What to expect from this first chapter:
“3 most important ranking signals used by Google: Content, Links and RankBrain” — Andrey Lipattsev (search Quality Senior Strategist at Google)
A guest post is an article you write as a “guest” author for a website that is not your own. Many blogs offer guest post submissions to get fresh and interesting content. By writing a guest post you can display your knowledge and expertise to a new audience and get more online exposure.
Writing a guest post for an authoritative blog gives you the opportunity to do 4 important SEO tasks all at once:
The first 3 points are pretty self explaining, but the last point might need some additional background information. I’m assuming you’re targeting high quality websites where you’re going to submit your guest post. This means this website also has a better chance of ranking for competitive search queries.
When you need something it’s always a little bit less scary to begin with the people you already know.
You probably have your favourite blogs you are reading, right? So start with these and find out if they accept guest posts. You’re reading these blogs because they interest you… This also means there is a pretty big chance you can contribute with an interesting article.
As in many cases Google can offer you a wealth of information (if you know what to look for). Use these example search queries to find guest posting sites within your niche:
Or use my link building tool to get these queries generated automatically for you.
Tip: be sure to start with general keywords related to your topic / theme, because otherwise you might be limiting the opportunities that Google will return.
Once you’ve found some great guest posting websites, use the query: related:domain-name.com to find related websites that might offer guest post options to expand your list.
Create a list in excel or Google spreadsheets to get a nice overview of the guest post opportunities you’ve found.
Domain authority Use the bulk domain authority (DA) checker to get the current domain authority for the blogs your going to target. Filtering your list based on DA can help you prioritize and do your outreach more efficient.
Go to: Bulk domain authority (DA) checker to create your list.
Another great way to determine the potential value of a blog is looking at the traffic statistics. Using SEMrush you get a pretty decent indicator of the total traffic (including organic, paid and social traffic) a site is receiving over time.
To write a great guest post you need to be sure you know what you’re going to write about and be prepared to put in the work. To maximize the return of your efforts you need to aim high. To really make an impact you need quality websites and these will only allow quality content to be published.
To improve your chances of being published you can reach out to the editorial team of a blog to find out if there are specific topics they would like you to write about. This knowledge will dramatically improve your placement success rate.
After you’ve submitted your guest post and you’re published on your favourite blog:
To wrap it up, here is an overview of some effective tools to speed up the guest posting process.