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How My First Guest Post Ended Up in a Book

I started blogging in August 2014. At the time I had no idea what a guest post was or how to go about “guest posting.” I actually didn’t find out what a guest post was until after I’d already guest posted on another site. To say I had no clue about blogging when I started would be an understatement. 

My First Guest Post

Dear Debt is a blog I had followed for a while. If you’re unfamiliar, the blog share’s people’s break up letter with their debt. In December 2014, I bucked up the courage to write and submit a letter to the site. To my surprise Melanie, the brains behind Dear Debt liked the letter and published it on her site January 2015

Guest Posting as a Traffic Strategy

As a result of her publishing my letter, traffic to my site increased. I had my highest traffic day since I started blogging. 42 pageviews in a day. It was big for a clueless newbie blogger. 

A few months later I learned that what I had done was called a guest post. Not only that, guest posting was a strategy to help grow a blog’s audience. I started to try and guest post on other sites. I was nervous, and sometimes my guest post pitch wasn’t always accepted, but many of them were. 

Guest Posting Definition

In case it wasn’t clear already, a guest post is something you write that is published by another blog with a link back to your site.

You are usually not paid for this post. If you are a new blogger, it is a good way to show off your writing and get others back to your site.

How My First Guest Post Ended Up in a Book

After FinCon 2015, where Melanie Lockhart’s Dear Debt blog won a Plutus Award, Melanie was offered a book deal. She decided that she wanted to include some of the Dear Debt letters in the book. She asked if I would sign a release for my Dear Debt letter. I enthusiastically said yes. I was thrilled to support Melanie and surprised that she would want to include my Dear Debt letter. 

A little less than a year later in August 2016, Dear Debt: A Story About Breaking Up with Debt was released. I picked up my copy and was amazed to see in print, that the very first guest post I wrote, the one I wrote without knowing what a guest post was, alongside Melanie’s terrific writing and some other fantastic Dear Debt letters. 

Moral of the story

You never know what one little guest post will lead to, it might just end up as part of a book.

I’m very grateful that Melanie would include my Dear Debt letter on her blog and in her book. If you are interested in getting a copy of this excellent (in my biased opinion) book, you can head over to Amazon, here is a link to Dear Debt: A Story About Breaking Up with Debt

What have been your guest posting strategies for blogging?

Related:Getting Started Blogging – Should You Use WordPress or Squarespace?

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