If you’re looking to get more eyes on your side hustle blog, a good guest blogging strategy is an essential part of the process you NEED to be doing.

Guest blogging is a hugely powerful way of growing your side hustle blog, helping you build authority, gain exposure, and drive more traffic to your website.

However, to truly reap the benefits of this approach, you need to have a solid guest blogging strategy in your toolbox.

In this guide, we’re going to look at everything you need to know when it comes to guest blogging. From finding guest blogging opportunities, to writing high-quality articles that will boost your blog’s visibility and credibility, this is your step-by-step guide to building a winning guest blogging strategy.

What is a Guest Blogging Strategy, and Why Do I Need One?

Before we jump into how you can develop your guest blogging strategy, let’s first understand what we mean by guest blogging.

We all know that having a steady stream of content published on a website is essential for a whole plethora of things, including reach, audience retention, SEO, and more, right? Well, it’s that steady stream of content that guest blogging helps address.

When you’re looking to publish articles regularly, the need will sometimes arise to outsource that content to other creators. But you need to offer them something in return. This is where guest blogging comes in.

A creator will write a high-quality article to be published on a website that isn’t owned by themselves, and in return they’ll have that website link back to their own, creating a backlink. And backlinks, when from a website with a high domain authority, are amazing for SEO and the exposure of the creator’s blog.

So for you, who’s looking to get more traffic to your side hustle blog, guest blogging offers significant benefits.

Guest blogging will allow you to tap into a broader audience of readers already interested in your niche or topic, improve your website’s SEO by building backlinks, as well as establish expertise and authority in your niche.

Whether you’re right at the beginning of your side hustle blog journey, or looking to scale a website you’ve been working on for a while, a good guest blogging strategy can be the key to unlocking faster growth for your side hustle blog.

Creating a Successful Guest Blogging Strategy: Step-By-Step

Cool, now we know the benefits a good guest blogging strategy can bring to you, it’s time to look at exactly how you can make one yourself.

In the following sections, we’ll explore how to identify guest blogging opportunities, write high-quality guest posts, write outreach pitches, and then promote your guest posts.

Let’s get into it!

Guest Blogging Strategy: Step One – Identifying Guest Blogging Opportunities

The first step in building your perfect guest blogging strategy is finding other blogs that align with your niche or chosen subject. After all, if the website you write for is about fashion, and you write about tech, what’s the point?

Additionally, the websites you pick should have an established audience that complements your side hustle blog, rather than competing with it directly. Whilst you can attempt to reach out to a competing blog, there’s a chance they won’t be interested in partnering.

There are essential three things you can do during this phase of the process, which are looking for communities, performing outreach, and then just plain old networking.

Find Guest Blogging Communities

Guest blogging is a strategy that’s used by blogs all over the internet, and not just those looking to expand their audience. Many blog owners will make a point of explicitly asking for guest posts.

So when it comes to finding communities and opportunities, look for blogs that accept guest posts within your niche.

On Google, search for things like “write for us” combined with your niche keywords. For example, you could search for “write for us, fashion blog” and be presented with plenty of opportunities for guest blogging within that niche.

PS: If you publish articles about writing, marketing, networking, or anything else related to side hustles, be sure to get in touch with The Side Hustle Blueprint for guest blogging opportunities!

Guest Blogging Outreach

Once you’ve built a list of blogs you think will be a good fit for your content, it’s time to prepare a personalised pitch explaining why your articles would be valuable to their readers.

We’re going to dive into this much deeper in the Crafting the Perfect Pitch section, but for the time being, you should know that not everyone is going to accept your offer of guest blogs.

Because of this, you’ll need to write a personalised and convincing pitch for every website you’re going to contact. But again, more on that shortly.

Networking

Another great way of discovering guest blogging opportunities is through good, old-fashioned networking.

Make a point of regularly reading and engaging with the work of other bloggers and creators within your niche. By going out of your way to write insightful and meaningful comments on the blogs of other creators, you’ll give yourself an “in” when it comes to asking about guest blogging opportunities.

And even if they don’t want to collaborate, you’ll have made a connection in the industry anyway, which is always a good thing.

Guest Blogging Strategy: Step Two – Guest Blogging Outreach: Crafting the Perfect Pitch

Integral to any successful guest blogging strategy is outreach. This is where you get in touch with the websites and blogs you’ve identified as being a good fit for your content.

And the success of your outreach all comes down to the pitch. You need to convince the blog owner or editor that your post will be a great fit for their audience. The thing is, convincing them of this isn’t always an easy task.

So to help you craft the perfect pitch for your guest blogging strategy, be sure to follow the guidance below:

Personalise Your Email

Depending on the popularity of the blog/website you’re reaching out to, there’s a chance they receive multiple guest blog pitches each week, potentially even each day.

Because of this, you must avoid sending out generic pitches. On top of this, avoid using AI tools like Chat-GPT to write your pitch. Both of these points will result in a pitch that lacks warmth, and will more than likely hamper any chances you may have had at a guest blogging opportunity.

Instead, make a point of addressing the recipient by name (assuming you know it,) and mention specific reasons why your post would be valuable to their readers. Be sure to include a link to your website, so they can see your previous writing.

Showcase Your Previous Writing

We mentioned that you should include a link to your website. On top of this, you can also include a few direct links to specific articles you think best showcase your content style.

This is particularly important if you’ve already had guest blogs published on other websites. Not only will this show the blog owner your writing style, but it’ll also put some additional weight and authority behind your request, by showing other bloggers have faith in your work.

Offer multiple ideas: Instead of pitching just one guest post idea, offer a few options to increase the chances of acceptance.

Guest Blogging Strategy: Step Three – Writing High-Quality Guest Posts

Once you’ve identified blogs to pitch to, the next step in your guest blogging strategy is to craft high-quality posts. There can be the temptation to not put in as much effort to the guest blogs as you do for your articles, but this is the opposite of what you should do!

Think of the guest blogs you write as advertisements for your blog. You want people to read the articles you write for other websites and be so impressed with your work that they’re compelled to read more by visiting your website.

Below, you can find our best tips for writing high-quality articles that not only provide value and insights, but also make people want to read even more of your work!

Provide Actionable Insights

When people read an article, they’re reading because they want to learn something. That can be learning how to do a specific task, or gaining insights or information on a particular subject.

What I’m saying is that your article needs to provide something to your reader. They need to read through it, and leave the article feeling as though they’ve learned something.

So for each article you write, whether part of your guest blogging strategy or for your website, focus on offering practical advice, insights, or solutions that your readers won’t be able to easily find somewhere else.

Match the Tone and Style

Every blog will have its own tone, and part of guest blogging is making your content blend in seamlessly with everything else the website has published.

Many websites that are looking for guest bloggers will have guidance on what to write, and how to write it, so the number one place you should look is there. For example, you can see the content guide for The Side Hustle Blueprint here.

However, if the website you’re going to write for doesn’t have a style guide, spend some time reading through their existing articles to learn their tone of voice, the wording they use, and how they structure their articles.

This will give you an excellent head start when it comes to both writing the article and getting it approved for publication.

Include Relevant Links

No article on the Internet can exist in a silo. What makes blogging unique is the ability to link to other articles, content, and resources that give the reader additional information or context.

Because of this, making sure to include relevant links to other articles that will support your own is essential. Not only is this great for your readers, but it’s also excellent for SEO, as it allows search engines to gain additional context for the article, which will mean it’ll have more chance of showing up in search results.

Guest Blogging Strategy: Step Four – Promoting Your Guest Posts

Once you have a guest blog published, you should do your bit in the promotion of it. This will both help drive traffic to the article (and therefore to your website) and also help to foster a deeper connection with the blog’s owner, by showing you care about the article, beyond getting a backlink to your side hustle blog.

So once your guest blog has been published, this is what you should be doing:

Share it on Socials

If you’re active on social media, promote your guest post across each one that’s relevant to help it gain more readers and additional traffic. You never know where your next reader could come from, so it’s always worth promoting your work.

On top of that, you may catch the eye of other bloggers, so sharing your articles will signal to them that you’re open to guest blogging opportunities. Again, a simple tweet or LinkedIn post could secure you your next guest blog spot!

Engage with Comments

Not all blogs have comments, so this particular point is only applicable to those that do. But, if you do publish a guest post on a blog that encourages comments from its readers, be sure to engage with them.

By actively engaging with the readers of your work in the comments, you can increase your visibility and credibility. When an author takes the time to interact with their readers, this signals that they truly care about their audience and how their work is being received.

Repurpose the Content

One of the eternal struggles for an online content creator is running out of ideas. Because of that, you should make the most of content repurposing. Just because your idea has been published in article form, that doesn’t mean you can transform it into something new!

Consider turning your guest post into a video for YouTube, an infographic for your own blog, or podcast episode to reach different audiences or anything else that you can share. A good rule of thumb, though, is that any additional content that comes from the blog should always link back to it. Again, this gives a better experience for your reader, and may also result in more traffic being sent to the guest blog.

This guide from the Rank Math SEO YouTube Channel gives a good insight into how to best repurpose your content!

Guest Blogging Strategy: Step Five – Measuring the Success of Your Guest Blogging Strategy

Once the article has been published, and you’ve reshared it, it’s time to look at the success of your guest blogging strategy. Whilst it’s a little tricky to measure just how successful it is (because you can’t track individual recurrent readers gained, user sentiment, how many people know your blog, etc), there are a few things you can track.

Referral Traffic

By using tools like Google Analytics, you can see in-depth reports on how much traffic is visiting your website, and what pages/articles are being visited the most.

A good approach to this is to make a note of your average traffic before your guest blog is published, and then cross-reference that a couple weeks later. This will give you a rough idea as to how much your traffic has increased.

Additionally, if you link to a specific article of your own in the guest blog, and notice that this page is receiving more traffic than it was, then you’ll know that people are reading your article, and then visiting your website for more. If the link you included is just a direct website.com one, then it's not as easy to determine where the traffic is coming from.

SEO Benefits

Google Analytics will also let you see how many backlinks your website has, which is a good measure of success. Whilst the backlinks will climb by at least one when the guest blog is published, there’s a good chance – especially if the website is a popular one – that other blogs will repost the article.

Because of this, it’s a good idea to keep an eye on your total backlinks. You’ll see it climb by one, but if you see more than that coming through to your website, then the guest blog can be considered a success!

Conclusion: Building a Long-Term Guest Blogging Strategy

A successful guest blogging strategy takes time and consistency. It’s not something that you can start today, and by tomorrow have a blog that millions of people are reading.

But, but focusing on building relationships with blog owners, and writing valuable content for them, you’ll gradually see long-term results, and more readers coming to your side hustle blog.

The key here is starting small, and building credibility as you go. Remember what we said earlier in the guides, every guest blog you publish can be considered an ad for your own website, so be sure that you’re always publishing high-quality guest blogs!

Now, if you’ve been thinking about setting up a side hustle blog, but don’t know where to start, we’ve written a whole guide to help you!

In our Ultimate Guide to Starting a Side Hustle Blog That Will Generate Passive Income, you can see the exact steps you should take to get your own side hustle blog up and running, including research, branding, content tracking, and more!

Like this article? Check out these next: