The benefits of writing guest articles for different types of media as part of your marketing strategy are clear to see. Guest blog posts, for example, not only exposes you and your services to a new audience, but they can be an easy way of grabbing a great link for SEO, developing a relationship with a key portal that speaks directly to your target market, and giving your reputation a real shot in the arm.

An old writer’s saying tells us to “write about what you know”; but what if you’re desperate to expand into another area that could have a massive impact on you and your business? As long as you are confident and stay focussed, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be able to speak to a new audience with authority and write a great article.

Find your niche

The biggest obstacle you’ll encounter when writing for an unfamiliar audience, is lack of technical knowledge, and trying to blag it will get spotted instantly.

To avoid this, focus on the area that relates to your angle and argue your point without getting tangled up with advanced language that you think will seduce the reader. For example, when we write for business focussed websites or magazines, we always tell them about the part that hosting plays in a successful business website, highlighting the key business features that we offer. We don’t start talking about how they should organise their deliveries or how to approach recruitment however, because we can’t talk about those things from a position of authority and it doesn’t help them.

Find your way in to the conversation, rather than trying to change the subject.

Do your research

Before you start, it’s vital that you do some homework into the area you are writing for. Make sure you understand the key demographic of the audience you want to speak to. What activities are they into? What major talking points are being discussed right now? If you can tap into the things they care about, then you will grab their attention and get them reading, as well as making the article good enough to get past the editor in the first place.

Take what you know about your own area of expertise and apply it to what you have learned about your new audience. It’s a simple formula, but if you stick to it then you won’t go too far wrong. After all, that’s the reason you’re targeting the new audience in the first place – you want to tell them what you can do for them.

Make it relevant to you

Whatever you decide to write about, make sure there is something in your piece that relates to what you do, or the business you are in. The trick is linking the two worlds together to demonstrate that they need to consider you for something. If all you are doing is writing something for that audience that you think they might like, then you’ve only got it half right. The point of the exercise is that you are letting the audience know that you understand them so that they think of you the next time they need your services.

It might be that you are trying to educate the audience that they are in need of your services, if so, give them real world examples of why and tell them what to look out for when choosing a supplier of the thing they need.

The biggest trap to avoid here is to turn your article into a sales pitch where you wax lyrical about how wonderful you are. An article written like sales copy will stand a slim chance of being published, and if by a miracle it does get past the editor, it will be ignored or slated by anyone who sees it.

An accurate representation of what you will be met with if you write pure sales copy

Instead, try to write a balanced piece that discusses your arguments carefully, and avoid splashing your company’s name all over it – you’ll get a link at the end. A more subtle approach is to point out the advantages of your own USPs or areas that you dominate; that way, when they do some searching, they’ll see for themselves that you’re exactly what you’re looking for.

Keep it fresh

SEOs love to stress the importance of fresh content, knowing that Google overlords will seize upon and punish duplicate content. Whilst this is important from an SEO perspective, covering old ground or trying to get an article re-published on a different blog is a big mistake for more reasons.

If the editor, journalist or blog owner has seen the actual article before, they’ll send it straight back and you will have most likely burnt your bridges for trying to con them into taking an old article. They want unique content to entertain and inform their readership, not hand-me-down pieces with no consideration for their audience. From a reader’s point of view, they don’t want to read an article they have read before or is a blatant lift from another piece, and they will most likely point out if they have seen it before.

Consider your media

Where will the article appear? Writing for on and offline media is very different, so tailoring your writing style and the content is crucial to getting it right and ensuring it will get published.

Online articles can potentially be published instantly, which means that as long as you are writing about an on-going issue with your target audience, current topic, or a favourite debate, then you can gain some attention and begin to relate to your readers. However, the fact that online articles are more interactive than ever before (social media integration, comments), means that what you say and how you say it will be under intense scrutiny. If you get comments on your article online, consider replying to them to further engage with the people that have read it and to give the piece more life.

If you’re writing for a print magazine, you’ll need to make sure that is doesn’t become dated as soon as the issue hits the shelves. Usually, magazines are planned out months in advance, so writing about something that is in the news right now will have little or no relevancy when it goes to print. Instead, open up a wider discussion on an industry talking point that references recent events, but is not trying to break any news. Don’t be afraid to be bold with your opinion on a subject, unlike online articles, there are no instant comments and if you spark some healthy debate, then you’ll have had a PR win.

Don’t assume any knowledge

Just as you shouldn’t claim to know everything about the industry you’re writing for, don’t take for granted that this new audience will know who you are or what it is that you do.

We know, for example, that 60% of the UK does not know what web hosting is, which means that when we write for audiences that are outside industries such as web design and web development, we are careful to make sure that we don’t alienate readers by talking about the technical aspects of our products.

Equally important to this is that you shouldn’t make any assumptions about your intended audience. Don’t stereotype or try to guess what they’re like, find out. Also, in terms of content, ask around to see if there is someone you know who understands the audience which will give you a window into how to write for them.

Whenever you are writing for an unfamiliar audience it is important to think about what you are trying to achieve. If you can’t sum up your message in one or two sentences, there is no point in continuing.

The old writer’s rule of “writing about what you know” certainly applies here, as you still need to stick to your area of expertise; the trick is to make it relevant to them and give them genuinely useful information.

Bloggers: What are your top tips for writing for an unfamiliar audience? Let us know in the comments.