How to Find the Right Guest Blogging Opportunities

For several months now, SEOs have debated the value of guest blogging. Has it lost its benefit? Or, is guest blogging still an effective SEO tactic?

As I have mentioned in several past posts, Google’s algorithm updates have cracked down on spammy backlinks and irrelevant content, shifting toward content marketing strategies. The key is finding the right guest blogging opportunity.

What is guest blogging?

Guest blogging is when someone posts an article to a blog that is not their own. The incentive for doing so is to build quality backlinks for their own websites. Guest blogging can help you gain the status of “expert” in a particular niche. It can also build your community and your customer base.

In order to be successful with guest blogging, you must be strategic about it. Take your time to carefully write a blog post that not only resonates with your target audience, but educates them as well. And your work doesn’t stop there. Once you’ve crafted a well thought-out post, you cannot just place it any where. You should place your post on a blog that resembles your values, beliefs and company.

Here are four steps to finding the right guest blog:

1. Set realistic goals

Being successful starts with setting realistic goals. What are you trying to achieve from guest blogging? What do you expect to gain from it? You are more likely to get where you want to go if you set a goal and commit yourself to it. It’s also important to measure your success. In terms of guest blogging, success can be measured by the number of connections made and leads generated.

2. Define your audience

In order to find the right guest blogging opportunities, you have to first identify your target audience. Research and find out as much as possible about the people you want to attract to your website through your guest blogging efforts. After you perform the research, you will want to create an audience profile. This is an in-depth description of who your average reader may be. It also includes demographic and psychographic information, such as age, gender, interests, values, lifestyle, and much more.

3. Find legitimate blogs

Now that you have figured out who you want to target, it’s important to seek out legitimate guest blogs. Reaching out to websites of similar interest is a great way to build a rapport with folks in the same niche. Also, find a blog that has strong credibility. Using tools like Open Site Explorer will allow you to check a blog’s domain authority and link profile. While it may be time-consuming and tedious to search for the right guest blog, it will be worth the hassle when you have real SEO results and more followers in the end.

4. Revel in the benefits

The biggest benefit associated with guest blogging is the ability to gain backlinks. These links will help your website move up in the search engines rankings. The second benefit of guest blogging is that it helps you build relationships with other bloggers. Such relationships will allow for future guest blogging opportunities. Another benefit is that guest blogging increases your exposure and helps build your brand. Lastly, when done correctly, guest blogging can be cheap promotion that generates a large portion of traffic flow to your website.

We would love to know about your guest blogging experiences!