Matt Cutts is fed up with spammy guest post requests and said so on his blog today with the claim that “guest blogging is done.”
That’s quite the announcement!
Matt goes on to say “Given how spammy it’s become, I’d expect Google’s webspam team to take a pretty dim view of guest blogging going forward.”
Matt’s post has many people worried, and I think that was his intention. He wants us to know that Google is going to scrutinize sites with a high ratio of guest post links, and they might even penalize sites that publish that type of content too.
How Not To Guest Post
If you read Matt’s post carefully, you’ll see that he’s just saying the same thing he’s said before. Spammy guest posts on low-quality sites are going to get you in trouble.
Look at the problems he describes.
- People are asking for dofollow links
- People are not researching their prospects (Asking Matt Cutts for a guest post?)
- People are trying to get guest posts on sites that don’t allow them
- People are asking to pay for PageRank links
- People are posting on low-quality, spammy sites
How You Should Do Guest Posts From Now On
Matt later added an update to his post, mentioning that guest posts aren’t that bad as long as they are done correctly. The old strategy of pitching a blog and hiring freelance writers with no expertise from content writing services isn’t going to work anymore.
Here’s what you need to do to bulletproof your guest post strategy
- Write content that you have expertise in, or…
- Hire industry-expert authors to write for you
- If you’re an agency, require that your clients contribute expert content
- Avoid byline links. Get natural links in the content instead
- Don’t use keyword-rich anchor text
- Your link-building strategy shouldn’t consist of a majority of guest posts
- Build relationships and trust with your prospects
- Reach out to only relevant websites
- Stick to some quality guidelines (for example, DA >30, MozRank >2)
Thank You, Spammers, For Ruining Guest Posting
No, thank you. I mean it.
I hate spammy guest posts and articles full of fluff written by people with no expertise in what they’re writing about. That’s not to say that a professional writer with no expertise can’t write great content, but I believe it requires a lot of research. And that requires higher fees, which many businesses aren’t willing to pay.
I think Google will start putting the hurt on sites with lopsided link profiles with a large ratio of guest posts and/or guest posts placed on mediocre sites.
If you want to protect your business from the wrath of Google, you need to provide expert content to highly respected websites in your niche. Start by building authentic relationships and writing content that displays true expertise and more information than everything else already out there.