Guest Blogging 101

Guest blogging involves writing and producing material for another blog, with the purpose of building backlinks, reputation, and getting traffic and exposure.

It remains one of the most effective, natural and Google-friendly link-building practices today, particularly after the introduction of Google’s search engine updates (Google Panda and Penguin).

Essentially, what you’re doing is giving away content, for free, with the hope of getting traffic, backlinks and exposure.

After guest bloggers are able to build authority, they are often paid to develop content and write for other blogs, and this also becomes their source of income.

Guest blogging is a tremendous way to

i.                     build reputation and authority,

ii.                   make a name for yourself and/or your brand,

iii.                  connect and network with other bloggers,

iv.                 connect and network with potential customers and clientele,

v.                   get the word out,

vi.                 and of course, it remains a valuable way to build backlinks to your blog that could potentially allow you to drive in a lot of referral traffic.

The potential is enormous. Guest blogging should be a fundamental part of not only one’s content marketing strategy, but their SEO strategy as well.

Purpose

Before setting off with your guest blogging exploits, it is essential to determine what your goals for guest blogging are. In general terms, it could be either to (a) build backlinks to your website, (b) drive in referral traffic from a high-PR source to your blog/website, or (c) build authority and reputation.

Most guest bloggers therefore prefer writing guest posts on authority, high-PR blogs that preferably has a large number of highly-engaged readership. This allows them to accomplish all three of the aforementioned goals simultaneously.

Guest Blogging Opportunities

In order to find guest posting opportunities, the following should be considered:

i.                     The blog is related to your niche or industry or the subject matter of your own blog/website

ii.                   The visitors of the blog will be interested in said readership,

iii.                  The blog has a good amount of activity – in terms of readership/traffic, comments and social sharing,

iv.                 The blog owner is socially-active, and will be able to share and promote your post on social mediums.

 Benefits of Guest Blogging

1.       Linkbuilding: One of the biggest advantages of guest blogging and (in my opinion) one of the best ways of building natural backlinks to your blog!. Most blogs allow guest posters to put up a few links in the author bio section as well as in the write-up, in the form of anchor-text. You might also be allowed to put in a few links to actual posts on your website/blog. It is important to try taking full advantage of all this by trying to get a couple of links in your guest post this way, and include as many keywords in the author bio as possible. However make sure that the write-up looks natural.

2.       Exposure: Blogs such as Problogger gets thousands of views on a daily basis. Publishing a single post on such an authority blog will allow your name, your content (and your links) to be seen by hundreds of thousands of people instantly. 

3.       Build Authority: Guest blogging is a great tool to build reputation and authority, and be seen as someone who is a leader in their field/niche. For this purpose, make sure that you know your stuff, know what you’re talking about, and have done your research. Be prepared to respond to questions and comments in the comments section. If you are able to come across as someone who knows what he’s talking about, and is knowledgeable and well-versed on the subject matter, you will eventually be seen as a credible authority figure on the matter.

4.       Traffic: Another important benefit of guest blogging involves the ability to drive in traffic to your blog. This links that you put up in your write-up are not only meant for link-building purposes, they also allow people reading your post to come to your website, which means that if you guest-post on a blog which gets, say, thousands of visitors daily, you can also potentially drive in massive amounts of referral traffic to your blog! Above all, if you guest-post on a blog that is relevant to your niche/industry, any traffic that you get will be highly-targeted. 

5.       Make Sales: If your on-page elements are strong (a good CTA couple with the ability to convert visitors), this traffic can be immensely beneficial in monetary terms as well. More traffic always equals more sales! 

6.       Building Relationships: In terms of building and nurturing relationships, guest posting has two distinct advantages: First off, writing guest posts on other blogs builds and forges relationships between fellow bloggers. If you write on a blog regularly, you are able to provide that blog with a regular supply of quality content. This is precisely what blog owners want – quality, well-written and fresh content. This will allow you to develop a strong professional relationship with an authority blog owner. Secondly, guest blogging also provides you with the opportunity to network and connect with your customers and potential clientele. It provides you with an opportunity and a platform to interact and communicate directly with them, be able to build trust and hence, maybe even market your products and make sales.

7.       Get subscribers: List-building is one of the most essential elements of good SEO. When you’re able to drive in a large amount of traffic to your blog, you also have a chance to build your list and be able to get subscribers on your blog.