For those of you who are not quite familiar with content marketing, blogging and SEO, guest posting is an act of writing and publishing a blog post or an article on someone else’s blog or website. Your work may or may not be compensated financially. This purely depends on whether the website/blog offers a financial incentive for your contributions. There is a little difference between guest posting & being a contributor. Guest posting is more for those who are looking to contribute a one-off post, whereas being a contributor may require some degree of commitment (e.g. producing 2-3 posts per month).Whatever you prefer to call this process, ensuring that your posts are published only on reliable, quality and reputable websites is an absolute necessity if you wish to reap the rewards of guest blogging.
Benefits of Guest Posting/Contributing
It would have been a crime to write this post and not to mention the main benefits of guest blogging. At the end of the day, you aren’t writing articles for 3rd party websites just because you have the time to do so. Although you may want to sound like a philanthropist when pitching articles, deep down in your soul, you are expecting something in return, whether it’s some nice referral traffic or a boost in your brand’s exposure.Here are 11 main benefits of guest blogging for other websites:
Reach a wider audience: Contributing your work to external websites would mean that more people will see your work. Imagine this, if you get your article published on Forbes, 10s or even 100s of thousands of people would read your article, and if the subject is directly correlated with what you do, people will come back for more (often directly to your website).
Generate quality referral traffic: Quality posts that get seen and read by 1000s of people are likely to generate a ton of quality, targeted referral traffic. You know where this can lead to. Yes, more exposure and more sales.
Build long-lasting relationship: If you’re not one of those people who guest post just for links, you are likely to publish multiple articles on a single blog. This, in return, will tighten up the relationship with the owner of the blog and may lead to further partnerships.
Become an influencer: Being featured in authoritative websites and blogs would make you an influencer in the eyes of your potential audience. People would look up to you as an expert in your niche, and will often cite your words as the words of “The Almighty”.
Build up your social media presence: Wondering how to build up your social following without posting dck pics? Guest posting is the way to go. For instance, when someone shares your article, you would often get tagged and mentioned.
Increase an authority of your website: People are more likely to trust and buy from the brand that has a powerful web presence. If your product gets a decent review from The Next Web, would people have more confidence in purchasing that product of you? Sure thing.
Become more confident: Imagine getting featured in Forbes, Wired, Inc and Entrepreneur? That would definitely tell you something about the quality of your writing and your expertise.
Increase exposure & brand awareness: Similarly to increasing an authority of your website, guest blogging can expose your brand to a much broader audience.
Inbound links (backlinks): Should I really explain this point? Okay, you can also get a quality, powerful backlink from your profile bio. The vast majority of sites will allow you to add a link or two in your byline, which usually appears at the bottom of every post.
Build an email list: An influx of referral traffic to your website can lead to a growth of your mailing list. If, and only if you can convert that traffic to your regular subscribers.
Money, money, money: Some people manage to build an entire business of contributing articles. Solvid (that’s us if you didn’t know) is a good example. We’ve gotten several monthly paying clients just from publishing quality articles on The Next Web, Sitepoint and Lifehack. Yes, we’ve worked our socks off to get there, but it all pays off.
How to be the perfect guest blogger?
By the time you read this part, you’ve probably realised that guest posting/contributing isn’t an easy way to gain backlinks. You should be prepared to work your socks off to get published in an authoritative publication.But, how do you go about creating that “perfect” guest post?
Step 1: Get to know the blog’s content and audience
Identify which content performs best on a particular blog and what type of content gets the most traction. Identify the style of other posts, how well they are written and how detailed the posts are.
Step 2: Read the guidelines
How long should the piece be? There is no point writing a 2,000-word article just to find out that the limit is 1,000 words.
Step 3: Pitch your post
Before you proceed with writing the actual article, it’s worthwhile pitching an idea first to see whether this would be something they would publish.
When pitching, keep your email short (200 words or less), provide multiple headline variations, give a brief description of the article, a quick bio of yourself (what you do, where else have you been published, achievements, etc.) and a few links to example posts.
Here is a great email pitch template by Local SEO Checklist.
Step 4: Draft an article
Make sure your post is formatted according to the style of the blog, including any relevant images (everyone loves images). Usually, blogs would ask you to submit the article in HTML or Markdown format, in which case you should host images on your own website and input the source links.
Step 5: Craft a perfect byline (bio)
If you wish your guest blogging to be successful, the way you present yourself may be the determinant factor. Illustrate your expertise and knowledge of the subject, add a link or two back to your website and add any relevant social networks.
Step 6: Revise
Double or even triple check your article, read it out loud and give it to a friend or a family member to read. Does it flow well, is it coherent, can an ordinary person understand what you’re trying to say?
Step 7: Submit
At this stage, your input is not over yet. An editor may ask you to carry out any necessary amendments.
Blogging, Lifestyle & How-To Websites/Blogs That Accept Guest Posts and Contributions
This list is more diversified than others. The following sites generally cover most topics mentioned in the title, but it’s still worthwhile checking out every blog on a case-by-case basis. For instance, Lifehack & The Huffington Post are more generalised than others. They cover anything from web development to yoga. Whereas Daily Blog Tips & Shout Me Loud focus on teaching novice bloggers.Hence, it might be worthwhile doing a quick background check before pitching these websites.
Business, Finance & General Marketing Webistes/Blogs That Accept Guest Posts and Contributions
Are you a passionate entrepreneur or small business owner who wants to earn some attention via guest blogging? If so, this list is exactly for you. Not only you can gain an immense amount of knowledge from these sites, but can also contribute by sharing your knowledge.The following list consists of websites that cover general business, strategy, finance and general marketing topics. I would not suggest jumping onto Forbes, Inc, Entrepreneur and the gang before you secure some guest posts from publications with lower barriers.
Digital Marketing, Social Media, SEO & Content Marketing Websites/Blogs That Accept Guest Posts and Contributions
This list is more for those who have an in-depth knowledge and experience in either digital marketing, social media, content marketing, search engine optimisation (SEO) or search engine marketing (SEM). The vast majority of these websites/blogs cover all aspects of digital marketing, some are more inclined towards technical SEO while others focus on advanced content marketing. So, make sure you check the content of each website before pitching or applying to contribute.Again, I would not recommend jumping onto sites like Search Engine Land, Hubspot or Adweek until you get covered by less demanding ones.
Technology, Gadgets & Computer Websites/Blogs That Accept Guest Posts and Contributions
Are you a tech guru or complete geek? This list is definitely for you. The following websites cover everything from general tech news and innovations to in-depth software reviews. So, if you run a tech company or just developed a new software, and are confident that it could potentially revolutionise the market of technology, why not reach out to some of the sites below?As you can see, there are some very high-profile publications on the list, such as Wired and Tech Crunch that are very picky to what they publish. So, belt up and use your secret gun when pitching these guys.
What are the other methods to find guest posting opportunities?
1. Google SearchGoogle Search persists to be the most popular way to find anything on the web. Same applies to finding blogs to contribute to.
So, begin the process with using advanced query strings. For example, to find out digital marketing websites that are on a lookout for contributors, we’ll use the following string: digital marketing “contribute”
To make the job easier for you, we’ve prepared the list of 10 popular strings:
Your Keyword “contribute”
Your Keyword “guest post”
Your Keyword “write for us”
Your Keyword “become an author”
Your Keyword “guest posting”
Your Keyword “submit post”
Your Keyword “submit article”
Your Keyword “submit an article”
Your Keyword “tip us”
Your Keyword “submit a tip”
All you need to do is to place your keyword.
2. Competitor Backlinks
This strategy can be so powerful if you have the right tools under your belt.
First and foremost, you would either need access to Open Site Explorer, Ahrefs or BuzzSumo. These are one of the best backlink analysis tools available on the market. You can simply input any URL, and the tool will give you the list of backlinks a particular site has.
Not only you can sneak behind the link building scene of any website, but you can also find some great guest posting opportunities. All you need to do is to go through the links and identify the sites that accept guest posts and contributions.
3. Twitter
Similarly to Google Search, you can use pretty much the same strings to find guest post opportunities on Twitter. When someone is featured on a reputable blog or publication, they will often share the post with their followers. That’s where you can sneak behind. For example, do a Twitter search for a query digital marketing “guest post”, and it will show you the latest tweets that include your keywords.
All you need to do is scan through results by clicking on the links and evaluate which websites accept guest posts.
Conclusion
Although guest posting can be a powerful way to gain traction, build awareness, trust, reputation and links, it’s incredibly important that you stick to the best practices that don’t violate Google’s guidelines.Hope you’ve enjoyed this huge post. We’ll keep this list updated where possible, and if you notice something weird (perhaps a mistake) feel free to point out.
Disclaimer: This list in no way guarantees that all or any of the websites listed below will accept your content, guest post or contribution.