Guest posting is the number one strategy I have employed to get my health blog to over 1,000 visitors per day.
It drives a lot of direct traffic to my blog daily from readers reading my content on other blogs and clicking my links. For example, just today, I have generated 137 visitors from just one guest post on one of the most popular “Hair Care” websites in the world and there’s still two hours of the day to go!
But, more importantly, the backlinks generated by my guest blog posts have significantly increased my rankings enabling me to rank on page one for a number of keyphrases that get more than 5,000 searches per month.
In this blog post I’m going to reveal my guide to finding guest blogging opportunities and how to approach those bloggers and convince them to publish your content.
Here we go…
10 Ways To Find Guest Blogging Opportunities
This is the simplest part, if a little tedious.
In this step we simply need to make a list of as many blogs in our market as is humanly possible. Preferably, we want to make a note of blogs that state they accept guest posts, but we also want to keep a record of blogs that don’t explicitly state that they do.
To keep a record of these blogs, either create a new Bookmarks folder in your web browser (this is what I do) or create a new Word document and copy and paste all the links into this file.
Here’s a few ways you can find hundreds of blogs in your market that you can guest post on. Make a note of each one.
1. Firstly, simply search for “keyword blog” with the keyword being your niche or market. For example “health blog”.
2. Search for: keyword “powered by wordpress”. This will identify a number of blogs in your market using the WordPress platform.
3. Search your keyword in Google Blog Search – http://www.google.com/blogsearch
4. Search for “best keyword blogs” or “top 50 keyword blogs”. This will bring up lists compiled by bloggers of the best blogs in the market. Follow these links and make a note of the best.
5. Search for phrases like: keyword “guest post”, keyword “write for us”, keyword “submit an article”. These phrase will produce pages with blogs in your market advertising for guest bloggers.
6. Use these three Google search tricks to find guest posting opportunities.
7. Go to Twitter and search for “guest post”. I only just read about this strategy but I’ve already found a number of blogs that accept guest posts in my market. It’s a fantastic strategy.
8. Register at guest blogging directories like MyBlogGuest.com and BlogSynergy.com. This is essentially a resource for guest bloggers and guest post hosts to find each other.
9. Every day I get three or four requests to guest post on my blog. If I’m interested, but not convinced by the writer, I’ll ask them to link to some existing guest posts they have published. I follow the link and make a note of the blogs.
10. Go to forums, either in your market or internet marketing forums like the Warrior Forum, and start a thread asking if anyone would like you to publish guest posts on their blog.
There we have ten ways to find guest blog hosts, now it’s simply a case of approaching the bloggers and getting your content and your link on their blog.
I reject 90% of approaches to guest post on my blog, yet I get accepted 90% of the time when I approach blogs to guest post on theirs. In the next section I’m going to reveal my formula for getting published on even the biggest, most popular blogs in my market, including a sample email you can model your proposal on.
How To Approach Potential Guest Post Hosts
It’s all well and good having a huge list of blogs in your market, but if you can’t convince them to publish your content, then it’s a worthless list.
Here’s my checklist for making sure you get your blog post published on even the most popular, authoritative blogs.
7 Step Checklist To Getting More Guest Posting Gigs
1. This is a given, but most of the guest posts I get sent to publish on my blog are absolute garbage. You HAVE to provide quality content or you’ll get rejected instantly. If writing isn’t your strong point, you can find some very good writers for just $10-20 per article.
2. Write about a topic that would fit on the host blog. Yesterday I got sent an article for my blog about plastic surgery. My blog is dedicated to natural health and beauty alternatives. I’m not going to publish a post about plastic surgery. Similarly, make sure the topic you are writing about hasn’t been covered recently on the host blog.
3. Don’t be over promotional with your blog post, but DO include an anchor text link WITHIN your article. I always include one anchor text link back to a blog post that delivers value within my article because this provides fantastic SEO benefit for me and gets lots of clicks. No blogger has ever had a problem with me including a within-article link.
4. In your email to a blogger, make sure you address them by name (if possible) and personalise the email for that blogger and their blog.
5. State your expertise and why you’re in a position to provide value for the bloggers readers.
6. Briefly provide an overview of the article you are contributing. State that should the article not be of interest to their readers, then they should suggest an alternative topic so you can provide an article on that topic.
7. Attach your article in .txt or .doc format including formatting, hyperlinks, your author resource box, and a high quality royalty free image if possible.
Now, here’s a sample email that you can use to model your proposals on.
—————————————————–
Hi FIRSTNAME
My name’s Your Name from MyBlog.com where I’ve been blogging for nearly four years and have amassed a following of over 30,000 readers per month.
I came across your blog recently and am wondering whether I could publish a high quality, unique and original post to your blog?
I’ve gone ahead and written a post that I think your readers will love. It will be exclusively available for YourBlog.com should you decide to publish it.
It’s titled “Blog Post Title” and reveals “this, this and this…”.
I have attached the article pre-formatted and with a high quality royalty free image you can use. If you publish this, let me know and I will be happy to share on social media sites, such as Facebook and Twitter to give you a traffic boost.
Let me know what you think or if there are any other article topics you would like me to write about.
Thanks a lot and I am very excited to (hopefully) see my blog post published on your blog.
YOUR NAME
——————————————
It’s as simple as that.
Write an article, send that email, and if all goes according to plan, you should see your post published within just a couple of days.
Bonus Tip: For really, really popular blogs where one blog post can send hundreds of visitors per week, I add one more element to my email. I say something like: “Should you decide to publish my blog post, I will happily share on Facebook and Twitter, and will also notify my email subscribers which will send 500 new visitors within 48 hours.”
This may just swing the deal in your favour. Obviously, only promise to do this if you actually intend to do so and can do so.
Getting published on high traffic, authority blogs is easy.
Simply find them, create fantastic and relevant content and send a personalized email using the template above and get your content published on some of the most popular blogs on the internet.
Your Challenge
Now we know how easy guest blogging is and how it can drive incredible amounts of traffic, here’s a challenge that I set to you to ramp up your traffic fast.
My challenge to you is to write one blog post every single day and to find a home for that blog post on someone else’s blog.
If you can have one guest post published every single day and each post sends just 10 visitors per day back to your blog, within one month you’ll be generating 300 visitors per day. Within one year you’ll be generating over 3,500 visitors per day.
Plus, your search engine rankings will be sky high.
Guest blogging is one of the most powerful, most effective, most ethical ways to drive traffic and increase your search rankings.
Follow the advice laid out in this post and become a guest blogging master.
I hope you’ve enjoyed this post. If you have please share it with your friends and followers on Twitter and Facebook.
Thanks,
James Penn
P.S. If you don’t yet have a blog that you can drive traffic to, or you want to learn how to make your blog better and more profitable, get yourself a copy of this physical book: ProBlogger: Secrets To Blogging Your Way To A Six-Figure Income
I’ve recommended this book so many times because it’s what set me on my path to setting up a very popular, blog that now generates a nice little income that continues to grow month after month.
Get your copy of the book here.
Leave a Reply
10/11/2011
This is priceless advice James!
I really need to get into the guest blogging game.. I feel like my content is helpful for sure, but a majority of my content is video. I wonder if other bloggers would accept a video guest post… hm… either way, this is going to help me!
Thanks for the post,
-Gabriel Johansson
Hey James,
So true! Guest blogging is awesome! I am sad to say that I don’t utilize it nearly as effectively as I should and you always remind me of that…
Now, I’m off to find some blogs to post on
Cheers,
Coby Wright
Another good post! Guest blogging is something I’ve been thinking about for awhile, I was afraid to try it, but I put it on my goal list for next week.
Hi James…
What is the theme you used in your blog?
It’s very cool…
Excellent stuff James – I’ve been fortunate to have generated a great deal of traffic (and crucially sign ups for my list) through guest posting. So I totally agree with you that its a strategy well worth following.
But you’ve outlined some extra tips here that I haven’t used before
Thanks for another great value added post!
Cheers,
Rob
Wow, this is all what we can find about guest posts! An encyclopedia for getting the most from our posts to other blogs.
I found really useful the tips for finding new blogs able to accept guest posts, and the tips are golden nuggets!
Thanks a lot and keep up your hard work!
See you soon,
Alessandro Zamboni
This is another excellent article.
I am open and willing to guest post NFL Football content, if anyone is interested, and vice versa.
Tiger
The Tiger Report
Mate… you must be one of a very select few that realises that you’re working in an industry where the more money you make your customers, the more they can spend on your products and suggested products… and the more they’ll be interested in what you have to say.
In all the time I’ve been on your newsletter, there are few that have offered an 8th of the content you have for free, yet immediately start spamming for months on end… I would love to see you create a product if you have not done so already… and that is marketing at it’s best… when customers are asking you for a product to buy! Oh wait… could it be because you’re too busy creating value to worry about sleazy tricks?
Much love and respect James, for one so young you don’t half make most of these other ‘guru’s’ look like amateurs. You’re an inspiration.