While there are plenty of reasons to guest blog as a way to establish thought leadership and reach a wider audience on different websites, is there a benefit to publishing other people’s guest posts on your own company blog? (Obviously, I set you up for that.)
Of course there is! I’m a big fan of having other people contribute content to my marketing blog, and here’s why.
1. You lighten your own contribution load
The problem with being a small business owner who blogs is that you are often focused on other aspects of running your business, and don’t have a ton of time to write content for your blog. So you can either publish, say, one post a month, or have such an erratic publishing schedule that people don’t know when to expect new content from your blog. No bueno either way.
By inviting others in your industry to submit guest posts for your blog, you have a steady stream of content without having to create it all yourself.
2. You will attract more visitors
With a regular schedule of content going live each week, you’ll attract more people to your blog as well as your website. The more people your blog attracts, the more potential customers you can reach.
Let’s say 1% of your blog visitors end up becoming customers. If you’re limping along, attracting just 50 visitors a month, that’s not even generating one customer a month. On the other hand, if you bumped that number up to, say, 200 a month, you could have at least a couple of new customers each month, and grow from there. So, essentially, you let guest bloggers help you generate new business, and it costs you nothing.
3. Guest bloggers promote their content for you
A good guest blogger shares any post that’s published on other sites. It shows they are diverse in the content they create, and that it’s good stuff. So every post a guest blogger writes for you will then be promoted to their social media, email, and/or blog followers. These are likely people you couldn’t reach on your own, so they send more traffic to you, and more people discover your brand.
4. You can expand your subject matter library
You may be well versed in a few aspects of your industry, but not others. By inviting guest bloggers to contribute, you’ll find people who can write in-depth posts about subjects you don’t know as much about. For me, that’s SEO and analytics. My blog now has a lot of great content on these subjects, and I’ve written very few of the posts. The more information you can provide your audience, the more they’ll trust you and come back for more.
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5. You might find a reciprocal opportunity
While some people who will ask to contribute to your blog will be less established in their businesses, others may have well-trafficked blogs of their own. It’s a great way to reciprocate. When they ask to publish a post with you, agree to it (assuming the content is high quality), then ask if you can do the same on their blog. You’ll reach their audience without having to seek out new blogs to contribute to.
A few tips for finding great guest bloggers
The only drawback (if there is one) to accepting guest blog posts is that the industry has become saturated. I personally receive several pitches a day, and I’m not even our point of contact for the blog. Many pitches might be unrelated to what you do, so you’ll have to spend time sifting through to find the ones that actually deal with your subject matter. (If you veer too far off path, Google will penalize you in search results.)
I have a page on my blog that outlines our guest blog guidelines. (I won’t link to it because we aren’t currently accepting posts.) This is how I describe what we’re looking for:
- Post must be 600-1000 words.
- Topic must relate to content marketing or social media marketing.
- If it’s an infographic, it must be accompanied by an introductory paragraph.
- We handle the images.
- Blogger gets one link (dofollow) in bio; no company links within the article.
- Post must not be published elsewhere.
These instructions are pretty clear, and anyone who doesn’t follow them automatically gets rejected by my team. Another deal breaker I have is bad grammar. If I skim a post and find errors in it easily, I won’t even bother editing it. I don’t have time! The post should be informative, well written, and interesting.
To get started, it’s as simple as putting up your own guest blog guidelines and announcing on your social profiles that you’re now accepting guest posts. Also, consider inviting anyone you know personally in your field to get the ball rolling.
Having guest posts on your blog can really beef up your content marketing game, and it costs you little to nothing to do so, besides some time to field email pitches, edit articles, and schedule and promote them.
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