A fabulous way to get traffic to your website is by writing guest posts. Here are the three main reasons to write a guest post:
- Normally part of the guest post exchange is that you get an Author Bio which gives a bit of information about you and links to your website. I’ve seen both long and short bios and up to three links within a bio. I’ve also seen guest posts with NO links. Frankly I would never write a guest post unless I could link at the least, back to my own website.
- A great blog post will get clicks coming into your website because readers will be curious and will want to see what else you have written. A good blog post can establish your credibility and readers who are interested will want to see what else you have to say on the topic.
- Guest posts are also part of a great SEO strategy because you get back-links coming into your site. The closer in content your guest post is to your own website, the more SEO juice you get out of the link. For example, if your author website is about training cats and your guest post is on a cat focused website .. that is a really solid backlink. If however, your article about cat training is on a financial website … well, yest it is a backlink and they add up … BUT it doesn’t get as much SEO juice as a link from another cat website.
There are several challenges. The first is having your “pitch” for a guest post accepted, and the second is in writing a great post.
I get over five guest post proposals every week. Most of them are such garbage I don’t even bother replying. I once got a pitch from a photographer suggesting an article on cameras. When the article arrived it basically said you needed a camera in order to take a photography. REALLY I would never in a thousand years have guessed that! What a garbage bin article … trite and useless.
One of my BIG ways of filtering out junk proposals is if the pitch has so many grammar and spelling mistakes, I can hardly read it, I assume the post won’t be any better. No thanks … another article in the garbage bin.
The other day I got a pitch that had me flabbergasted. What was this guy THINKING?
Here is the Pitch
Hello,
My name is Stewart and I am working as a freelance Blogger, Copywriter and Journalist from London, UK. I like your blog and want to be a part of that as a contributor to increase my credibility and followers.
I hope to get your positive response…
In writing ANY kind of marketing material, you must always answer the question … WIIFM .. What’s In It For ME? I think Stewart misunderstood which ME he was targeting. It is not MY job to increase HIS credibility and followers. It is MY job to give my readers great information they can use. IF I can achieve that, then MY credibility and number of followers will increase. So from MY point of view it is all about ME. And any good marketer will keep that at the top of their mind all the time!
Curious to know YOUR reaction to the “pitch” and how you would have done it differently?
In spite of the fact that I sent Stewart a reply telling him I was not interested he proceeded to send me an article on “financing.” It probably won’t surprise you to find out that it was an ill-conceived article, filled with six links to a spammy website.
The article had NOTHING to do with the subject matter of my website. It was quickly tossed into the trash can.
The whole point of Guest Posts is that if a guest writer, gives ME great content I will happily to post their article along with a bio that has a maximum of three (two is better) links to their website. Not only do I publish the article. If the author has not supplied me with a header graphic, I create one so I can promote the article on all my social media networks including Pinterest, Twitter and Facebook. I get great content for my website, and the guest writer gets exposure, links and traffic back to their website.
Guest posts are a WIN-WIN as long as you remember that you have to win over the owner of the blog first. Make it easy for them, make sure your suggested posts fits their audience and be sure your inquiry is in PERFECT English.
If you want some templates and more great advice about guest posting here is a great little book. The authors even take it a step further and talk about getting PAID for your guest posts.
How to Pitch a Blog Post:
A Guide for Guest Bloggers and Freelance Writers
I can’t say I’m terribly surprised… I myself would never pitch anything to a blogger unless I knew it would benefit them in some way. A pitch is just like a job interview that way.
LOL It’s like applying for a job at a furniture company and then telling the interviewer how you can increase their candy sales. Doesn’t work for me. Doubt the applicant would get the job!
I’m curious if the great content is enough to satisfy the WIIFM, as a rule. I’ve only guest posted once, and it was a requested theme (more like we see in Link-ups).
Personally I think that some kind of WIIFM (What’s in it for me) statement or lead in has to “sell” your great content, otherwise people won’t read it.
If nothing else, Stewart’s message brought a smile to my face. It’s the same smile I have when someone tells me they wrote a novel in a week. Then they ask why it takes me months and months to write one. I am now curious about your website so maybe Stewart fulfilled his mission.