At the heart of very great blog post is solid content that people want to share. Here are five simple tips to help you write killer guest posts that get published.
As you know, guest blogging is a great opportunity to build your brand, name recognition, and even links to your website. But none of that will happen if your articles don’t get published.
Like most blogs that accept guest posts, we created a list of submission guidelines. But the guidlines only cover the basics. Since every blog, and the articles they post, is unique, it’s important to research the blog you’ll be submitting to and customize your article to fit their site—in content, format, and voice.
The better your article fits a site, the more likely it is to be accepted and posted.
For example, here are the five most important points we look for when reviewing guest blog submissions.
5 Steps To Writing a Great Blog Article
1. Write a Powerful Headline
A well-written blog post headline is a magical thing. It has the ability to attract the readers eye, entice them to know more, and, most importantly, get them to click-through to the blog post.
It’s better to have a headline that’s clear in describing what the article is about than to attempt at being clever, and confuse the reader. Remember, a great headline not only captures a reader’s imagination and invites sharing, but also helps decrease bounce rate. So make sure your article content fulfills the promise your headline is making.
Another writing tip: When you’re done writing your article, go back and read the first sentence. You’ll be surprised how often the first sentence will actually make a better headline.
2. Write a Strong and Enticing Introduction
Sure, a great headline can get people to click your link, but once they get to the blog page, you want them to stick around to actually read your article. That’s why a strong introduction is so important.
Our blog is designed so articles have a bold introduction (generally 1-2 sentences). The purpose is to entice readers to read the full post by summarizing what they’ll learn. Essentially, you want to answer their most important question, “Why should I read this?” This is similar to how newspapers use subheads to communicate more information about a story—without giving it all away.
3. Make Content Easy To Read and Scan
As the Internet has become more integrated into our daily lives, it’s made us want information faster. The end result is that people no longer read articles—they scan them first.
To help make your articles easier to read, break the content into small bite-sized chunks. For example, instead of writing one paragraph of 8 sentences, try to break it into two, four sentence paragraphs.
To increase scan-ability, use sub-titles to separate different sections of your content. This allows readers to quickly scan the article and focus on the parts most important to them.
4. Include A Summation
Nothing is worse than leaving a reader hanging and feeling unsatisfied. Imagine reading a great book only to discover the last page was missing—so frustrating. So don’t do that to your readers. Spend some extra time to write a summation that wraps up your article with a nice ending and call-to-action.
5. Edit Without Prejudice
When you’re done writing your article, go back and remove everything that isn’t absolutely essential to your story. The rule of thumb, if you can remove words and/or sentences without losing meaning, delete it. Yes, your article might end up being 1/2 the length, but it will be two times better.
As you can see, the above five steps are simple to follow but can have a hugh impact of the quality of your content, the likelihood your guest posts are accepted, and it’s share-ability.
Take Aways
- Write a powerful blog post headline — get readers to click-through.
- Write an enticing introduction — Tell the reader what you’re going to tell them.
- Tell your story — use shorter paragraphs and sub-titles to make the article easier to read.
- Wrap it up — summarize your post by telling the reader what you told them and include a call-to-action.
- Edit your article. Then edit it again and again until there’s nothing left but solid gold content.
What are your thoughts on writing and submitting guest posts? Do you find any particular format or style is more effective for you than others? If you have any additional guest blogging tips or suggestions, please feel free to drop them in the comments.