Online publicity tip: How to become a guest blogger

I just finished my first gig as a guest blogger. 

Brian DeSpain invited me to write about my best PR tips for start-up businesses, or new businesses that are online. You can read my tips at his Thalasar Ventures blog.

Here’s how I got the invitation. Pay attention because this is powerful stuff, and you can use this same strategy to build the buzz for your own business. 

One of my areas of expertise is writing press releases. So I set up a Google Alert for “writing press releases.” (For a demonstration of exactly how Google Alerts work, and why it’s such a powerful tool for Publicity Hounds, check out this cool video courtesy of my friend Terry Brock.)  

Every day, Google emails me a list of blogs and articles that include the phrase “writing press releases.” Last week, the list included this post about press release tips at Brian’s blog.

So I clicked on the link, went over to his blog and saw immediately that I could add something valuable to the discussion. I was the first one to post a comment. Notice that I mentioned my free email tutorial “89 Ways to Write Powerful Press Releases.” 

Brian saw the comment, signed up for the tutorial and liked the first several lessons. So he emailed me a few days later asking if I’d like to be a guest blogger at his blog. I sent the article to him on Friday and he posted it today.

Here’s the best part. His blog has a Google page rank of 7, which is excellent. Within the guest blog, I included several links back to my website. That means that more inbound links from yet another high-page-rank blog means Google will look more favorably on my website. 

Also, it looks as though lots of Internet marketers and small business owners read Brian’s blog. A lot of them may not have heard about me. So I’m getting exposure in front of a new group of people, all of whom can sign up for my ezine, or start reading my blog, or buy my products.  

Brian also suggested that I “seed” the URL for my guest blog at Newsvine, a website consisting of community-driven news stories and opinions. Users write articles and save links to external content, vote, comment and chat on article pages created by both users and by journalists from the Associated Press, ESPN and News Scientist. I had never heard of it, but I followed his instructions.   

One of the best ways to be a guest blogger is to submit comments at other high page rank blogs and really show off your expertise. Don’t just mention whether or not you agree or disagree with the blogger. Weave into your comments anything that demonstrates your expertise, like I did when I mentioned my free tutorial. 

Have you written a book? Or articles? Do you have your own blog? Are you a coach or mentor?   

Now go find some influential bloggers. For more tips on pitching bloggers, see “How to Pitch the Best Bloggers & Create a Publicity Explosion,” a teleseminar I conducted several months ago with Denise Wakeman and Patsi Krakoff, aka The Blog Squad.