A few weeks ago, an announcement appeared at ProBlogger (owned by Darren Rowse) that they are putting a halt on unsolicited guest posts. As soon as the news spread, it broke a lot many hearts. At the same time, the announcement came as a respite to those who were about to unsubscribe to ProBlogger’s email newsletters. Why did Darren make this change?
Around two years ago, Brian Clark of CopyBlogger embraced the same kind of shift in his content marketing strategy.
But the point is why do some A-list bloggers want to do away with unsolicited guest posts?
Most importantly, why do they begin to accept posts from just any old guest bloggers when they plan to stop it, after a period of time?
Going Unsolicited…
There’s little doubt that opening a blog up to guest bloggers has the potential to create a win-win situation for both the author and the publisher. By offering guest blogging opportunities, you do an excellent job of allowing other bloggers to voice their views while they help build the foundation of your own blog.
When you are just starting, trying to build up your blog, publishing guest posts from anyone who’s interested proves to be a boon. It not only allows you to offer your readers a variety of content consistently – but it also saves you a lot of time which you can devote to other vital aspects of your blog’s growth.
Publishing guest posts from other bloggers in your niche gives your blog instant exposure, builds traffic and keep readers coming. In addition to that, it helps you connect with other fellow bloggers, that’s vital for blogging success.
Allowing other niche bloggers to guest post on your blog makes you feel like an actively contributing member of the blogging community.
Turning to Invitation-Only Guest Posts
But why do many professional bloggers stop accepting unsolicited guest posts, after a couple of years? Yes, it’s really a bold decision which isn't an easy one to make while you are still waiting to taste success.
When your blog grows in popularity, you start to receive tons of guest posts every week, consistently. It becomes awfully hard to deal with the flood of these submissions, most of which are poor in quality and irrelevant. Even when you decide to fix some of them up, it consumes a good amount of time. Managing the submissions, therefore, becomes a lot hard work.
Discover the secret of how Ms. Ileane took control of her in box and stopped the avalanche of requests from random guest bloggers.
As your blog's content goes up and up, your readers mature too.
They don’t want to listen to the same kind of stuff that they can find in other places. As they grow, they look for more in-depth and enlightening write-ups. Accepting guest posts from just anyone then becomes a major hurdle for you.
That’s exactly when professional bloggers start to hand-pick guest authors, send them invitations to write, and publish.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with uninvited guest posting. In fact, it’s an excellent way of featuring a variety of content on your blog, engaging the blogging community, adding new sources of traffic and ultimately gaining more social exposure.
You can do away with publishing content from unsolicited guest bloggers only when reach the point of feeling – ‘I’m too successful now’.
Otherwise, it might become a huge risk!
What do you think about this?
Remember it took Darren around nine long years to come up with the decision of halting uninvited guest posts.