Blogging Tips

BloggingTips has for a long time been a place where guest bloggers are can submit posts. I have certainly raised the bar in the last 6-9 months for how good posts need to be to published here but there is no denying the overall standard of posts being submitted has dropped considerably in the last few months.

In two days I leave the wet and cold shores of Great Britain to sun myself in Bulgaria for two weeks. I will of course have my laptop with me and will be checking emails every day but I may not have time to write posts so I was planning on publishing some posts from some guest bloggers. On average BloggingTips gets about 3 or 4 submissions every week from bloggers who want to publish a post here though recently most of these have been declined as the standard has been incredibly low. Therefore, I am of the opinion that it’s better to have some days without posts rather than having poor quality posts published here.

* When I refer to guest posts in this article I am not referring to the BloggingTips weekly authors, I am referring to bloggers who submit a blog post or two for publication here. Many of these guest bloggers have expressed an interest in writing on a full time basis though I usually request a guest post first.

Why guest posts have not been good enough

When I first started accepting blog posts here my standards were not very high. I didn’t accept terrible posts though I did accept some posts which I certainly would not now. As I looked to improve the quality of my own posts I quickly realised that the standard of guest posts should also increase.

Here are the most common reasons why I have rejected guest posts :

• Grammar, Punctuation & Spelling – I don’t mind the odd spelling mistake however some submissions have been almost unreadable due to the poor standard of grammar and punctuation. There has been times where I have reread a paragraph 3 or 4 times and still not been able to understand what the author was trying to convey. I do appreciate that bloggers who are still learning English may struggle with this kind of thing but it’s something that I value incredibly high therefore I have rejected dozens of submissions because of it.
• Short Posts – I don’t expect guest bloggers to submit novels however many submissions have been no longer than 3 short paragraphs. I do write short posts like this when I am covering some news event but for tips and guide posts I expect more, both from myself and from guest bloggers. It’s a shame because some of these posts start off really well but then just end abruptly.
• Poor Quality – Some of the posts have had no substance. You read several paragraphs and look back at the article and realise that you have learned nothing. It’s important for your post to have a point and you need to make this point to the reader in a manner in which they will stay interested. I’ve also rejected some guest posts because of repetition. The post makes a great point at the start but is then rehashed and repeated a few times without expanding on the original idea.
• Selfless Promotion – The main reason people submit guest blogs in the first place is to promote themselves and their blog. However, many bloggers take this too far and try and squeeze in as many links and references to their blog as possible in the post. Many times the author goes on a complete tangent from the main content of the post so that they have an excuse to link to their post, even if the link is irrelevant to what they were talking about.

  Personally, I’m more than happy for guest bloggers to add a link or two to their blog in their post if the link is relevant however many guest bloggers try and take this too far. I had one submission where the author had added about 5 or 6 links to posts of his using keywords he was targeting and had asked readers 2 or 3 times to subscribe to his blog. Needless to say, that post wasn’t accepted.

Why you should take the time to submit great guest posts

I have spoke many times in the past about the benefits of guest posting. Guest posting is supposed to be a win-win situation for the blogger and the owner however many bloggers are not putting enough effort into them.

I believe many new bloggers are looking at guest blogging in the wrong way. Too many bloggers are looking to guest blog to get some incoming links to their blog which is why so many guest submissions are littered with links to the authors blog. If you want some incoming links to your site then I recommend submitting some posts to a free article directory. However, if you want to gain new subscribers and reach a whole new audience then you should be trying to write one of the best posts you have wrote.

You see, writing a post on a larger more popular blog should not be seen as a cheap way to get some traffic or links, it should be seen as a way to reach a whole new audience. If you can write a high quality post and truly engage with a blogs readership then they will be more likely to visit your blog and subscribe. I think it is worthwhile to place the odd link to your blog in your guest posts however selfless promotion could actually do more harm than good.

I can illustrate this better with an example. The number of subscribers to BloggingTips has recently slowed down therefore in the next few months I think it would be beneficial for me to do some guest posts on some larger blogs in the same niche. ProBlogger is a good example of a site I should target. It is the most popular blog in this niche and has over 50,000 daily subscribers. If I assume that everyone who subscribes to BloggingTips also subscribes to ProBlogger, then I can assume that there are at least 48,000 subscribers to ProBlogger who don’t subscribe to BloggingTips and perhaps don’t even know the site exists.

Therefore, publishing a guest post on ProBlogger would be a fantastic opportunity for me to reach a wide audience who are interested in the topics I cover here. Now lets say that I wrote two posts for submission to ProBlogger.

• The first post was good but had several links back to articles at BloggingTips and had a lot of selfless promotion.
• The second post was a long, detailed and resourceful with no mention of my blog other than a small link at the bottom of the article.

I doubt Darren Rowse would accept the first post but assuming he did, it’s safe to say I could probably expect more traffic from it because of the extra links to my blog. However, the second post is much more likely to increase the number of subscribers here as the post is of a higher quality. A guest post is an advertisement of your writing abilities therefore higher quality posts should convince more people to subscribe to your blog. Popular bloggers such as Skellie have built hugely popular blogs through writing consistently high guest posts on other blogs.

Overview

Guest blogging is a great way to promote yourself and your blog but like anything in this world, you only get out what you put into it. The better your guest posts are, the more likely you are to convince the blogs readers that they should check out your blog.

I appreciate the time and effort guest bloggers take to submit posts to BloggingTips. I don’t like rejecting posts however like all blog owners, I don’t want the quality of posts here to drop either. If you are new to blogging, guest blogging is a great way to promote yourself however if you are going to do it you should do it right and make sure guest posts match the quality of posts on your blog