- Inc., Forbes, Entrepreneur, Huffington Post.
Guest posting, do you think it's really worth it?
You know what?
If you do, just leave your comment with yes.
If you don't, leave a comment with no.
Hey, everyone, I'm Neil Patel,
and today I'm gonna share with you what I've learned
from over 1,000 guest posts.
(pulsing electronic music)
That's right.
I've written over 1,000 guest posts.
Yes, it hasn't happened over the last year.
It was many, many years of building it up,
but I have written literally over 1,000 blog posts
just in English.
If you combine Portuguese and Spanish and other languages
and German, I've probably written over 2,000 guest posts.
That's a shit ton of content!
Is it really worth it?
I don't do it anymore, so you're probably like no.
But you know what, I'll actually tell you the answer,
and it's a bit more complicated
than just a yes or no answer.
Now first off, if you're in the B2C niche,
if you're out there selling dog shoes.
I don't know what you would be selling,
but let's say B2C niche, dog shoes or dog leashes
or pick anything out there.
Chances are guest posting is not worth it
because the amount of traffic that you can get
from these sites and the amount of business it generates
for the consumernage is so small,
you will not generate enough revenue.
But on the flip side, for B2B,
it is worth it in which you can make a shit ton of money.
I'm talking about millions of dollars.
And I can even give you an example of how I've done well
through guest posting, but it's not what you think
in which you can't just release a guest post
or two guest posts and do well.
See when I started guest posting,
I would write one or two articles a week
and I'd be like oh, okay, I'm gonna write on Entrepreneur,
Forbes, Inc., and you know what?
I'm gonna get a shit load of business
and people hitting me up for marketing advice
and consulting, and guess how much business
I drummed up from it.
Little to none.
But after doing it for a year or two,
what happened to all my articles on Entrepreneur, and Inc.,
and Forbes about social media marketing and SEO
and link building and digital marketing?
They started to rank on Google.
These articles started getting a ton of traction.
And I wasn't doing anything.
Just over time, they naturally rank.
Businesses would be like, oh, I read this article by Neil.
Let's hit him up.
Let's see what he does.
And I would get business contracts from it.
I wasn't getting contracts that were like,
hey I'll pay you 1,000 bucks.
Sure, those leads would come in,
but I was getting some six figure contracts,
and it was amazing, all because
of all my guest posts out there.
But when people talk about guest posting,
they're like, yeah, you guest post,
you're gonna get business.
No, they're full of shit.
I've done more than most people.
I had a team who helped me manage
my whole guest posting scheduling.
I had editors who helped me out, right?
Just because I'm writing the articles
doesn't mean I could edit 'em fast enough, add images.
I was going at one point where I was doing one guest post
per day, seven days week.
And there were short articles.
I streamlined it down to like 700 word articles
or 1,000 word in order to just crank 'em out left and right,
and some of the topics were regurgitated
in which I would published similar articles on Entrepreneur
as I did on Forbes.
I didn't care.
It wasn't duplicate content.
I would rewrite it, make it unique enough,
but I was doing it so I can do quantity.
What ended up happening is after a year or two,
it drummed up business, but in the short run,
it was a big time sink and a money loss.
And here's the thing with guest posting.
When I got started in it,
the times were amazing and everyone was like,
oh, I'm gonna guest post on Entrepreneur, Inc.
so I can links and get higher rankings on Google.
You think this $700 billion company does know
what you're doing?
You think they're that dumb where they can't stop it it.
Those links don't really help you that much.
Instead, and even these blogs and these publishers,
they're no following these days.
But instead, you should be doing it to build authority,
a name for yourself and drum up business.
If you don't do it in the long run,
you're not gonna do well.
And that's why I'm telling you,
if you're gonna guest post, you gotta do it
for at least two years.
After the first year, you'll start seeing some results.
After two years, you'll dominate
and you'll start getting business,
and you can actually generate
a seven figure business from it.
My buddy, Jason, from AudienceBloom,
he guest posts everywhere.
It's a seven figure business,
not just what you can potentially sell the business for,
but I'm talking about revenue.
How does he get all his business?
Guest posting.
And all he did was write articles about marketing.
It's worked for me, it's worked for him,
and it's worked for tons of other people.
My buddy, Nadav, from Inbound Junction,
he's built up a seven figure business, as well
from guest posting.
It's not about selling links or anything like that.
You build a business by becoming a authority in your space.
Heck, I get speaking engagements 'cause people are like,
oh, I read your article on Content Marketing Institute.
Can you come to our company here in Dubai and speak?
We'll give you 20 grand for the hour,
all because of guest posting.
It's priceless.
If you want to do it, do it,
but do it for two straight years.
If you wanna give up after that, that's okay.
There's already, you know, five, 600 articles
out there on the web.
And you have to do at least five articles a week.
Doing a few here and there doesn't do shit.
It's hit or miss.
Some articles do well.
Some don't.
So follow those strategies and you'll create a shit load
of income from guest posting, assuming you're in B2B.
If you're in B2C, don't waste your time.
If you're not sure what kind of articles to write
when it comes to guest posting, leave a comment below
and I'll give you some advice.
Best of luck with your guest posting.