Contributor FAQs

Simply complete the form on our Submit an Article page. See the instructions on that page for more information.

Once you submit your article, we will email you to confirm our receipt of your article. If your article doesn't meet certain requirements, this is the point we would let you know. Over the next day or so, we run your article through Grammarly (free editing software) to fix basic grammar and spelling errors. Then we run it through plagiarism software to be sure the content is original and doesn't exist anywhere else on the web. Assuming your article passes the plagiarism test, we upload your article to our site and send you a unique URL so you can review what we've put together for you. Upon your approval of the article on our site, we share it with our social media outlets.

First of all, your article just needs to tie into sports in some way. That's pretty obvious. Your article must be original content that isn't published anywhere else on the web (unless you're quoting another source, of course). Word count isn't all that important. Your article should be long enough to tell the story you're trying to tell. We will let you know if we feel it's lacking in this area once you submit it to us. Besides these general requirements, here are the things you should try to provide us when submitting your article:

1. Featured Image - If you don't provide one, we will put one together for you. Large resolution images are best. We understand if you use the form to submit your article there isn't an attachment option available (for now). This is why we recommend just emailing the article content to us directly at publishing [at] abstractsports.com. That way you can attach supplementary materials with ease, including images, YouTube videos, embedded tweets, and other assets that aid in telling your story.
2. Article Title - We may alter the title for online marketing purposes, but it's good to know what your article's main point is by providing a title.
3. Article Content - This is the body of your article. No matter how you submit your article, just be sure to include instructions of how you'd like us to put your article together, if necessary. For example, if you provide an image you'd like us to use within the body of your article, you can specify where you'd like that image to go by using a [Figure 1] callout or something so we have an idea of what you want us to do for you. However, we have a good sense of how to make an article flow well for our readers, so if you just provide us with the content (text and images) for your article, we can put it together in such a way that our readers will enjoy it.
4. Author Name - Pretty straightforward.
5. Author Headshot - Although optional, putting a face to the voice of an article can have some benefits. We understand you may want to preserve your identity, so we don't require it. When submitting your photo to us, make sure it's at least 250x250 in resolution. If you have a newer smartphone, taking a simple portrait selfie is perfect.
6. Job Title - We like to show that our readers are everyday people by showing your day job title. This shows that people who enjoy sports come from all walks of life which speaks to the wide-ranging impact they can have on people.
7. Author Bio - To make our blog personable, we like to put together bios for our writers so people can connect with them if they'd like. This can come in two forms.
   • Short Bio - Each article has an author excerpt at the bottom. If you ONLY want to have your bio go with your articles, you can provide a short bio (~ 25 words). We also allow you to link to your social media profiles, so provide those links in your submission if you'd like.
   • Full Bio - This option is recommended if you plan to post several articles for us. We provide you with your own contributor page that's a little more substantial. It will have a cool banner intro, your bio, social links as requested, and we will link to your articles from that page. This bio can be as long as you like. For the short bio on article pages, we will just use your Job Title, but if you provide a shorter bio for that excerpt, we will put it in that place.

We provide a free hosting service for your content to have a place to live, and we share it with the world. We are happy to be the platform for you to share your thoughts about all things sports-related so that you don't have to worry about managing a blog on your own because, if we're being honest, it's a lot of work.

That being said, we are extremely grateful to anyone who chooses Abstract Sports to be that publishing outlet for them. We have a handful of regular contributors, and we have sent hats, shirts, etc. to those who keep new content on the main pages of the site. While we can't pay guest writers for their submissions, the regular work from our contributors doesn't go unnoticed.

Along with small perks for our regular contributors, we can be that team for you to bounce ideas off of, or even collaborate on a project. Whether it's an article you need some extra eyes to review, or you're wanting to record a podcast episode, we'd love to hear your ideas and help you get them out in the world.