Cheviot New Zealand
Bloggers typically publish content only to their blogs.
Beware making this mistake.
Offsite content bridges the gap between your blog and the outside world. Maintaining an offsite presence is important.
Do you expect readers to magically appear before your blog? Do you call on a benevolent blogging genie to grant your wishes?
Blogs do not actively find readers like heat-seeking missiles. Never expect an inanimate object to do anything without a bit of a push. The passive traffic and passive income manifest after active work executed for quite a heady stretch of time.
Successful bloggers publish offsite content to arrest the attention span of intrigued readers.
I know; it’s scary out there.
My Guest Blogging Fears
The moment I left the comfortable confines of my blog way back in the day, fear arose in the mind.
I loved being surrounded by my tribe. Everyone here loved what I did. All resonated deeply with my content. If anyone felt less than pleased with my posts, none voiced their displeasure. All seemed well in the world but only because my blogging growth came to a blinding halt.
That’s what happens when you never venture from your current blogging community. Increased growth unfolds beautifully outside of your present day reader network. Everyone takes that step to eventually thrive.
I recall my most prolific guest blogging gig. I placed over 1000 guest posts to the blog yet the owner had to beg me to seize the opportunity before submitting a dizzying volume of content over there. I secretly – and not so secretly – felt terrified to guest blog for his large audience. Visions of vicious critics danced around in the mind. Would his community skewer me? Would I lose my blogging reputation?
I fought diligently to shake these fears. But the blog owner had to gently coax me to become a regular contributor. Blogging outward triggers fears one denies when only publishing content to their blog.
The world can be a tough place the moment you step away from your online real estate.
But overcoming this fear is the only way to become known by the world. No blog is an island. Building backlinks makes your blog discover-able.
Every blogger gets offsite to create and connect, eventually.
Otherwise, the blogger quits.
Blogging Outward
Do you blog outward?
Blogging outward means blogging wide. Blogging wide means guest posting on blogs from your niche. Consider a Christmas tree. Picture your blog being the trunk, sitting at the center. Everything runs through the trunk, aka, your blog. If bloggers just work the trunk perhaps you experience some success but the trunk travels only up and down, north and south. The vertical carries only so far in either direction.
However, blogging outward grows branches sprouting from the trunk in side-to-side, east and west directions. Imagine exposure gained by growing side-to-side branches via guest blogging. Reaching into highly targeted audiences outside of your current community expands your reach nicely. Guest blogging leverages your presence like few other marketing tactics.
Guest blog on respected blogs from your niche. Journey out of your home base blogging comfort zone. Bloggers tend to feel comfortable publishing posts in a familiar home setting. Wading into discomfort on other blogs challenges even stout bloggers. New audiences, unfamiliar communities and possible critics lurk in the shadows of your guest blogging campaign. Nudge into these uncertainties. Edge into fear. Begin guest blogging to blog outward.
Gain Exposure
Gain exposure to enjoy the chief benefit of blogging outward.
Guest blogging places you and your blog in front of new readers consistently. Being seen offers traffic and income boosts for you and helpful content for fellow bloggers and their readers.
Versus dwelling on your blog, business and traffic you consider other blogger’s blogs, business and traffic. Appreciate this shift to understand how to become a prolific guest blogger. Put being truly helpful in your mind. Proceed to become a prolific guest blogger who blogs outward persistently.
Comment to Blog Outward
Blog commenting serves as a way to blog outward.
Imagine your blog being a tree trunk. Picture genuine, personalized blog comments being branches sprouting from your blog tree-trunk. Comments build friendships. Comments add value to posts. Blog comments also open doors to guest post invites. I scored a guest post on Pro Blogger:
Imagine the power of adding branches outward to be enhanced by guest posts. But each guest post becomes enhanced with blog comments, too. This is a rich blogging campaign geared toward helpfulness and exposure increases.
Think and blog outward to accelerate growth online. Avoid lulling yourself into home blog complacency. Technically, trees can grow indefinitely, like Redwoods, letting your blog-trunk be seen far and wide. But branching outward with guest blogging and genuine blog commenting covers width along with height to expand your blogging campaign exponentially over the long haul.
Access Half of the Population
Why turn your back on half of the population?
I share a steady flow of blogging tips to:
- X / Twitter
on a daily basis.
I also publish practical blogging tips to LinkedIn.
Working social media and the network for professionals puts me out there. Blogging outward through guest blogging, genuine blog commenting and social media forms a powerful trio. Social rocks around the clock because the scaling potential is magnificent.
Billions use social media. Target your readership from this titanic pool of potential readers to blog outward.
Publish helpful content to:
- profiles
- pages
- groups
- communities
Draw interested peepers to your blog.
Respect the long term nature of blogging outward. Being consistent increases your targeted exposure. Show up regularly. Help people with thorough content. Toss in a few short form updates to change tempo. Give people practical solutions to use for their benefit. Draw their attention to your blog.
Conclusion
No one succeeds solo. Branching out requires co-creations among like-minded bloggers. Each branch and co-creation brings the world closer together.
Doesn’t that sound like fun?
