelming and sometimes you just have something important you need to get out to this community. Again, FirefighterWife.com is YOUR community and we want you to have a voice that supports our mission. All of our stories combined are going to change lives. We sincerely believe in that collaboration.
Here’s how it works:
What Kind of Content We Look For
Your post must be relevant to the fire life in some way but does not have to be all about the fire service. Topics can include:
- marriage
- friendships
- parenting
- family activities
- fashion / fitness / personal care
- health and safety
- food / recipes
Anything that’s a personal story of marriage / family / fire life success (even small successes!) or successes / tips from departments who do good things for their families are great.
Your post cannot be an advertisement for your product or the equivalent of a sponsored post. (However, we do have an advertising program if you are interested. Email us at contact@firefighterwife.com for advertising.)
If you need more structure, we have that too.
“Real Fire Wife/ Fire Families Diaries”
We did a series called “Real Fire Wife Diaries” and it got great reviews. All you need to do is document a day in the life of a fireman / fire wife / family. Oh, and here’s the kicker. We KNOW you firemen aren’t all out fighting the big one all day long 😉 Include how you balance your life, what you do for your marriage and family, your fitness, your personal development, as a leader. Etc. A good way to do this is to pick a day, jot down notes throughout the day and suddenly by the end, you’ve got 5 or 6 scenes to share and a post is ready. Real works best.
“Hot Seats”
Next option….if you need more structure, we feature Fire Wife Hot Seats where there are guided questions we give a fire wife to write back to us. Things like “What’s been your biggest challenge you overcame in your marriage and how did you do it?” or “Tell us about the best practical joke you ever played on your husband.” So if you prefer that format, we can do that as well – either just the Firefighter or you together as a couple.
Webinar / Video Format
If you aren’t a writer and prefer video format or want to share in an interview format, we are also regularly looking for guests to share in live webinars. Email us your story if you are interested in this format.
Blog Submission Guidelines
- Your post must be original and not previously published either on the Web or in print.
- You agree not to publish it anywhere else, including your own blog or Web site, if your blog submission is selected to be featured on FirefighterWife.com. You may, however, post a brief “tease” or summary on your site that links to the post.
- You may provide up to three byline links: one for your blog or Web site, one for your bio or About page, and one for your Twitter username (optional).
- Your post should be at least 500 words long and no more than 2000 words.
- You should also read:
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- “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).
These all contain some very helpful tips to maximize your post.
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Editing
- We expect the post to drive free of spelling and grammar issues.
- We will reserve the right to copy-edit your post for minor grammar, punctuation, spelling, etc. If we make substantive changes (very unlikely), we will email the post back to you for your approval before posting.
- We may provide a short introduction or conclusion to your post to provide context or the rationale as to why we think the post is important. We will make sure that our comments are set off from yours stylistically, so that the readers are clear that these are from FirefighterWife.com and not your own words.
- We may also add a CTA (call to action) at the ending of your post that will direct readers to a resource related to your topic.
Disclaimer
We understand the hard work that it takes to write a blog post. Submitting a blog post does not guarantee that it will be published at FirefighterWife.com. If for some reason we do not choose to publish your submission, it absolutely remains your sole property and you are free to do with it as you desire.
If FirefighterWife.com elects to publish your blog post on our website, the blog post (with proper attribution of authorship to you, as the submitter) will become intellectual property of FirefighterWife.com, and thereafter, all copyrights in such blog post will belong to FirefighterWife.com. To the extent that any such copyrights are not vested in Firefighterwife.com, you hereby grant FirefighterWife.com a perpetual, royalty-free, worldwide license to publish, use and display the entire blog post and all elements thereof, for commercial purposes or otherwise. You also consent to Firefighterwife.com publishing your name, photo or other identifying elements associated with your blog post for attribution purposes, unless you elect to be published anonymously.
Submissions
If your post meets the above guidelines:
- Please use this form for consideration. Although we try to stay very responsive, it could take 2–3 weeks to respond, so please be patient.
- Please include a one to two-sentence byline that includes who you are, what you do, along with your blog address and your Twitter and/or Facebook address.
- Please include the size of your readership: number of blog readers, Facebook friends or fans, and Twitter followers. (It’s ok if it’s zero and you just have a great story to share!!)
- Please confirm that you are willing to engage with readers in the comments about your post. This is hugely important. Blog readers have come to expect this.
- If you have preferences for headings and graphics (and know what all this means 😉 ) then please do format your guest post as an HTML document, so that we can copy and paste it into the WordPress HTML editor.
- Use H2 or H3 tags for sub-headings.
- Send us the images attachments inside the submission form