I recently got my “Create A Media Kit To Attract Advertisers To Your Blog” article published at Problogger.net, which is arguably the biggest “how to blog” site online. I recommend guest blogging as the best tactic of getting high quality, inbound links for new blogs.
This article will take a look at why it is a good idea to guest blog and will look into how a new blog like mine was able to get a guest spot in the biggest blog in my field.
How can it be a good idea to give some of your content away?
- You get good exposure of your blog to your target audience
- You get quality inbound link from the relevant blog that featured you
- You get good volume of direct traffic
- You get new subscribers to your RSS feed
- You get several inbound links from other bloggers
- You get good amount of comments to your article
How does a small blog get a guest post spot at blog like ProBlogger?
- Follow what is happening in your targeted community. Subscribe to the blogs in your field, follow what their write about and beware of discussions and trends. Beware of what people comment on these blogs, what is on their mind and what questions they seek answers for.
- Write a relevant article to something you have read on one of these big blogs. It can be an article that goes in depth and answers some questions from visitors or can be a follow up to something the other blogger has written about.
- It is important to have something important, useful, valuable, or original to say in your blog article. No one will feature your article if they do not believe that your article creates value to their blog and their blog visitors.
- Contact the blogger and do your best to “sell” your article and the idea of it being featured as a guest post. Explain why you think your article should be featured and attach the article in the email.
- This is my initial email to Darren, who runs ProBlogger. Notice how I incorporated one of the recent articles from his blog into my “sales pitch”.
Hi Darren,
I have written an article which can be used as a continuation of the video tip at http://www.problogger.net/archives/2008/11/11/how-to-find-advertisers-for-your-blog/.
When reaching out to potential advertisers, it is very useful to prepare kind of a media kit of your own blog, to be able to easier sell your blog to the advertiser. The full article is below.
Let me know if you are interested in having this article in your blog as a guest blogger article. I can easily amend/add to the article if you needed me to incorporate your earlier tip into it.
Best regards,
Markohttp://www.howtomakemyblog.com
Hopefully these 5 steps will be enough to get a response from the blogger. If the response is negative, there is nothing you can do. You tried, you did your best but it was not the best time. In any case, you have nothing to lose by asking, so keep trying with other blogs.
What should I do if my guest article gets accepted?
- Jump, dance and celebrate.
- Make sure that your blog features good content to keep the visitors interested enough to browse around, read some of your other articles and subscribe/bookmark your blog.
- Feature a welcome message to all the new visitors. Darren confirmed me couple of days in advance that my guest post was accepted, so I had time to make some plans. I used the Referrer Detector plugin to welcome the visitors of ProBlogger.net with the following message on top of my blog (note that message was only shown to visitors coming from ProBlogger):
Welcome to ProBlogger readers! If you’ve found my article useful, please subscribe to my RSS feed for updates on similar topics about blogging.
The guest post at ProBlogger resulted in HowToMakeMyBlog getting more than 280 unique and targeted visitors and 60 new RSS subscribers in first 5 days. See all the traffic details in my case study of ProBlogger guest post effect on my traffic.
Image by: Robert Nelson
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Congrats on the exposure.
These are definitely some valuable tips, I have also dreamt of having a guest blog post on a large blog, maybe someday with the guidance of the post it may happen.
Congratulations, and very well done follow up on how you did it.
Jamie Harrop has a great series on guest posts as well – including an analysis of his results. Perhaps you and him could collaborate on something? I would be very interested in seeing such results, because he guest posted at JohnChow recently (and him and Darren are probably two of the biggest single person blogs period)
Awesome post! It is nice to see what your message looked like.
This is good information and also very encouraging for us all. I have had much success with guest posting on some smaller blog. I’m sure taking it to the level of a really big blog is a great feeling. Give me some food for thought about taking my guest posting to the next level. Thanks again for the excellent post.
Thank you for sharing your experience.
I’ve been lucky enough to interview several “A”-list bloggers with a similar approach as yours.
I’m looking forward to your traffic analysis.
Hey good post and very helpful advice. I’ve been considering starting to try to guest post on other blogs as part of my efforts for next year. Will be interested in seeing those stats!
And congratulations btw!
Thanks for nice comments everyone! I appreciate the support. If anyone has tried this tactic, please post your experience.
@Sid Savara: thanks for telling me about Jamie, I’ve just subscribed to his RSS.
Congratulations on getting your guest post accepted to Problogger, and good idea to make a how-to article out of the process. That plug-in, in particular, looks like a good idea. How many RSS readers were you able to add to your site as a result from having your article featured?
@Lindsay: thanks for the comment! I am in process of writing the article on the effect on my traffic/rss so stay tuned for that.
Thanks for the post. I like how you encourage us to make a plan of action and just do it. A guest posting position is most likely not going to fall into our laps. If we want to guest post, we have to take the necessary actions to see that it occurs — be proactive. It’s all about attitude and action. Thanks for letting us know what action you took to accomplish what you did. And congratulations.
Krissy
visit my main blog: Sometimes I Think
visit me on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamkrissy
Thanks for this post – it came at a really good time!
I’ve been offered a guest blogging gig recently and was looking for tips at how to make the most of the opportunity. I’ve googled to find specific case studies and found that the main blog that is used as an example is Problogger. Jamie had some good ones, but I also found a really interesting one on My Tropical Escape.
I’ve found that if you provide value to site owner prior to the pitch, you have a better chance of being accepted. Twitter is a really useful tool for this.
Thanks for the referrer detector plugin!
I have some experimenting to do – after I’ve read your follow up article.
Awesome Blog man! I just found your blog through google through the guest post on problogger, and I love your site. I was reading on another article about how you got your guest post and I was like o man, I hope he posts the email he sent. But I was like nah… he wouldn’t, they don’t want to give away their secrets. But there it was, you’ve already out done 90% of blogging tips and MMO sites. Most of them write every day, and still don’t tell you anything. You’ve given me new information on every post I’ve read so far. I just subscribed, keep up the good work!
Jonathan
@How to Blog – Thanks for the nice comment! I know what you mean, part of the reason I started this blog was that I did not feel I got enough practical information from the real-life blogging situations on most of the others “how to blog” blogs. I hope I can continue providing information like this.
Hai Marko, I’m Really admire about you, when i checked how old is your blog, it’s just 2 Months 19 Days Old, but i see your alexa ranking had reach 191.204. I’m Totally Glad to be you reader,
based on your post, does the blog which you published your guest post give you condition or rules before you can post it?
@Barock – Thanks for the comment! Usually the only rule is that the post is written exclusively for that blog and not being given away or posted any other places. Always make sure to discuss this with the blogger so you both know and agree with the rules.
@Marko Thanks for your quick respond Man.. I’ll try to create one,
I’m Always wait for your new Post…
I like the kind of professionalism you put in while writing emails.
There is one more post from you on Getting direct advertisement, and I used it.. Though I could not get any advertiser that time 3 months old but now I’m getting their mail after my blog crossed alexa 50K milestone..:)
@p@r@noid – Congrats, I am glad it is working out for you!
Great post…
What you need to be is a journalist with a brain. Well probably im not getting very popular in writing this, but these days most journalists don’t know shit about the topic they are writing about.
In 2009 information is accessible for all people with the skills, and therefore the demands to hit the big times with a post have grown exponentially.
I love problogger!! and now i think i love this site lol some very informative stuff us bloggers out here.
esp this Referrer Detector plugin will try this on one of my blogs
thanks a million
I got a guest/regular spot on a Blog, posted my first article and the site was hacked and has not reappeared. Sometimes life just sucks.
I second the bit about responding to contacts. If you don’t reply you will be telling the other person you have no interest in them (and probably anyone other than yourself). A reply of “No, Sorry” is better than no response every time.
I got a guest/regular spot on a Blog, posted my first article and the site was hacked and has not reappeared. Sometimes life just sucks.
It’s Working dude thanks ..!
people sell this kind of information..
you have officially been bookmarked
Recently I was asked to write a guest post for a highly rated blog site and I was wondering whether to post the same content on my blog reffereing to the guest post but I guess this post answers my question. Thanks.
@Rezbi – Definitely. I love getting in touch with other bloggers. Feel free to contact me directly or leave comments on my posts and I will get back as soon as I can. What is this book about that you have been interviewed for?