Did you know that Google has reworked their top secret page ranking algorithm? One of the biggest changes has been the down grading of links to article marketing sites.  Guest blogging is now the best way to build back links to your site.  Good Back Links = Improved Google Ranking

Here are 7 of the biggest reasons why I plan to start guest blogging and why I believe you should too.  Check out this post for tips on how to get started guest blogging and how to come up with great content.

Easily build quality back links to your site – Each time one of your guest posts is published is should include a short bio (a couple sentences usually) and a link back to your website.  This means that each guest post adds another back link, which really helps increase your Google rank.  Just be sure you are guest blogging on reputable site because Google will penalize your site ranking if you are linking to disreputable sites.

Get your message in front of new eyes / Reach new audiences – This is probably the most obvious benefit of guest blogging.  Each time you guest blog related to your product, service or niche you are reaching a brand new audience.  The odds are that the majority of those new eyes haven’t read or visited your blog before.  This gives you an enormous opportunity to impress a new audience and convince them to follow your blog.

You will establish yourself as an expert – There are a bazillion blogs out there and any Joe Blow on the street can set one up in order to pontificate on whatever subject is nearest and dearest to his heart.  This is why it is no important that you establish to the masses that you really know what you are talking.  Guest blogging help create the perception that you are an expert in your field or niche.  If other bloggers are willing to let you post on your site they must trust your opinion and believe you have important information to share.

Networking / Building connections – Success online in the blogging world, just like the brick and mortar world, requires networking skills.  This really comes in handy when you want to spread a piece of link bait to encourage new links back to your site or sign ups to your list.  The bigger the network the further your message will go.  This of course goes both ways.  You want give back to your network as often as they give to you…  share their link bait via social media, ask them to guest blog for you or link to some of their posts.

Guest blog post tend to be visible longer – When you use article directories  your articles will never make the homepage of the site or if they do only stay there a very short amount of time, perhaps only hours, quickly becoming lost in the thousands of articles submitted each day.  When you guest blog most sites publish new articles maybe once or twice a week.  This means your guest post will stay prominently visible for days, maybe even a week or two.

Your guest post is promoted by the blog owner and the blog itself – Think about this… when you post a new article to your blog what do you do?  You promote that new post to your network to drive traffic to your site.  Simultaneously, your new post is automatically broadcast to your various social networks and potentially to your follower’s links on their social networks.  This is exactly what the owner of the site your guest post is published on will do.  This really increases the potential of your post to go viral.

No blog? No Problem! – Do you not have a blog of your own?  That’s OK; guest blogging can give you the opportunity to link back to your website and various social networks.  It can also give you a change to try your hand at blogging before jumping into a full fledged blog of your own.

Remember to check out this post too.  In it I share ways you can start guest blogging and how to find places to guest blog.