 Hey guys, welcome back to my YouTube channel Daniel Rossell here bringing you another video blog from my home office in Jerusalem I want to talk today about a topic that I think is of relevance to freelance writers But which I don't think gets the discussion that it deserves on Groups and freelance writing for even though it does crop up and now and again there And that's this issue of whether or not as a freelance writer You should allow your clients to use your byline in the work that you're produced now The first thing to say is that this question is really only of relevance to freelance content writers If you're doing freelance journalism, and that is definitely still a market It's definitely an it's very much an expectation that if you sell a piece of freelance writing to To either a print the few print Outlets that haven't gone under yet or to a website or to both that you're giving and that's usually spelled out in the in The contract as well Some minor exceptions to that might be if you're writing wire copy, and it's going to be not not individually Attributed such as maybe Jerusalem Bureau staff or whatever so but that's really an outlying exception So for journalism, it's the norm that you're going to be sending in something And it's going to be attributed to you as a freelance correspondent or writer Content marketing is a little bit different because when we're doing content marketing as freelance writers And it's really a much bigger market nowadays and I hesitate to say this because it's not an absolutism But it's probably a better remunerated market I've done a little bit of freelance tech journalism over the past few years, and I've been doing freelance Writing for seven so I've more experience at this point doing freelance content marketing And I periodically thought of a pitching articles. There's a very good website. I recommend anyone doing freelance writing check out It's called who pays writers I'll put the exact URL in the description to this video, but it's very very eye-opening if you look at what some Major household name publications are paying their freelance journalists And then you look at freelance technology writing which I have to say if you can get the right clients is a relatively well-paid field And it just doesn't stack up So I've mostly focused on content marketing for reasons of financial survival more than anything else in any event So by lined getting your byline in content marketing is a little bit of a sort of Outline situation because we are writing to promote the company So the companies don't it's not really in the interest of companies to have their content writers byline because companies probably Want to put out the image that you know, they have an in-house writer. They have a brand team They're not just just using freelancers. So that there can be a bit of give and pull on this one Now it's not you might think that well from the writer's perspective It's a no-brainer right if you could have by Daniel Rosal or by whatever your name is under a blog That's great brand recognition for the most part the answer to that is yes But there are reasons why and I'm just this is just kind of coming from my time working in the industry Reasons that may not become apparent until you've done this for a while that you may want to be a bit more selective So that's personally how I approach it. I am selective I don't say yes to everyone who asked to use my name on their marketing materials. I Specify in some cases. I don't want you to use my name. I've done that before as well It's a bit of unusual request, but clients have usually been okay with it So before we talk about the obvious advantages, why may you not want to lend permission to use your byline? Well Think about it when you're writing for an agency or a client You're not really the ultimate Typically, there's an editorial process you're gonna send in some writing Perhaps it's going to go to your agency editor then it's gonna go to the client and what might emerge on the internet or Print but that's we're talking content marketing. So let's keep it to the internet What might ultimately emerge onto Google might be a heavily modified version of your works It could in fact be butchered and as a writer your personal name is your brand identity and everything that you put out That has your byline on it people who randomly stumble upon that are gonna view that as a writing sample They're not gonna know the internal dynamics. Well, you know, this went through through your visions and this guy made a mess of it That's gonna be your name So that's one really important thing to consider is what's the editorial revision cycle gonna be like with your client Or is what you are going to put out as a draft actually gonna make it to the internet Alright, so that's the first thing the second thing is you know We've all taken on work and this goes back to the point about your name Your byline and for those who don't know I assume if you clicked into that video into this video You do know but for some reason you you don't know on your flummoxed a byline is that just it says by Daniel Rose So it's literally by line under the header of the articles comes from newspaper journalism and now it's using content marketing so We've all had to take on work as writers or marketers freelancers That's not the work. We probably would have loved to take on the most But it's what was out there and we need or we had a gap in our schedules Or it was really well paid or for whatever reason we just took the work now Those are the times where I'd say is this really aligned with what I want my personal brand to be so for me my personal branding I try to put out there as a marketing consultant and Formally as a writer because that was what I focused on for the first four years pretty much exclusively was I'm a technology expert So if a client in the world of business management came to me and said could you take on this project perhaps? I could perhaps I have experience in interest But it's going to dilute from my perspective the strength of my branding as a technology writer if I take that byline So when I when you put my name into Google I want you to get technology clips for that's my kind of overarching Personal branding strategy from a business perspective. So just be aware of that What's what's really the need that you're having success with what do you want the image you project? Your potential clients to be because one thing you can know for sure is that everyone's going to be running your name through Google If they're serious about working with you. So just bear that in mind Finally, it may be undesirable work for other reasons and I'll just kind of leave that one hanging in the air You know, but as I said, we all take on work that isn't necessarily the best work or our proudest work And sometimes if you say hey look, I don't this seems fine But I'm not sure I want my name on this that or might say I'll totally fine We'll attribute it it's effectively ghost writing then either to me They're at the content manager commissioning the pieces or to our in-house team the final reason and this is one You might not think about and that's why I want to do this video blog because I've had this happen multiple times I'm not going to name and shame any past clients But just to say this has occurred multiple on multiple occasions. That's when You do writing for a client and they want to reuse your piece over and over for SEO purposes So maybe they'll make a few changes and they'll update the publishing date now I've had this happening to me for the past year. I get RSS alerts that former client of mine has Republished and updated the date now that to me is very problematic because if I have let's say a current Contract of whether a competitor is saying I can't work for a competitor to the outside world Do that client it looks like I'm still writing for them and I'm not I've had this happen with newspapers I used to write for I've had this happen with clients I used to write for and I've tried to write to them and say hey Would you might not doing this, but you have to scrutinize your contracts? I definitely think it's a bad practice personally You know what happens if the writer has I don't know died or whatever right? There's all sorts of problematic situations that could arise in this But it is a common practice that content managers will for whatever reason use these automated systems to periodically Republish because there's so much emphasis in content marketing on reusing existing work So you'll definitely see this happening So that's another thing I'd be wary of and you could have an open conversation if you're you know It's a really big client for whatever reason for you you could say look I'm happy to let you use my byline, but I have a few reservations one you can't republish using my name To I don't want this to be bylined etc. Now they might say no they might say fine But you can definitely negotiate That's the beauty of freelancing you can negotiate any contract any terms you want the worst that can happen is that your potential client Will say will say no my as I said my personal practices I tried to give my byline unless there's a reason not to so and let me just finish on that point why it's a good idea to To put your byline so there is one former client I had called top 10.com or that was one of their websites and I used to write technology articles for that website Just by and that was one of the first times that someone said we want to use your byline And I used to say no every time actually I used to think well I'm doing ghost writing and the journalism is one thing and I don't want to muddy the waters I want everything I do That I write myself fully to be bylined and writing I do for clients is like a separate thing It goes through cycles. It's not really my own And then I said you know what this is it was a stupid principle as I started saying yes more So this website top 10.com me just having an author page there has probably resulted in Six inquiries over the past six years from people saying hey I saw you write reviews about this on top 10.com. Would you like to work for us? And the good thing is it can be a snowball effect that you can write for a relatively small publication and a bigger Publication can say because they're using Google as well, right? They'll say oh We'd look we'd love we'd love you to work from us Then you get your byline clips up on that website the next website the next website etc So it can be an invaluable way so the reason the reason for allowing clients to use your byline is that? It's a great inbound marketing tool now the final question that I've seen debated And it's not really something I think about doing but just as I'm doing a whole video about the pros and cons of Lending your byline to a client is right or some people will say well Should you charge extra for your byline? I've heard people saying saying that my my personal advice for what for what little it matters Is I would not recommend doing that. I can see the rationale that you know You're letting them use your brand identity. I can actually also see the rationale from the client side of going the opposite way saying well We're using our brand identity. So you should pay less for your byline. So both sides can argue their case I would not recommend charging extra unless you're like a celebrity And if you are a celebrity, I would say you might have better outlets for making money than a freelance writing So I wouldn't do it personally, but I have heard some people Advocating for that approach on these Facebook groups and subreddits, etc. I Hope my thoughts about lending bylines the pros and cons of doing it was were useful I would summarize this by saying I would personally recommend it It does drive inbound business you will find if you have your clips up there online for long enough I would say however just to do it do it a little bit cautiously Think about your brand identity think about whether each potentially bylined if you write for Six different clients and they're up on six different websites Have a think about whether each of them adds value or is congruent with your personal brand identity as a writer And I think you'll be on the course for managing those requests Juditiously and prudently Thank you guys for watching and if as as I end up every video by saying this if you do want to get more videos from me Please subscribe to this YouTube channel