You’ve heard it said before: “Content is king.” When it comes to marketing, content plays a critical role in engaging your target audience and encouraging them to interact with the business. And of course, one useful source of content is a blog. In fact, according to HubSpot, 53% of marketers say blogging is their top content marketing priority.

However, blogging can often be a tough task. Not only do you need a skilled writer to create the content, but you need to consistently develop fresh, new ideas to write about. Regularly generating blog content can end up being… exhausting. Insert: the guest blogger. Guest bloggers are a great way to incorporate new content into a business blog, without worrying about generating new ideas or writing the content yourself. If you want to improve your content marketing strategy through blogging, here’s how to utilize guest bloggers.

1. Identify industry leaders.
When identifying candidates as guest bloggers, obvious frontrunners should be well-known leaders within your industry. Utilizing an industry leader as a guest blogger is a great way to position the business blog as a leader itself, credible enough to work in conjunction with other well-known industry professionals. Identify leaders within your industry who might have useful content to promote on the blog, and then approach them to discuss working together. 

2. Set up a “write for us” page.
If you want to consistently utilize guest bloggers on your website, consider setting up an inbound lead generator through a “write for us” page. This is an ideal way to bring writers to you, without having to do the extra work of finding them yourself. Of course, one struggle with this tactic would be vetting the various applicants and finding the most credible writer to work with, but this is a minor step compared to going through an outbound engine.

3. Reach out to freelancers.
Speaking of outbound, if you’re not sure where to start in finding a useful guest blogger, then begin by reaching out to freelancers. Perhaps your website doesn’t receive enough traffic to validate a “write for us” page. Instead, reach out to freelancers yourself through popular freelance job sites or even sites like LinkedIn or Indeed. Freelancers typically are professional writers, and with a little bit of research on the industry, can make fantastic guest bloggers to have on retainer whenever necessary.

4. Offer guest bloggers benefits.
Now, you might be asking yourself: “But what about money? Our business doesn’t have the extra funds to pay a guest blogger.” While some guest bloggers are paid, you might be surprised to find many others who merely accept the benefits from blogging. The biggest benefit you can offer any guest blogger is exposure—exposure through your website, through your social media and to your target audience. This type of exposure can definitely benefit their own business, so use this as a bargaining chip when working with guest bloggers.

5. Pay guest bloggers.
Finally, if the guest blogger you’re interested in wants more than exposure, consider paying them. The price of a guest blog can vary significantly, depending on how well-known the author is, the quality of content you want, the industry niche and the amount of time the blog will take. All of these variables make pricing for blogging extremely inconsistent. When pricing, consider what the writer is giving your business—valuable content, solid positioning as an industry leader and plenty of potential leads clicking through the article. Pay according to the potential revenue you can generate through the blog post.

We know creating content for a blog can be a long and strenuous task. This is where guest bloggers come in. Take advantage of these tips when researching and deciding upon your next guest blogger, and see how your blog and content marketing strategy grow.