If you run a blog, you know that you need to be consistently producing quality posts for your regular readers and to help attract new traffic to your website.

That shouldn’t be news to anyone, as that is what’s required of a blogger! However, producing these regular posts takes time, time that you could be using to improve other aspects of your website. This could include; social media marketing, increasing brand awareness, identifying potential new affiliates to incorporate on your site, etc.

What if there was a way to free up your time from writing so that you could spend time improving these other aspects of your website? Well there is and it is called ‘Guest Blogging’!

What Is Guest Blogging?

For those that may not be aware, ‘Guest Blogging’ is when someone else (a guest) writes an article for your site for you to publish.

But why would someone want to write for me? Well they may do this for a number of reasons. Guest blogging can be an excellent way to promote yourself/business and get your name heard by other people. Some people use guest blogging as a way in which to improve their writing, perhaps to increase their chances of getting hired as a professional writer.

Primarily, people who ‘Guest Blog‘ are bloggers themselves and they do this for one reason specifically, and that is to get a link back to their website. It is generally accepted that when you write a guest post for someone, you are allowed to link back to your own website either within or at the end of the article. That way, when people read the post and like it, they have the option of navigating to your website to read more.

The added benefit of these ‘links’ is that the more external links that you have pointing people towards your website (i.e. links on other websites), the more you improve your SEO enabling you to drive more traffic to your site via search engines.

How Do I Get Guest Bloggers To Write For My Site?

So, now that you know how guest bloggers can help you, how do you attract them to write for you? Well, a lot depends on your blog and what niche you specifically concentrate on. For example, a website that publishes tips for fellow writers will naturally attract more people who may be willing to write for you, compared to a blog about skin care. But don’t be put off, there are still ways to attract guest bloggers to your site.

Probably the best way is to simply advertise on your site that you accept guest bloggers. This way, when people visit your site, they are aware that they could write for you. I have found this to be extremely effective on this very site, as I get a number of people every week getting in contact with me via the ‘Write for Us‘ page wanting to write a guest post submission.

If you choose to do this, it is important that you outline some rules for any submissions that you get, such as; minimum word count, article topics, language, etc. This helps to make your life easier, as otherwise every individual writer will want to know what you accept via email, or alternatively submit an article that is totally unrelated to your site.

Another way to attract guest bloggers is to simply ask them! You may follow other blogs within the same niche as yourself, why not ask the author to write a post for you. The worst they can say is “No”, but generally bloggers are more than happy to write guest posts. They may ask you to write a post for their site as well, which only helps to drive more traffic to your blog!

If you are just starting out, then it may be a little harder to attract guest bloggers. In this instance it may be better to reverse the roles and approach sites to write for them. If you get your work published on someone else’s site, ask them if they would like to write for you. This is how many bloggers start out by building contacts within their chosen field (I started this way!).

Doing a simple Google search can find you many online forums, social media groups, community websites, etc. where potential guest bloggers hangout. Here you can ask people if they want to write for you. You are bound to get some interest from these, though I generally find that the quality of writing is better from bloggers who approach you directly.

Lastly, and probably my best piece of advice, is to forget about attracting guest bloggers and just concentrate on your own website. Work on making it the best that you can and producing the best quality posts that you can write. You will find that as your site and your authority within your niche grows, people will start approaching you and asking if they can write an article for you.

I hope you found this post helpful. Do you have any other ways of attracting guest bloggers to write for you? Please leave your comments below!