How guest blogging can change the future of your blog

Guest blogging is among the top recommended strategies on how to create and grow a blog. It is one of the fastest ways to ensure a better future for your blog. Just one guest post on a highly influential blog can greatly increase your own blog’s traffic and branding. You will not only receive these benefits on the day your guest post was published. These benefits will continue to come to you for weeks, months, or even years to come. That’s how powerful guest posting can be. It exposes your blog to a much wider audience. In fact, many bloggers rely solely on it as their only marketing strategy.

In simple terms, guest blogging is simply the process of creating content and posting it on another website to build your reputation and drive traffic to your own blog. You are literally giving away good content for free. Although you don’t get paid for your efforts, you will benefit from them through targeted traffic to your site or your own blog. This is not to mention the increase in search engine ranking of your blog as a result of the link you dropped. The bigger and more influential the site, the more benefits you can get. As a general rule, you’re better off writing guest posts only on blogs that rank higher on the search engine results page than yours. This maximizes the results you receive.

There are certain steps you need to follow when you write as a guest. You can’t just submit content to every blog that accepts guest posts. You need to make sure that the site you are guest posting on is appropriate for your blog. Below are the simplified steps on how you should create and submit guest posts.

1. Find blogs that are in the same niche as yours. To find these blogs, you can use search engines and blog directories. Or you can visit the top ten blogs in your niche and search their blog lists.

2. Once you have a list of blogs at your fingertips, start segmenting those that accept guest posts. To find out if a blog accepts guest posts, you need to visit the blog and browse the content. If you see articles written by people other than the blog owner, it means that the blog accepts guest posts. Sometimes you can find a “contribute” tab on a blog. This also means that it’s okay to send your submissions.

3. If you have decided which blog to target, you should start creating your author bio and guest post right away. You’ll want to browse the blog and read some of its content to get a feel for the style and voice of the blog. Always remember that you are a guest blog, so you need to tailor your submission to the general feel of the blog you are submitting to in order for the editorial team to approve your post. Your bio should include your areas of expertise, experience, a description of your website or blog, and a link to it.

4. Add impact to your blog post using images. By using graphs, charts or images you will help communicate your ideas and improve the performance of your posts.

5. Submit your guest post and wait. If you followed all steps 1 to 3, there is a good chance that your submission will be accepted and finally published.

6. Rinse and repeat to keep your website and/or blog relevant to your niche.

Pursuing guest blogging opportunities will position you as a thought leader and help give your blog exposure. Remember to comment and leave smart comments where influential bloggers are in your industry to drive traffic and open up other opportunities for guest blogging.