The Crave

Weekly tips and stories that will help you do your job and make you smile (or groan).

By Sim Samra June 9, 2022

Selecting a great guest post is like going to a beer tasting

Reviewing guest blog requests can feel a bit like a beer tasting. You're never quite sure what flavor you're going to get. That’s why I decided to focus this issue on how to do guest posting right, from making sure your strategy is focused on the right areas for maximum gain and giving you an insight on the tactics that work for us here at Foleon. I also threw in a few beer analogies for fun! To give you an idea of how hectic guest posting work can be, here’s a quick breakdown. I get at least 5 guest blog submissions a day. That means I'm reviewing at least 25 requests by Friday — and only 10% of those are full of promise. Yikes. There's no doubt that guest posting is a great way to promote content on other websites to drive traffic and gain greater exposure. Unfortunately, guest posting is also used by spammers and 'SEO consultants' solely for link-building purposes. And when that’s the case — there's always a chance that content will fall flat — just like bad beer. While guest posting is most often used as part of a bigger link-building strategy, there are many more benefits to publishing work on other trusted websites — but only if that content is brewed right ☝️

If your guest blog content is brewed right, you can get so much more in return than just a backlink.

Good beer and great guest content have a lot in common

As a guest blog reviewer, I tend to publish content that's refreshing, fun to share, perfect for the time of year, and makes our readers smile. I often class the content into three categories. Sometimes you can end up with 'Lager' content — which is light and easy to consume. These are typically more top-of-the-funnel pieces that appeal to a broader audience. 'IPA' content is more flavorful and catches the reader's eye for being edgier by incorporating videos, and interactive quizzes, making it more appealing. And on the rare occasion, you get a 'Porter' that is rich and satisfying. Beautiful infographics and interactive charts often accompany this type of content to give readers a complete picture of the story. To avoid the flat beer situation mentioned earlier, you ultimately want all these categories to fulfill the following criteria:

Make sure the content is related to the blog it's being published on and is relevant to readers.
Written by an expert in the field.
Includes detailed and accurate information.

Advantages of accepting guest posts (aside from link-building)

If your guest blog content is brewed right, you can get so much more in return than just a backlink. For instance;

Guest posts are an excellent way to introduce new voices and opinions to your readers that you cannot cover yourself.
If it's excellent content, it's free content for your blog.
Publishing a guest post every now and again can help fill up gaps in your content calendar and free up some time to do other tasks.
Usually, the guest author will promote their article on social media, and your website will get promoted as well.

But remember…

If you don't have stringent guest post guidelines and get carried away by 'offering links for free content,' you will either get a penalty or lose your rankings. Worse yet, you could lose the trust of your website in the eyes of Google.

Creating strict guest post guidelines for quality consumption

To make sure you benefit from the advantages (and not suffer from the disadvantages) of great guest posts, you must set strict criteria before accepting them. We've created a landing page with instructions for guest bloggers on our guidelines and how they can submit a post to us, which you can view here. Some of the key criteria include:

Content must be 100% unique, not appearing anywhere else on the web.
Guest bloggers must agree not to reuse the same piece of content elsewhere in the future.
Content must be vendor-neutral and non-promotional.

If you're flooded with guest post submissions in your inbox every week like I am, you can send an auto-generated email explaining that you'll only reply to the requests you want to move forward with:

It's ultimately your choice whether or not you want to accept guest posts on your blog. You certainly don't have to do it all the time. When deciding on which requests to proceed with, just remember that these guest posts are used to enrich your publishing strategy and not to replace it. You will still need to publish your content! In-between the publishing dates, you can throw a guest article as well 😉

Let’s talk about it together!

Share your thoughts on LinkedIn using #thecravediscussion This week’s topic: What are you primarily using your guest blogging strategy for?

Sim Samra

Content Marketer

About the author

I am a Content Marketer and one of the Foleon blog’s main curators. Born and bred in London. Honorary Amsterdammer. Liverpool FC supporter. Lover of carbs and puns. Horror movie fanatic.