• By Obinna Heche
• Published 03/25/2008
• Article Writing

Look in your local newspaper or through a trade magazine in your field of interest. Look at the bottom of some of the columns and articles throughout the literature. What you will see in many cases are short biographies of a paragraph or two telling you a little bit about the person that wrote the article. Usually included in that bio will be the name of a business this person runs. That bio, for the author of the article, is what it is all about. More than likely, its why they wrote the article in the first place. Not for the money, which might have been nominal or even nonexistent but for the advertising. You do not have to be a National Book Award winner to write an article for your local newspaper. You need competent writing skills which can be developed and an idea the newspaper or magazine will want to share with its readership. When writing for a newspaper, you have two options. One will be a feature and this will be an article that encompasses a specific subject and gives in the time and space the subject requires. The other would be a column of some kind, related to your field of business. Either one has a chance to be published, though it may be easier to get a short column published than a feature just due to space considerations.

It is also important to make sure your article, in whatever form it takes, is something the paper can hold onto and publish at a time of their choosing. Do not waste your time writing something time sensitive if the publisher can not make room for it in that days issue. You will not have another chance to pu

blish it, because the subject will not do anyone any good. Keep your articles as general and evergreen as possible and you will stand a better chance of breaking in. Read the newspaper or magazine you are thinking of submitting to in order to understand what types of stories they like to publish. Many a query has been wasted by writers trying to break into a market with a wholly inappropriate subject. This does not mean an article that breaks the boundaries of adult content but simply a subject the publication has no use for. If you read what they publish, you will have a better chance of developing a story they will be likely to use. On the other hand, you will need to keep the subject of your story related in some way to your field of expertise. Not because you know more about that subject but because you will attract more customers to your business if you are writing an article your target audience is more likely to read. Also, it would not make much sense to get to the end of a health and fitness article to find out the author is a stock market investor. This should go without saying.

Be persistent and polite in your effort to get published. Many professional writers experience rejection on a daily basis trying to break into the print market and you may have to go through some of the same. Keep at it and be polite in your acceptance of rejection. You do not want to burn bridges that have not even been built yet. If you can break in, you will notice it will do wonders for your business. Simply by writing articles on your chosen topic, you will come to be known as an authority in your field and this can be very helpful when it comes to taking your business to the next level.