Sad but true, not everyone likes guest bloggers.
Apart from the ones that email you claiming to love your blog only to offer a post that is completely unrelated from your niche (I was recently offered a post on parenting and childcare from an ‘avid’ reader of my blog…really?), some people just refuse to accept posts from other people.
Personally, I love to hear from people who want to write guest posts – that is assuming they actually offer something that is relevant to the subjects my blog covers.
To me guest bloggers offer a lot of pros:
- They offer fresh content for my readers
- Their posts offer a new way of looking at things
- They enhance my blog with expertise that I may not have
- They reduce my work load (very important)
- They could bring in a whole batch of new readers to my blog
So, on the whole, there are a lot of good reasons why you should accept guest bloggers.
But as I mentioned earlier, not everyone shares my point of view.
The cons of guest bloggers
After reading my list of reasons why you should accept guest posts (I’m sure there are loads more, but they are the ones that stand out for me), it may be hard to think why anyone would be anti guest posts.
Some people are very precious about their blog, only wanting their voice to be heard through it, which I guess is fair enough.
Others believe that bringing in outside writers may turn-off their readership. Not really convinced on that one, after all surely a new perspective would be welcomed? I don’t think the odd guest post would put anyone off. After all how many novel readers out there only ever read books from one author? Most people like to try others out for size too.
Then of course there are those who think they may lose readers when publishing a guest blog because there’s a chance that their readers will prefer what the guest author has to say and they’ll jump ship. But surely your readers will remain loyal and thank you for introducing them to a new voice that they may also want to follow?
Finally, there’s always the concern over being offered content that’s just been scraped off another site, or an article that’s been spun. But you can get round that by using tools such as Copyscape and Plagiarism checker.
What do you think?
Despite the cons above, I still think guest bloggers are worth their weight in gold (the good ones that actually read your blog before offering a post). For me, the pros far outweigh any possible downsides.
But then I am just one little voice in a vast blogging sea.
What’s your take on this issue?
Are you for or against? Leave a comment below.
If you’re interested in writing a guest blog for me, email me for the FCB guidelines along with your idea.
Author: Sally Ormond, Copywriter and MD of Briar Copywriting Ltd
1 comment so far ↓
Glad to see someone finally tackling this topic! I’m sorry to say I’m in the ‘against’ camp, I suspect largely because of the poor quality of guest blog posts out there. I get requests from people every week to guest post on my blog and always turn them down (probably stupidly, given that I’m not exactly prolific myself). I just feel that my blog is a vehicle for me to reflect on my life in Barcelona, and shouldn’t host articles on spuriously related topics just so that I can make some easy money. I hope I’m not precious about it, but it’s a very personal thing – I wouldn’t want someone else to interject with a random stanza half way through a poem I had written either.
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