Let’s imagine you are working in your office when a colleague comes up to you and says that the new coffee machine makes excellent coffee. Now you are not a huge coffee drinker. So one person’s suggestion is not going to alter your mind.
What if multiple colleagues say the same thing? This might push you to consider the idea. Now imagine your boss says everyone ought to try the coffee this new machine makes because it tastes divine. Will you rise from your seat and go try the coffee now?
Chances are, you will! If not that day, then sometime over the next week.
This right here is an analogy for guest blogs.
Guest posting holds the power to influence the reader’s mind way more than a brand beating their own drum. When an authority figure vouches for your brand, you are bound to gain people’s trust.
What’s more? Google will trust you as well. So your site will start ranking higher in SERPs.
In a recent survey, 60% of consumers said that blog posts are valuable in the early stages of the buying process. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could grab those consumers by the collar and lead them to your site?
Follow these five stellar guest posting tips to do just that.
- Pitch to valuable high authority sites
The first and most crucial step in guest blogging is choosing which site to guest post on. If you blunder at this stage, our other guest posting tips can’t save you.
The run of the mill tactic is doing a quick “your niche, write for us” Google search of websites and sorting out the blogs on the first few SERPs that accept guest posts. This is a lazy approach to guest blogging. It is the reason why your guest posts are not ranking well or driving any traffic to your site.
Here are some far more effective methods of choosing the right site for your guest blog:
- Aim for sites with a high user engagement. This means people are actively sharing and commenting on the content. Chances are they will engage with your guest blog as well.
- Check for the site’s domain authority using a domain authority checker. You want to post on sites with a similar or higher domain authority than yours.
- Do a competitor backlink analysis using a free tool for website link analysis. It lets you see where your high-ranking competitors are getting their backlinks from. You can analyze which links are from guest posts. Then you can pitch your guest post to those influential sites your competitors are using.
- Don’t guest post just for the sake of building links
In his article ‘The Decay and Fall of Guest Blogging for SEO’, Matt Cutts said, “So stick a fork in it: guest blogging is done; it’s just gotten too spammy.”
Wonder why he said that?
It’s because digital advertisers started using guest posts only to build backlinks to their websites. Since that was the sole aim, the quality sucked. This not only made those guest blogs ineffective for real readers, but also brought down the reputation of the host site for spamming their audience.
Backlinks are only the icing on the cake. The real prize is reaching new leads who are likely to convert into customers. That’s not going to happen unless you write with ingenuity. A guest blog that invokes curiosity and reflects the value of your products and services always works best.
- Get your keyword strategy in place
Keyword optimization is the basic grammar for ranking on Google. You want your page to show up when your target audience searches for a specific term. Variations of this term are your keywords. Your entire guest blogging strategy revolves around optimizing this keyword for SEO.
Given below are some top-notch guest posting tips for grooming your keywords for SEO:
- Research the keyword you want to rank for. Use a keyword research tool to find similar keywords people are searching for. You can determine which ones to choose based on search volume and SEO difficulty.
- Each guest blog should target different primary keywords. If you design every article around the same keyword, you will create competition between your own articles. Better not confuse Google.
- Include your primary keyword in the meta description, headers, image files, page content, alt text, and URL.
- In the title tag, use long-tail keywords that your target audience will search for. Don’t stuff keywords just for the sake of it.
- Use image alt tags to rank better. Videos and infographics can also be used to appeal to the audience visually. But this should not be out of context.
- After the guest post is published, track its ranking for the target keywords using a content analyzer tool. This will let you gauge your post’s performance. You can further optimize your content for SEO to help it rank higher on Google.
- Follow guest posting best practices
Guest blogging has suffered some terrible disrepute over the past decade. Digital marketers have turned guest blogging into a trend to rank higher on Google.
It used to be a means of earning a credible recommendation. Now it has turned into a mere advertisement. In fact, according to a recent survey, 79% of editors say guest content is too promotional.
So is there a way to surpass this stigma?
Yes, there is only one way—writing high-quality blogs that cannot be disregarded.
How to do it? Here are some guest posting tips to get your boat rowing:
- Create specific content for the target audience. Make sure your target audience aligns with the audience of the blog you are writing for. Avoid generic articles.
- Be transparent about guest blogging. Your name and brand name should be unambiguously stated as the author of the content.
- Do your research and provide unique insight. Enlighten your readers with new information that makes them curious. Don’t bore them with obvious rehashed content.
- Cut out fluff as it doesn’t add any meaning. Provide helpful, actionable ideas. Answer relevant questions and try to be thought-provoking.
- Turn your reader’s interest into desire. Talk about the benefits of your topic and drive them to take action.
- Include a call to action after you have made your point. This should be at a stage where you feel the audience is likely to consider knowing more about your company.
- Link to a well-optimized landing page on your website. Don’t just direct your leads to the homepage. It usually confuses them and results in a high bounce rate.
- Use guest post services
It’s understandable if all of these steps seem too troublesome and complicated to be executed properly. It takes years of expertise to nail guest blogging.
If you want to bypass that steep learning curve and get the most out of your guest posts right away, we recommend using professional guest post services. It’s like hiring experts who turn your idea into a brilliant plan. They help you achieve your goals with flawless action.
What are the merits of guest post services? Let us elaborate.
- Your Google ranking improves. Guest post services can secure backlinks from high-authority blogs, thus proving your credibility to search engines.
- Your website’s domain and search engine authority increases. With their blogger outreach services, guest post experts can easily make this happen.
- Your site gets quality traffic from guest blogs. Guest post experts ensure that you can grow your potential customer base with sales-qualified leads.
- They help boost your brand awareness by guest posting on multiple popular blogs on your behalf. The more they post, the more leads and links you gain.
There you have it. We have provided all the premium guest posting tips you’ll require to ace the guest blogging game. You are ready to take the digital world by storm.
