Guest blogging is a common practice now, but some people aren’t quite sure what the value is, how to approach it and where to find opportunities.
There are many advantages to guest blogging, as well as accepting guests writers to post on your website or blog.
Accepting Guest Posts
- It provides you with more content, which helps you keep your blog updated frequently.
- It offers value to your readers by covering a topic that is of interest to them, even though it may not be in your area of expertise.
- Guest blogs, when they are of high quality and/or they come from industry leaders, can make your blog look more “legitimate.”
- Your guest posts can be an amazing source of increased traffic and inbound links to your website/blog.
Blogging for Others as a Guest
- If you get the opportunity to do a guest post for someone else’s blog, you can get access to a new audience—hopefully one that coincides with your target audience. It can also help you poise yourself as an expert in a certain field/area.
- You can establish or enhance a strategic relationship. If you want to establish one, providing a guest blog (as well as the opportunity for your partner to send you a guest blog), is a great first step. If you already have a partnership in place, posting a guest blog is flattering. It’s a great way to develop rapport.
- SEO! One of the best benefits to getting your blog post published on someone else’s blog is the backlink to your website or blog. If you’re posting on an authoritative website, it can help boost your website’s authority. Be sure to always request that a backlink be added to your blog post.
On the flipside, there can also be issues to blogging as a guest or accepting guest bloggers.
A Few Things to Watch Out For
- Guest blogging is definitely a legitimate marketing and SEO tactic, and has increased over the past year as content marketing became the catchphrase for SEO—but it’s also a tactic that’s often used by spammers. When you get a request for a blog post (and believe me, you will!), make sure you vet them before accepting their request. If their email is poorly worded or sounds like a canned message, their blog post probably will be, too. If your instincts tell you it’s a spam request, trust yourself.
- Don’t accept a guest blog without getting one yourself—unless you have a good reason. In other words, if you get an email request from someone who wants to give you a guest post, but they won’t accept a guest post from you, it’s probably not worth it. Of course, if you’re working with a strategic partner, that could be other reasons to accept the post.
- Make sure there is at least some correlation to guest blogs you write as well as guests who post on your site or blog. They don’t have to be in exactly the same category/industry as you, but close enough that you are adding value for your readers – whether it be as a guest writer or by accepting guest postings.
- Mark it as a guest blog post, so you don’t confuse your readers. If your blog is focused on software development and then all of a sudden you have a post about HR (for example), you can confuse your readers. As long as the content is beneficial to the audience and you implement the right tools of explanation – your audience will benefit from the content and spread the word.
At the end of the day, you want the content on your site and/or blog to have meaning and be of value to your audience. To bring awareness to a subject that is beneficial and to increase your traffic, build your brand, and increase readership, as well as give your social media footprint more depth – whether the content is written but you or as guest blog post.
