If you’ve been writing blog posts for a while, you’re probably aware of guest posting, which is where an author writes for a blog that they don’t own. They are a guest, writing a piece for someone else’s website. But you may wonder, should I write guest posts, should I have guests post on my own blog, and what are the pros and cons of guest posting in general? Thankfully in this article I am going to break down everything you need to know about guest posting.
All the Benefits of Guest Posting
Let us start by examining all the ways that guest posting can be beneficial. First, we’ll start from the perspective of writing as a guest for other blogs. This can extremely beneficial for you because it helps to build backlinks to your site, potentially introduces you to a new audience, and can be an advertisement of sorts for your own work, which can drive new readers to your own blog. It’s also a great method to meet new people online and maybe work out a long-term business relationship. Finally, it can help to establish you as an expert on a particular subject.
On the other side of the stick, let’s go over some of the benefits of having guests post on your blog. To begin with, this is one less article you need to write. If you’re posting daily or weekly, a guest post can take over that scheduled slot. In addition, having other opinions or expert voices on your blog can help increase your audience’s appreciation for the resource you’re providing. Finally, having guests post on your blog can help bring the guest’s fans over to your blog.
How to Find Guest Posting Opportunities
If you’ve identified a potential benefit to either becoming a guest poster, or to having a guest post on your own website, then the next step is finding that guest posting opportunity.
How to Find Work as a Guest Poster
If you’re looking to write guest posts, then you should have work of your own that you can send to potential blog owners. This means if you’re just starting out with blogging, you should probably build some experience and a body of work before attempting to grow through the use of guest posting.
To find opportunities to guest post, it helps if you’re familiar with blogs that already cover the subjects that you like to write about. In this case, look for a contact form or email address on the blog and send them a message with an offer to write a guest post in the subject line. Be sure to include links to samples of your writing style in the body of the message, and if you can, leave some personal touches in the message so that they know you’re actually a fan.
Other methods to find guest posting work is to do searches for things like “_______ guest post” where the blank is replaced by the subject or keywords that you’re interested in writing about.
How to Find People to Guest Post on Your Blog
If you have a moderately established blog or better yet, a blog that has become a trusted resource, then you shouldn’t have too much trouble finding guest posters. One of the best ways to get guest posts on your blog is to have an open invitation on your own blog.
You should look at other similar blogs to your own, and then reach out to those blog authors in hopes of having them do guest posting. As a rule, it is easier to attract authors of smaller blogs to larger blogs, then it is to do the opposite. However, that is not always the case, and obviously, if you can land a big name to your smaller blog, it can do wonders for your blog!
How to Pitch a Guest Posting Opportunity
Whether you’re trying to write a guest post, or you’re looking for an author to make guest posts on your own site, regardless you’re going to need to reach out and ask for the guest posting opportunities. This requires some preparation and research on your part, so that you can clearly win the other party’s interests and have your guest post proposal approved. Let’s dive into how to properly pitch your guest posting proposal.
How Often Do They Accept Guest Posts
Regardless of if you’re looking to write or receive a guest post, you’re going to have a better chance with an author or blog who regularly works with guest posts. That’s not to say you couldn’t be someone’s first guest post experience, but it is to say that you’re going to have an easier time with someone who already knows the benefits and practical realities of guest posting.
So, we need to know how often they work with guest posts, and that implies doing some homework or research on potential guesting posting collaborators. To that end, there is a bunch of preliminary research you should do, which bring us toâ¦
The Recommended Things to Research for Guest Posting
Yes, you’re going to need to vet your guest posting opportunities. If you’re trying to write a guest post, you need to know certain things, and if you’re trying to have a guest post written, then there are some different things you need to research. In this section, we’re going to explore both so that you know what to look for when pursuing guest posting opportunities.
When you’re looking for guest posting opportunities on other blogs, you should first make sure that the blog covers a subject that overlaps with your own blog and areas of expertise. Next, you should look at the general content of the target blog and get a feel for the author’s writing style, the tone of the content, and the reading difficulty level that they write for. Moving on, after familiarizing yourself with their work, try and build an audience profile of the blog. Who reads this blog, what are the comments like, what demographics are the visitors, how popular is the site? Finally, you need to know what type of content does best on this site. Is it lists, tutorials, personal stories, technical breakdowns, product reviews or something else? Armed with all this information, you can then decide if writing a guest post for this blog is going to help further your writing career in a meaningful way, and then use this same information to construct a much more relevant pitch for why you would be a great guest poster.
Now it’s a little different when you’re trying to find authors to write guest posts for your site. While all the advice still applies, you need to approach this from a different perspective. When you look at their blog, and are examining their previous writing work, you want to judge whether or not their content would be a good fit for your audience.
What to Include in Your Guest Posting Proposal
So, you’ve done your research homework, and you’ve identified your guest posting target, but how do you nail the perfect guest post pitch? Well, nothing is guaranteed to work, but there are several best practices to follow which should help increase your odds of getting a positive reply.
First, keep your message as brief and succinct as possible. If they open up your message, they’re not going to want to read 4 pages of endless content. Instead, try to keep it short and to the point. The content of your message should introduce yourself, tell your prospect a sentence or two about yourself and why they are a match for guest posting. Next, you should make sure you include something personal in the email, such as “I read your recent post on social anxiety and was blown away by the advice you gave.” Finally, directly ask for the guest posting opportunity and include a short description of what your guest posting idea is.
How to Write an Amazing Guest Post
If you send out enough guest posting requests, you’re bound to find some opportunities. Don’t waste this chance to capitalize on your work, but also don’t come into this assignment as if you’re writing an ad! You’re not writing an ad; you’re trying to write something that will blow away this audience.
If you did your homework before pitching to this blog, then you know what content does well for them. You should format your guest post in the same way the regular posts are formatted, you should try to match the tone of the blog, you should try and connect with the audience of this blog, and you can do all that by mimicking the writing style and popular posts from this site. Make sure you’re citing any references with links, and end the post with an engagement challenge, such as a controversial or topical question that is sure to fire up discussion in the comments.
Finally, make sure you have an amazing guest bio written up. This is the real ad for you and your content, but it shouldn’t feel like an ad. A good guest bio is individually rewritten for each website that you guest post on. That way, you can target the specific audience that you’re currently engaging, instead of using a non-targeted bio that is boring or uninteresting. Make sure your bio has a backlink to your site that uses keyword anchor text!
Final Thoughts
Guest posting is a powerful tool, but it is often overlooked. When you utilize it properly, it can help increase your traffic, reputation, and market reach. Keep an eye out for guest posting opportunities and you will find more than you realized! It’s a great tool, so hopefully this article has helped you to fully leverage the power of guest posting! Thanks for reading, and happy blogging!