Despite all the controversy surrounding guest blogging, it still remains one of the best ways to get your business before your target audience. When done right, guest blogging can not only be a great source of links, but also help establish authority and brand presence.
If you’re thinking of adding guest blogging to your content marketing strategy, follow these steps to pitch a post to your target publications:
- Shortlist your target publications
The first step in the pitching process is to make a shortlist of the publications you want to write for. You ideally want your posts only in blogs that have a reputation for producing high quality content. To find such blogs, search for your niche on the following sites:
Alternatively, you can Google “[niche name] + write for us” or “[niche name] + guest post”.
The key here is to target publications that have a small but highly engaged audience. You will see far better returns on your investment if you land a post on a niche blog such as CopyBlogger (for copywriters) vs. a large, general audience publication like The Huffington Post.
- Find out what kind of content gets published
Take some time to go through the blogs on your list. Note the kind of content that actually gets published. You’ll find that every blog has a character of its own. Some publish only list posts, some do short, crisp pieces, while some others prefer lengthy deep dives into complicated topics. Not only does the type of content matter, but understand the WHY? Is it about entertaining and educating the audience or is it about attracting traffic through common SEO techniques? All content has a context.
Once you have an idea of what kind of content these publications prefer (and why), head over to Buzzsumo.com and enter the blog’s URL into the search bar. This will show you the most popular content from the blog.
Use this as the foundation of your guest blogging pitch. If you can create something similar to successful posts, you’ll have a much better chance of getting accepted.
- Find the blog owner or editor’s email address
While most blogs will have a contact form, you’ll have a much better chance of getting through to the target person (usually the blog owner or editor) if you can email them directly.
There are several ways you can do this:
- Search the blog’s ‘About’ or ‘Contact’ page for an email address.
- Use a tool like VoilaNorbert to look up the concerned person’s email address. For a more advanced tool, try NinjaOutreach.
- Search Whois data for the domain.
- Ask the blog owner/editor directly for their email address via Twitter.
- Pitch your idea
The final step is to send the actual pitch to the blog owner/editor. Follow the steps below to make sure that your pitch is successful:
- Personalize the email. Refer to the concerned person by name, and try to mention something they’ve done recently (from their Twitter feed or blog).
- Send at least three ideas with a short description of what the post will be about.
- Refer to any of your previously published content to assure them of your post quality.
If you follow all these steps, you’ll be accepted by nearly every publication you pitch to.
Conclusion
Guest blogging is one of the most powerful content marketing tactics you can use to grow your business. By writing stellar content and pitching it to the right publication, you can get powerful backlinks and put your business before your target audience.
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