For all those bloggers who have desired to earn great reputation as an opinion leader, guest posting comes as an ultimate opportunity. What might attract more bloggers towards the concept is the speed at which one might get into the thick of things with guest blogging. When you set up your own blog, you might take a long time to establish yourself. However, with guest posting; it is a matter of 4 or 5 good posts on good blogs and things start rolling.
The point is that those authoritative people who are looking for appealing and informative content are choosing guest blogs over some other sources. In this case, you get an option of building relationship with such people and escalate your reputation. On the other hand, there are blogs and bloggers who are influencers but are starved for time. They require someone to feed the content on a regular basis and when you offer something of substance you definitely strike a chord.
Moreover, the theory of link building has changed over the past few years. The old fashioned ways have become redundant to an extent that they are not generating the results that they are known for. In today's competitive world where search engines have become extremely stringent, websites need to be mentioned on the social media more frequently and even be searched by their brand name. Generating such signals require you to indulge in serious brand building activities and one of the strong ways of doing so is by the means of guest posting. You are publishing articles in blogs which are influential and hence giving your brand a real spark.
How to Search For the Right Blogging Opportunities?
To make the most of your guest blog, you have to look for that blog which has an audience similar to yours. There are times that you might choose a blog on the basis of its reputation and ignore the fact that its theme doesn't match yours. This would mean that there are fewer chances of drawing traffic from there. Therefore, you have to post on those blogs which draw the same traffic as you and discuss on subjects that are relevant to your industry.
As always, search engines are at your disposal and you can search for relevant blogs there.
You can use some of the following Google Search Terms to find blogs that are currently accepting guest posts:
- Looking for "guest post"
- Looking For "Guest Bloggers"
- "This guest post was written"
- "This guest post is from"
- "Guest post by"
- "submit guest post"
- "guest post"
- "guest blogger"
- "accepting guest posts"
- "guest post guidelines"
- "write for us"
- "guest blog for us"
- "guest blogger"
- "guest contributor"
- "this is a guest post"
- "Guest Bloggers" Required
- "This guest post has been written"
- "This guest post is written by"
- "guest post"
- "accepting guest blogs"
- "guest post for us"
- "Guidelines for guest posting"
From the blogs that appear, you can shortlist the ones that interest you.
On the contrary, you can also decide to add your relevant keywords to the search query.
- Looking For "Guest Bloggers" keyword phrase
- "guest blog for us" keyword phrase
- keyword phrase "submit a guest post"
- keyword phrase "accepting guest posts"
You can do the same with some of the other search terms that are mentioned above.
There are certain Guest Post Networks too that can help you find out Guest Blogging Websites which are related to your niche. The names of some of them are provided below:
- blogdash.com
- linknami.com/guest-post
- guestbloggenius.com
- blogsynergy.com
- guestblogit.com
- postjoint.com
- bloggerlinkup.com
- myblogguest.com
- grouphigh.com
- guestr.com
Is Your Selected Guest Blogging Website Authentic?
This is the next question that needs to be answered. After searching on various websites, you might shortlist a few of them that relate to your niche. Post this, you have to ensure that the blog that you are writing for is of high quality. Not only should you get the desired back link for it, it should also help you enhance your reputation. There are certain key points that you should consider while conducting your evaluation:
- Find out if the website is established.
- What would also be of relevance is the structure of the website. It will give you a hint about the lifetime value that you would derive from the link.
- You have to look for the contact details of the website and ensure that there is a physical address attached with it.
- Does this website have substantial activity on the social media?
- The blogs which are the most popular are the ones which have contribution from the main blogger. If the website is only a stream of guest posts without any intervention from the real blogger, its value might diminish.
- Ensure that the website and its subject relate to your niche.
- Also make sure that there are regular updates that the site comes up with.
- See if there are stringent guidelines for writing guest posts and they are uploaded after rigorous editing and proof checking.
- Does the website have enough content?
- You can also look at other factors as ACRank, MozRank, Domain Authority, MozTrust, Page Rank and Link Count Metrics. These would give you a hint of whether it will help you in your SEO efforts too.
How To Be Successful At Guest Posting?
Know The Blog For Which You Are Writing: Most new guest bloggers fall in the trap of writing their post first and then looking for relevant blogs for the same. This strategy might land you in trouble every now and then. The reason is that each blog has a separate target audience and even writing guidelines. All elements of your blog post including the title, content, content size, structure and others have to revolve around these facets of the host blog. Hence, without knowing the host blog and its guidelines; you might not manage to get your writing approved.
Be Thorough With The Guidelines: Each established blog has its own set of guidelines for guest posting. You are required to follow that to ensure that your blog post is approved. Therefore, make sure you read through these guidelines thoroughly.
Get In Touch: Once you have written the blog post, you need to get in touch with the blog site owner. You can send an email to him / her. You can either first send the idea of your blog and get it approved or send the entire article. In either case, you should ensure that you keep it crisp and simple.
Write As Well As You Can: There are some bloggers who commit the mistake of retaining the best quality for their own blog only. However, unless your blog is of the highest quality, you wouldn't be able to make an impact. In the first place, poor content wouldn't be approved by the blog. However, even if your content is reasonable enough to make it to the site, it will not have an impact on the audience if it is not compelling. Once you have written the content, send it to the main blogger with a byline and link to your brand name.
Guest Post To Say Something And Not Build Links: This is another problem that you might seriously face. In the craze of building links, you might end up writing something so that you can get the back link desired. However, is such strategy doing you any good or is it working against you? The point is that you should write a blog post only when you have something constructive to write. If there is nothing unique and interesting in what you say, your efforts might fall flat on their face.
Follow Up: There is some time that you would have to give to the blogger to review your blog post and come back to you with comments. In case, you have not heard from the blogger for more than the prescribed time, you can write a polite mail to him / her. If you still do not receive any response and it has been a lot of time, you can write a mail mentioning that you would like to post the article somewhere else.
Post Upload: What do you do once your blog has been uploaded? Party and sleep? No. You have to first thank the blogger for the same. You can then use the social media to promote your blog. Also engage the readers through active interaction by timely responding to comments.You can even send emails for the same. Eventually, the more the people who read about it, the more would your chances of success be.
Why Guest Post?
So, eventually what are those reasons which will make you write a guest post?
Publicity
Publicity and exposure is the first reason that attracts people towards guest blogging. In today's modern world when advertisements are not working with the customers, this can happen to be a subtle way of marketing and improving your brand image. When you write something that is liked by the audience, you tend to create a positive image about yourself and your company. Therefore, people think of you as an influencer in the industry. Also, other people shall share your link and that would make your website reach out to as many people as possible.
Back Links
When you write something interesting and the people are impressed by it, people would be willing to share your links at as many locations as they could. This would firstly make more people read about you, your blog and be sensitized towards your thoughts. Moreover, they would also be introduced to your company. This is all that you want to let your search engine efforts be influenced positively. Your rankings will start moving upwards and the results shall reflect sooner rather than later.
Traffic
What do you expect people to do once they have read your post and liked it? In most cases, they would either share your blog post's link or visit your website or do both. In other words, this works as a great opportunity of elevating traffic to your website. Therefore, if you have chosen an established website with relevant traffic to your body of work; you increase your chances of having conversions through the same.
Network
People from different walks of life will read through your blog and even comment on the same. By being active and responding to comments in a constructive manner, you will create a network that can be beneficial to you in your work.
Branding
It is a misconstrued notion that only the large companies have interesting ideas about the industry. Even some of the smaller and medium sized companies have thoughts and ideas but have no mediums through which they can share such ideas of theirs. By making use of the guest blogging platform, they can make their voice reach to the masses and hence create a brand reputation for themselves.
Is The Guest Posting Strategy Safe?
Absolutely. There is nothing that can make guest blogging unsafe for your brand or search engine rankings. All that you have to keep in mind is that it should be considered as a holistic internet marketing strategy and not just a tool of generating back links. It is like having your own road show where you can portray your knowledge in the industry, present some intriguing ideas and receive instant popularity. It is a one time opportunity that you can take up without any risk. Finally, if you are receiving a back link after sharing such valuable content; you absolutely deserve it. It works as an endorsement of your good work.
The best form of marketing today is third party endorsements. Blatant self promotions are not making sense in today's times. That is where guest blogging helps. When you write a compelling piece of content, the blog owner is so impressed that s/he mentions your link in the author's box. It is a service to his / her audience. Now, this is what Google loves. Moreover, even your audience would appreciate the lauds that you receive in an unsolicited manner.
Therefore, guest blogging can happen to be your door to success. It is a medium through which you can reach to your target audience. When you write something that is interesting, intriguing, compelling and enthralling; your audience is going to want to read you more and even consider you an authority in the subject.