You’ve got an idea, an opinion or experience you want to share? Our inbox is always open.

What are we looking for?

Content with Advice

What our readers like to read above is content with expert advice from entrepreneurs who have encountered struggles, overcome them and are willing to share their experiences to help people save time and avoid making the same mistakes. The sort of advice or tips that would make you say to your friends and contacts "Hey, this was really useful you should read this."

Opinions

We’re not here to be the PR agency or a mouthpiece for the government and their various initiatives to promote innovation and entrepreneurship in the UK. We are here to spark debate, ask questions, share solutions and to encourage people to challenge, exchange and innovate. 

We are always looking for unique insight and explosive content, the sort of thing that hasn’t already been read about in 152 other articles. 10 tips to create a startup culture in your otherwise traditionally corporate business? No thanks, been there, done it, what next? 

House style

Humour? We love it - a bit of cynicism, sure. Maybe a bit disruptive or just outright twisted? Entirely up to you. What we are really looking for is a sense of the author’s personality and personal experience coming through their words (and not the voice of the marketing department). Show us who you are and take us on the journey of the story that you want to share with our readers.

No need to adopt an arch or formal voice, and don’t be afraid to use your own words… but yes, let's keep things within the realm of basic human decency. We are looking for articles with spirit and insight, articles that will captivate us and our readers from the beginning to the end.

Information, information, information

Although we've all been in this ecosystem for a while now, we would never pretend to understand it in the same way that you the entrepreneurs, founders and investors see it and live it. You are the key players in this game and we report on it and that's why we want to publish your words.

Be sure to cite your references and sources and refer to reports, anecdotes and data that will help support your point of view. You can also cite other people and refer readers to other articles (ideally from Maddyness).

In a nutshell, share your point of view and help us and our readers to expand theirs.

What do we avoid?

Our editorial agenda

We like to believe that all the people who propose content are already readers who understand us. But we are wrong. We receive plenty of submissions that fall well outside of our EDITORIAL AGENDA. So, let's be clear, what we are looking for is entrepreneurship and innovation in the UK. To be on our radar the business needs to be based in the UK.

That doesn't mean you need to be British to write for us, far from it, we know just how rich and diverse our ecosystem is. But we need to maintain our focus, and what better place to start than the leading startup ecosystem in Europe.

Self-promotion

We’ve said it before and we will say it again. Better to write something impactful and insightful and let the readers come to you for more information rather than proposing a piece of pure promotional fluff.

Dear Founders,

We’ve got your number, we already know that your product is miraculous, and that your service will revolutionise your market, and you'll probably be the next unicorn, but we would rather see you prove it than try to convince us with an article devoid of any substance. Our readers won’t be impressed, and nor will we.

Best,

Maddyness

You’ve got a deep understanding of your market? That’s great, it’s exactly what we want, but, take a step back, for our reader’s sake.

Press releases

A press release exists for a very simple reason: to get specific information about your startup to the editors of Maddyness (and everyone else of course). Then it's up to our editorial team to decide if the information provided is interesting enough to warrant our journalists writing about it. So, don't expect us to receive a press release and publish it as it is, without the critical input of a journalist, it will only ever be a fluffy mouthpiece for PR with no added value.

Bullshit bingo

Be clear and concise. Don’t lose yourself in convoluted verbosity or industry-specific jargon that only you and your peers understand. You need to be able to write in a way that everyone can understand, all the while demonstrating your expertise. We know this is a challenge, but you'll find that it’s rather satisfying to find a way of articulating the complex ideas that only you understand into words that others can learn from.

Our shopping list

Images

Send your photos in HD. For articles about startups we want to see the whole team (so get your branded swag on), or at the very least the founding team. For certain articles, we use set templates and will need a portrait of the author, again in HD. Please don’t bother sending small low def snapshots, they won't get used.

Word count

We’re online so anything goes right? Well, no. Anything longer than 5 or 6 paragraphs and everyone's attention span drops dramatically. As a guide, a good article should be between 600 and 900 words (1,000 if you’re a really good writer.)

Style

We’re not looking for the next Pulitzer Prize winner, but we’re also not looking for a diamond in the rough who needs hours of editing and correction before being ready to publish. If your style isn’t the best, we are here to help, although perfect spelling is a must.

Humility

We all learn to write at school, so in theory, we can all do it right? Well, yes but the ability to write to be read by others is a different ball game altogether. We know our readers and we know that humility is always well-received, so, be humble and accept our advice and guidance if it’s given, and if we propose a complete re-write its not against you, but more likely because we know what our readers like.

Want to pitch an article?

Just send an email to [email protected] then sit back and hope to see your masterpiece published online soon.