While many blog owners would love to accept and publish guest posts because this reduces their overall costs, thanks to Google’s crackdown on spam my guest posting, many blog owners are quite wary.
This is the reality.
The old days of simply coming up with a guest post around target keywords and pitching it to bloggers who would readily publish it are long gone.
If you’re dealing with a legitimate blog, chances are the blogger or editor in charge of the show is more discriminating. They have to be.
Google has truly changed the rules of the game. The old rules of low-quality guest post content just to generate backlinks are long gone.
Sure, there are still people playing that game but those people are playing a losing game. Google is on to that technique, and it’s really just a matter of time until they get penalized.
If this is how you build backlinks, I strongly suggest you change your tactics. Instead of relying on spam my guest posting, I would suggest you change how you do guest posting.
I’m not saying that you should stop guest posting. Unlike other SEO or online marketing blogs that tell you to stop guest posting outright, I’m just telling you to change how you do guest posting.
Just like with anything else in life, there is the right way and the wrong way to do things.
The most tempting thing about doing things the wrong way is that it’s easy to get results with the wrong way. Also, if you’re an impatient person, doing things the wrong way yields faster results.
The problem is the results are short lived. Moreover, when things blow up in your face, it can really set you back.
If you want to succeed as a blogger, and you want to develop a solid backlink footprint for your blog to maximize your search engine visibility, you really have to adopt the long game.
What am I talking about?
A long game is all about long-term quality-based guest posting.
This means that you shouldn’t focus so much on getting a quick backlink or getting a nice burst of traffic. Instead, your focus should be on blogging in such a way that your brand is established with the right kind of audience.
You might not get a nice surge of traffic or not even get a nice boost in the search engines, but if you focus on the long game, all these short-term priorities fall by the wayside.
By keeping your eye on the ball and looking at the big picture, you are actually positioning your blog to be able to withstand any kind of mood swings Google might go through.
You have to understand that Google goes through periodic mood swings. Whenever it launches a new algorithm update, it ends up wiping out lots of online incomes.
It ends up penalizing lots of mom and pop blogs far from making a decent living from their blogs. These people are essentially wiped out because they chose to do things the quick and easy way.
By playing the blogging game with your eye on the long game, you will be able to survive whatever short-term ups and downs and nerve wracking changes Google goes through.
One of the best ways to do this as far as building links to your blog is concerned is to guest post without looking like you are guest posting.
Let me explain below.
Guest posting is not about link-building
One of the first assumptions that you really need to destroy for you to be successful as a guest poster is to disabuse yourself of the old idea that the only reason you should guest post is to build backlinks.
While this may be true five years ago, this is no longer the case.
If you still guest post just so you can get backlinks, you are only playing the game to lose. You are only setting yourself up for a nasty headache and disappointment later on.
People who do guest post for link-building purposes tend to produce garbage guest posts. I’m sorry to say this, but it’s absolutely true.
How can you produce quality guest post when your primary concern is to make sure that the guest post is stuffed with the right keywords and links to the right keywords?
This is precisely the kind of activities that Google frowns upon.
Google looks at this type of link-building as manipulation: You are simply going through all these processes just so you can manipulate the results from Google.
Of course, you and I know that this official policy from Google is self-serving and essentially pointless. The reality is that Google does allow optimization.
In fact, Google has a vested interest in people optimizing their websites for Google. However, it plays this hypocritical game where if you get too good at it, you’re a bad guy.
As morally reprehensible and evil as this may be, the sad reality is that Google is playing the tune as far as global search engine marketing is concerned, and we are just forced to dance along.
They call the shots.
As hypocritical and self-serving these rules may be, it’s their call. We can call them out on it as much as we can, but if we want to get all that free yummy search engine traffic from Google, we have to play along.
So how do you come up with guest posts that satisfy these so-called ethical link-building rules from Google?
Here are some tips
They’re not revolutionary or earth-shattering. In fact, most of them are rooted in common sense. Unfortunately, common sense is not very common nowadays especially when there’s a lot of easy search engine money to be made.
There is so much money left on the table that people basically let go of common sense and take riskier and riskier gambles. These people really have nobody to blame when Google finally hammers them.
So if you don’t want to join the ranks, keep the following tips in mind.
Don’t write your guest posts around keywords
This is very self-explanatory. I hope I don’t have to spill too much digital ink regarding this concept.
However, it is worth repeating: Do not write your guest posts simply around keyword targets. Those are very easy to spot.
A lot of target keywords are grammatically incorrect. They are very easy to identify.
So at the very least, if you are targeting keywords, and you insist on putting them on your titles, make sure they are grammatically correct.
Make sure that you use enough English wizardry to massage your keywords smoothly into your titles.
Don’t make them easy to peck off.
The more obvious your keyword titles are, the easier it is for Google to penalize you.
Moreover, the more awkward your keyword-based titles are, the harder it would be for you to find a legitimate guest post source.
Sure, there are a lot of broken desperate bloggers out there that would love to take your $10 and post your spammy guest post. Unfortunately, their blogs usually have low page rank and low quality to begin with.
If anything, having a link to their blogs would only harm your website. You have to look for quality bloggers.
Quality bloggers, on the other hand, exercise a higher level of editorial control. They can be quite tight regarding the quality of your content’s grammar.
I’m not saying you should forget about keywords but make sure that the keywords make sense, flow naturally from the article, and are phrased in a grammatically correct form. Otherwise, you’re just wasting your time.
Focus on the needs of the end user
There are so many guest posts that are like literary Frankenstein creations-they really are. They’re like slapped together and barely coherent thoughts.
In fact, there is no unifying thought among these articles. How can they contain a unified theme when they are simply gunning after keyword targets?
High-quality guest posts are able to address keywords by talking about themes. This way, the needs of the end user are met while at the same time the keywords are mentioned in a strategic way.
It’s a harsh truth, but you are really serving two masters: You are serving Google’s search engine robot while at the same time you’re trying to serve flesh and blood human readers.
The good news is if you are creative and imaginative enough, this doesn’t have to be an “either or” proposition. There is no zero-sum game here.
For Google to gain your flesh and blood human readers, you don’t necessarily have to lose. Similarly, for you to write a high-quality guest post that addresses real human needs, your SEO considerations don’t have to get flushed down the toilet.
There can be a happy compromise. In fact, you don’t even need to compromise at all. By writing a high-quality content that really addresses the needs of the end users and then formatting that content in a natural way where keyword targets are highlighted, you can achieve both goals.
Get into the mind of the publisher of the blog you are guest posting on
This is the most important part of this blog post. You have to remember that in this day and age, guest posting is a political act.
By a political act, I’m not talking about expressing liberal or conservative views. I’m talking about massaging the egos of blog editors.
These people have priorities and are looking out for their target audience members. You have to understand this reality.
As a result, you have to learn how to negotiate. You have to say the right magic phrases. Most importantly, you have to deliver on whatever it is that you promise.
If you are able to deliver solid quality that adds real value to the lives of the existing audience members of the blog you’re guest posting on, you will be invited back.
The reality is that there are few guest post writers who truly care about their guest blog post’s audience members.
If you are able to deliver solid quality, you will stand out from your competition, and this might be the beginning of a very powerful brand relationship.
This is the reality.
The old days of simply coming up with a guest post around target keywords and pitching it to bloggers who would readily publish it are long gone.
If you’re dealing with a legitimate blog, chances are the blogger or editor in charge of the show is more discriminating. They have to be.
Google has truly changed the rules of the game. The old rules of low-quality guest post content just to generate backlinks are long gone.
Sure, there are still people playing that game but those people are playing a losing game. Google is on to that technique, and it’s really just a matter of time until they get penalized.
If this is how you build backlinks, I strongly suggest you change your tactics. Instead of relying on spam my guest posting, I would suggest you change how you do guest posting.
I’m not saying that you should stop guest posting. Unlike other SEO or online marketing blogs that tell you to stop guest posting outright, I’m just telling you to change how you do guest posting.
Just like with anything else in life, there is the right way and the wrong way to do things.
The most tempting thing about doing things the wrong way is that it’s easy to get results with the wrong way. Also, if you’re an impatient person, doing things the wrong way yields faster results.
The problem is the results are short lived. Moreover, when things blow up in your face, it can really set you back.
If you want to succeed as a blogger, and you want to develop a solid backlink footprint for your blog to maximize your search engine visibility, you really have to adopt the long game.
What am I talking about?
A long game is all about long-term quality-based guest posting.
This means that you shouldn’t focus so much on getting a quick backlink or getting a nice burst of traffic. Instead, your focus should be on blogging in such a way that your brand is established with the right kind of audience.
You might not get a nice surge of traffic or not even get a nice boost in the search engines, but if you focus on the long game, all these short-term priorities fall by the wayside.
By keeping your eye on the ball and looking at the big picture, you are actually positioning your blog to be able to withstand any kind of mood swings Google might go through.
You have to understand that Google goes through periodic mood swings. Whenever it launches a new algorithm update, it ends up wiping out lots of online incomes.
It ends up penalizing lots of mom and pop blogs far from making a decent living from their blogs. These people are essentially wiped out because they chose to do things the quick and easy way.
By playing the blogging game with your eye on the long game, you will be able to survive whatever short-term ups and downs and nerve wracking changes Google goes through.
One of the best ways to do this as far as building links to your blog is concerned is to guest post without looking like you are guest posting.
Let me explain below.
Guest posting is not about link-building
One of the first assumptions that you really need to destroy for you to be successful as a guest poster is to disabuse yourself of the old idea that the only reason you should guest post is to build backlinks.
While this may be true five years ago, this is no longer the case.
If you still guest post just so you can get backlinks, you are only playing the game to lose. You are only setting yourself up for a nasty headache and disappointment later on.
People who do guest post for link-building purposes tend to produce garbage guest posts. I’m sorry to say this, but it’s absolutely true.
How can you produce quality guest post when your primary concern is to make sure that the guest post is stuffed with the right keywords and links to the right keywords?
This is precisely the kind of activities that Google frowns upon.
Google looks at this type of link-building as manipulation: You are simply going through all these processes just so you can manipulate the results from Google.
Of course, you and I know that this official policy from Google is self-serving and essentially pointless. The reality is that Google does allow optimization.
In fact, Google has a vested interest in people optimizing their websites for Google. However, it plays this hypocritical game where if you get too good at it, you’re a bad guy.
As morally reprehensible and evil as this may be, the sad reality is that Google is playing the tune as far as global search engine marketing is concerned, and we are just forced to dance along.
They call the shots.
As hypocritical and self-serving these rules may be, it’s their call. We can call them out on it as much as we can, but if we want to get all that free yummy search engine traffic from Google, we have to play along.
So how do you come up with guest posts that satisfy these so-called ethical link-building rules from Google?
Here are some tips
They’re not revolutionary or earth-shattering. In fact, most of them are rooted in common sense. Unfortunately, common sense is not very common nowadays especially when there’s a lot of easy search engine money to be made.
There is so much money left on the table that people basically let go of common sense and take riskier and riskier gambles. These people really have nobody to blame when Google finally hammers them.
So if you don’t want to join the ranks, keep the following tips in mind.
Don’t write your guest posts around keywords
This is very self-explanatory. I hope I don’t have to spill too much digital ink regarding this concept.
However, it is worth repeating: Do not write your guest posts simply around keyword targets. Those are very easy to spot.
A lot of target keywords are grammatically incorrect. They are very easy to identify.
So at the very least, if you are targeting keywords, and you insist on putting them on your titles, make sure they are grammatically correct.
Make sure that you use enough English wizardry to massage your keywords smoothly into your titles.
Don’t make them easy to peck off.
The more obvious your keyword titles are, the easier it is for Google to penalize you.
Moreover, the more awkward your keyword-based titles are, the harder it would be for you to find a legitimate guest post source.
Sure, there are a lot of broken desperate bloggers out there that would love to take your $10 and post your spammy guest post. Unfortunately, their blogs usually have low page rank and low quality to begin with.
If anything, having a link to their blogs would only harm your website. You have to look for quality bloggers.
Quality bloggers, on the other hand, exercise a higher level of editorial control. They can be quite tight regarding the quality of your content’s grammar.
I’m not saying you should forget about keywords but make sure that the keywords make sense, flow naturally from the article, and are phrased in a grammatically correct form. Otherwise, you’re just wasting your time.
Focus on the needs of the end user
There are so many guest posts that are like literary Frankenstein creations-they really are. They’re like slapped together and barely coherent thoughts.
In fact, there is no unifying thought among these articles. How can they contain a unified theme when they are simply gunning after keyword targets?
High-quality guest posts are able to address keywords by talking about themes. This way, the needs of the end user are met while at the same time the keywords are mentioned in a strategic way.
It’s a harsh truth, but you are really serving two masters: You are serving Google’s search engine robot while at the same time you’re trying to serve flesh and blood human readers.
The good news is if you are creative and imaginative enough, this doesn’t have to be an “either or” proposition. There is no zero-sum game here.
For Google to gain your flesh and blood human readers, you don’t necessarily have to lose. Similarly, for you to write a high-quality guest post that addresses real human needs, your SEO considerations don’t have to get flushed down the toilet.
There can be a happy compromise. In fact, you don’t even need to compromise at all. By writing a high-quality content that really addresses the needs of the end users and then formatting that content in a natural way where keyword targets are highlighted, you can achieve both goals.
Get into the mind of the publisher of the blog you are guest posting on
This is the most important part of this blog post. You have to remember that in this day and age, guest posting is a political act.
By a political act, I’m not talking about expressing liberal or conservative views. I’m talking about massaging the egos of blog editors.
These people have priorities and are looking out for their target audience members. You have to understand this reality.
As a result, you have to learn how to negotiate. You have to say the right magic phrases. Most importantly, you have to deliver on whatever it is that you promise.
If you are able to deliver solid quality that adds real value to the lives of the existing audience members of the blog you’re guest posting on, you will be invited back.
The reality is that there are few guest post writers who truly care about their guest blog post’s audience members.
If you are able to deliver solid quality, you will stand out from your competition, and this might be the beginning of a very powerful brand relationship.
1 Comments
Thank you for the good content I like this content. I will share this must on social media. Read about dofollow guest post.
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