It is undeniable that link building is integral in improving your website’s search engine ranking. Hence, many businesses would stick to any tactic to acquire links. This includes building links through guest posting.
Should You Guest Post To Build Links?
In our opinion, guest posting is one of the excellent ways to build links and drive traffic for your website. However, it can be a double-edged sword.
For one, some businesses would settle for crappy content for the sake of getting it published and acquiring links. Another is that brands would publish their content on irrelevant and under-performing websites.
So, before you use guest posting as a vehicle to build links for your website, here are three things you need to know:
1. It’s Not About Link Building
Guest posting is meant to expand your audience reach and establish your brand as an industry thought leader. That’s because the content you publish helps build your reputation. Hence, you should not settle for less when guest posting services.
2. They Don’t Really Bring Referral Traffic
Back in 2016, Tim Soulo did an experiment to measure the ROI of guest posting.
After collecting traffic data from 239 guest posts published on 78 blogs, it was revealed that such content brings an average of 56 referral visits. Not impressive.
This explains why you should not rely on guest posting alone to drive website traffic.
3. It Doesn’t Bring Immediate Result
If you want quick results, guest blogging is not for you. That’s because you need to build your reputation first before you can convince more prominent publications to accept your guest post.
5 Steps To Use Guest Posts For Link Building
Now that we have set your expectations about guest posting for links, it is time to learn how you can do it effectively.
1. Look For Relevant Opportunities
Looking for relevant websites is the key to an effective link building campaign. These websites cover similar topics, cater to the same audience as yours, and where your competitors are likely to contribute.
So, how can you find relevant opportunities?
Google Search
There are search formulas that you can use to look for guest posting opportunities.
For example, if you are in the travel niche, it can be as simple as typing “travel + guest post” on Google. That way, you can create a list of websites that publish guest posts.
Competitive Analysis
Another way to know where you can guest post to check where your competitors are getting their links.
Using our previous example, that would mean knowing whether your fellow travel bloggers are contributing to other websites. Check whether those websites are travel websites. If not, determine what the content they contributed is all about.
That way, you can figure out how you can make a robust link building campaign.
2. Refine Your Target List
Once you have a list of target websites where you can guest post, the next step is to refine your list. And you can do that by considering the following factors:
- Relevance. Of course, your target website should be in the same niche as yours but is not necessarily a competitor.
- Domain Authority. Look for websites with DA higher than yours.
- Moz Rank. This indicates the importance of a page (i.e., pillar content vs. a news article).
- Follow vs. Nofollow. You should get a do-follow link, as this pass-on link juice to your website.
- Spam Score. The higher the spam score, the farther you should stay away from it.
- Inbound Link. You should check whether your target website is acquiring links from gambling or porn sites.
These are just some of the factors you need to consider. And the metrics that matter to you may vary depending on the nature of your website.
3. Pitch Your Content Ideas
After refining your target websites’ list, the next thing you should do is pitch your content idea.
The key here is familiarizing yourself with your target website. That’s because some websites require that you only pitch a title. Some would want a draft, while some will ask for submissions.
Hence, it is better to check their guest posting requirements before searching for an editor’s name and email. Doing so will make you efficient in acquiring guest posting opportunities.
Because the quicker you provide guest posts, the faster you can build links.
4. Submit Your Content
Regardless of guest posting requirements, you will need to craft content that will adhere to your target website’s guidelines. We are talking about word count, the acceptable number of external links, and topical relevance.
But more than that, you craft content that can fulfil two conditions:
- Establishes your brand as a key opinion leader in your industry.
- Resonates with your target website’s audience.
For instance, you are a travel blogger and were given an opportunity to guest post on a hotel comparison website. Writing a list of travel tips may not resonate with their audience.
Instead, you can write about how their readers can book a hotel suite without breaking the bank.
5. Measure Your Progress
No digital marketing campaign is complete without tracking its progress.
So, what can you measure in the case of guest posting? Here are the basic ones:
- Number of guest posts published within a month
- Number of links acquired within a month
- Improvement in keyword ranking (if you used your target keywords as anchor text)
That said, you need a tracking system. It can be a spreadsheet that lists down all your target websites and the guest posts you made for them. It should also include the status of the guest post (i.e., scheduled or published).
And other than the improvement in keyword ranking, you can also measure the number of referral traffic you got from your guest posts.
Final Thoughts
It goes without saying that guest posting can help you acquire and build links. But keep in mind that there is more to it than link building.
Instead, use guest posting as an opportunity to build awareness around your brand. Leverage it to establish your reputation as an industry expert, and links will naturally come.
