Everybody can write. However, everybody has a different way of expressing a thought or idea in writing.
Some can communicate their ideas much more effectively with how they present their points in writing. Their mastery of grammar, punctuation, and the English language is much superior.
However, the process of how to hire a freelance writer is not as easy as simply looking for a writer who writes well.
While I don’t fancy myself as a superior freelance writer (wink wink), I have nonetheless made a living as a writer for different clients. I’m not a native English speaker and need a tool like Grammarly (the paid one or the ones for teams) to help clean up my writing before submitting it to clients. However, I make up for my shortcomings by providing immense value to my clients. The intangibles that I believe I possess are qualities that you as a client might need in your writer.
Nonetheless, there are other writers out there who might be a much better fit for what you’re looking for in a writer. The needs of a writer depend from industry to industry. It’s a matter of checking all the boxes you want from the writer.
Therefore, If you want to hire a freelancer and need tips on how to find the best one for you, here are a couple of tips you can follow:
Before you begin reading the post, unlock the gated content below to learn the questions you need to ask them during the interview to make sure you hire the right person for the job!
A catch-all writer isn’t enough for most businesses.
Each niche and industry have technical terms that only insiders know. Therefore, you can’t expect every writer to write the kind of content that you want to be published on your blog.
When you hire a freelance writer, make sure that s/he knows what to know about in your niche. You don’t need to hand-hold or spoon-feed him/her with information that s/he should already know about your industry.
If this person is truly the writer for you, then s/he must produce with little to no guidance at all. Their ability to perform without giving clear direction and still produce stellar content is a sign that they truly know your niche inside and out.
However, such writers are rare and can’t be found easily. If you do, expect them to cost more than usual because they specialize in a topic. They have created a market that caters to a specific need and thus command a higher price than a jack-of-all-trades writer. This is a fair trade-off compared to hiring a cheap writer who claims to know your niche but writes content not up to your standards.
Industry professionals who are also fantastic writers do exist, but based on my experience, they are rare. So if you’re trying to scale your content program or build a brand newsroom, you should focus on looking for writers who can deliver their own type of expertise. Not cardiologists. – Brian Maehl, “Why Marketers Struggle to Hire the Best Freelance Writers“
Below are other questions that you need to be asking yourself to help refine your search in your journey to hire a freelance writer:
Can s/he write SEO-friendly content? A writer who observes the best on-page optimization practices will help rank your content for your target keywords and increase your site traffic.
What kind of other written content can s/he do? Aside from blog posts, you may want the writer to do copywriting, social media posts, technical writing, and others for your business.
Is s/he capable of managing bigger writing tasks? You need to look into the future prior to finding a freelance writer. You may be planning to expand your writing team to help produce more content for your site. Does the freelancer have the qualities and traits to lead your writing team if the opportunity arises?
Once you’ve determined who your ideal writer is, you need to find one that suits your niche and fits your budget. The cost of paying for your freelance writer will be discussed at a later point in this post.
2. Know where to find a freelance writer
To find a freelance writer, you need to learn the places where you can find the best ones. There are lots of sources where freelancer writers are available for hire. However, not all of these places offer the best writers for your website or project. Therefore, determining the best places where to hire writers will help you cut down the time for searching them.
Determine the best places where to hire #freelance #writers to help make sure that you hire the best one for the job.
That said, let’s get a couple of things out of the way: “traditional” content mills are a no-no.
Content mills like Textbroker and CopyPress have a reputation for churning web content at cheap prices. However, this is a classic case of “you get what you pay for.” Due to the low costs of the articles, you get run of the mill stuff that won’t pass your high standards.
At the same time, there are new content mills that provide high-quality content at reasonable rates, some of which will be discussed below. Still, you must keep your guard up against content mills and always opt for alternative ways of finding freelance writers. Below are some of them:
Google Search
Google is a place where you ask questions and get answers. It only makes sense to use it for finding and hiring a freelance writer for your business!
The great thing about Google Search is you can find writers that suit your niche. For example, if you want content written for your website about blockchain, all you need to do is type “blockchain freelance writer.” Below is a screenshot of the first five organic search results:
Granted, the other four results are from Upwork, but the top is a freelance writer who specializes in blockchain topics. Scrolling down the results page would show more writers for hire about this topic.
If you are working on another niche, you can simply replace “blockchain” from the search query to your preferred niche or industry. You can also play around with your search queries to reveal potential writers you can hire such as the ones below:
[niche] writer for hire
[niche] content writer
[niche] copywriter
[niche] blogger
These are just some variations that you can use to help you find writers from Google Search.
Social media
Social media sites like LinkedIn and Facebook are excellent places to scan for writers whom you can hire for your online business.
Facebook
Personally, the best of the two to find freelance writers is Facebook. Search for Facebook Groups dedicated to writers with a vibrant and active community. Lurk the posts of members there. If you like the content they’ve written and shared with the groups, you can reach out to the writer and discuss how you can work together.
You can also field job applications from writers in a Facebook group by posting the job offer.
Here’s a rough example of a job posting on a Facebook group. The response to your post depends on how active and vibrant the group is. Therefore, make sure to post your job offers on groups with the highest engagement among members.
Below are quick tips on how to place your job posts on Facebook groups:
As permission from the moderator first – Some groups don’t just allow members to publish posts with a click of a button. If this is the case, you need to talk to the moderator or owner of the group first to post your job offer on their group. Doing so makes getting the post live on the group board easier to attract potential writers faster.
Be as descriptive as possible – Inform writers of what to expect from the position you’re offering. Indicate the responsibilities, benefits the writer will receive, and your proposed budget. Doing so allows you to filter people truly interested in the job.
Provide a clear CTA on how writers can send their proposals – Tell writers how they can contact you. Ideally, ask them to shoot you an email with special instructions. Aside from requesting sample works, require them to write a specific subject line for the email, i.e., “I’m your writer!” If they don’t follow the instructions, they don’t read your job posting carefully, and you can throw their email in the trash.
Linkedin
As a social networking platform for professionals, LinkedIn offers a more streamlined approach to searching for candidates for your writing job.
Type the kind of writer you are looking for in the search bar to show potential writers for hire.
For more accurate results, you can filter the search according to the company name, location, industries, and others.
Once you have the best results, connect with them and offer them the job.
Since there is no mediator on social media for job offers, you need to develop a system to screen the candidates appropriately for your job. We will discuss the exact process you need to take later in this post.
New content mills
As mentioned, there are brand-new sites that offer good pay to writers in exchange for good content. They take the concept of content mills but offer better value for the content. Granted, you will have to pay more, but if you’re aiming for quality content, then you shouldn’t skimp on the costs.
Sites like Contently and Skyword are great places to start looking for writers for your projects. Create a client account on these sites and follow the directions on hiring freelance writers from these platforms. Each has specific onboarding processes, so it’s best to sign up for these sites to find out yourself.
I can’t personally vouch for either site above since I don’t have an account there. However, one of the best sites where you can get quality content, and which I’m happily part of as a writer, is ClearVoice.
Once you’ve signed up as a client on the site, you must send a brief of your project. The site will send handpick writers from the platform who can express their interest in the project. The client will be able to choose from many writers who they think are perfect for the project. From there, the platform will connect the writer and client for the project. The writer will finish the article from the site’s text editor, and the client will review the content afterward. If approved, the client will pay the proposed amount to the writer.
Based on the process above, Clearvoice offers a painless way to get high-quality content from more than capable writers. It’s a great platform that changes the way to look at content mills.
Job marketplaces
Upwork, Hubstaff, and others provide an easy way for people like you to connect with writers looking for work. Sites like these require users to bid for your jobs. There’s nothing wrong with job marketplaces except that you need to filter out a lot of bids to get to the good stuff. Expect a lot of crappy bids thrown your way after posting a job. However, if you’re eyeing a writer from these job marketplaces, you can personally invite him/her to submit a bid for your project.
Before posting a job, it’s best if you can search for potential people with whom you can work on your project. Choose “Freelancer” on the search bar and type the kind of writer you’re looking for.
Below are the first three results for the search query “grant writers.” You can look for specific writers by refining your keywords or clicking the Filter button beside the search icon.
If you want to organize the results according to your preferences, click on the Filter button to arrange the writers according to job success, hourly rate, freelance type, and more.
EXTRA: You can use tools like Social Animal to find the best content from writers and influential writers looking for writing gigs.
3. Ask for sample works
Normally, you can view sample works of prospective writers from their online portfolios and profiles. You can also request published samples as part of their pitch to your job posting.
It is important to indicate that you need sample works, not just one article from the writer. Also, if they will send you links to their articles, consider the websites that they have written for. Anybody can set up a blog now and publish their articles from there, so you have to be wary about the quality of the sites where their articles are.
Getting a post published on your blog and getting it published on someone else’s are different. For one, since the writer doesn’t own the blog where s/he wants the article to be published, it’s not up to them whether it will be posted.
It’s what makes content published on high-authority sites much more valuable than the ones published on yours. Because the content needs to pass strict editorial guidelines of the blog, the post is much more valuable that way.
As a result, writers with articles published on high-authority websites are people who you prioritize for the job.
You may have heard who Neil Patel is. It’s probably because you’ve read some of his articles published on different blogs online.
More importantly, most of the articles written under his name are some of the most shared articles in marketing.
Screenshot from Buzzsumo. All articles are written by the same Neil Patel except the one from pokernews.com
Even if you haven’t heard of this Neil Patel fella, the fact that his articles are published on Entrepreneur, Forbes, and others makes him, well, kind of a big deal as a writer.
4. Develop your screening process
Once you have handpicked a shortlist of writers for the job, it’s time to take a closer look at each of the candidates and see if they are perfect for the job. Below are ways that you can do to help pick out the best writer from the lot:
Talk to each of them
Writing ability is one of the many factors that you need to consider when choosing a freelance writer. Sure, the writer can’t probably whip up a damn good article in his/her sleep, but if s/he’s a pain in the ass to work with, then you may have to twice of hiring this person.
Before are other things that you need to weigh on when screening writers:
Temperament
Does the writer rely on striking inspiration before s/he writes or is this persona a reliable hand when it comes to writing? Some writers need to get their creative juices flowing first before they hit the keyboard. There’s nothing wrong with this, but you may risk hiring an unreliable writer who is dependent on his/her mood that day for writing.
Availability
You can’t blame freelance writers if they have other clients on the side. However, you may encounter writers who will use their current workload as leverage to get higher pay from you. At the same time, you’re not sure where their loyalty lies. They might be saying the right things now. But behind your back, they could be focusing on their on their other clients and give no time for your projects.
Communication
You don’t want to work with a writer you can’t contact. A writer who doesn’t respond to your urgent messages and emails is a big red flag. Their lack of communication will compromise your projects. It would be best if you had someone whom you could reach out at certain times without fail to make sure that the project is going smoothly.
Receptive to feedback
Writing is a deeply personal experience. Therefore, it is rare for writers not to feel the heat whenever an editor rejects their work with critiques on them. An exceptional writer takes constructive criticism in stride and learns from his/her mistakes. The writer may not have to agree with you or your editor sometimes, but if s/he displays grace under fire, you may have a keeper.
These factors and more must be part of your interview process. Ask questions that reveal more about the writer, which gives you more insights into the factors mentioned above. Schedule a Skype call so you can ask more questions along the way based on their answers.
Request them to write an article for you
There’s no question that all of whom you’ve chosen for the job are good writers. However, asking them to write a brand new article for you is sensible as part of the job requirement.
Once you have selected from a pool of writers, have them write an article for you about your topic of choice. Give them 24 hours to finish the article. Some writers won’t be bothered to write a sample piece for you, which is good. This will allow you to immediately separate lazy writers from serious ones.
The test article for #freelance #writer will answer questions about their non-writing capabilities, such as timeliness, organization skills, work attitude, and more.
Also, the sample works they have submitted are good indicators of how they write at their best. The writers will only send you the best material they have written. Therefore, an actual writing exercise allows you to see how they work in a live setting.
Will the work they’ll be submitting to you on par with the sample works they gave you earlier? Can they work well under pressure or not? Can they thrive with or without instructions? The test article they will write for you answers these questions.
Lastly, while specifying the number of words or tone of voice and providing their resources for the article it would be nice, but it’s not necessary. This would allow them to showcase their proficiency in researching and writing the article on time. Little directions also allow them to write an article aligning with their personality.
Pay for the article(?)
Some would be annoyed at this suggestion, but there’s a good reason why you should pay them even if they’re just writing an article for you.
Some writers may write for free, but the good ones don’t come cheap. Therefore…
If you want to attract good writers, you need to offer a fee for their article.
Some writers won’t bother writing the article if they’re not getting paid for it. On their defense, they might have written more than enough articles over the years to prove their worth to you. Consider this quote from a seasoned freelance writer:
[A]sking for a sample article—as opposed to asking for portfolio clips—is a strong indicator that this company expects to be working with entry-level writers. At this point in my career, for example, I would not work for a client who asked me for a 600-word sample. I have over 800 articles, written for a variety of publications, in my freelance portfolio. That should be enough sample material for any potential client. –Nicole Dieker, “Ask a Freelancer: Is It Ethical for a Company to Make Me Write a Sample on Spec?“
If you can’t get rid of asking for sample works, at least ensure that accomplished writers get compensated for his/her efforts. For writers with a chip on their shoulders, you can probably afford to take the risk and get them to write for free, although I would advise against it. You don’t have to pay much for the sample articles. Just compensate them with just enough via PayPal or wire transfer for the effort they’ve put into their writing.
Discuss the payment terms
Once you approve a writer’s article, it’s time to discuss money. For some writers, how much you will compensate them will help them decide whether to accept the job.
You should have indicated the price you’re willing to pay on the job posting so writers already know what offer to expect from you.
Schedule of payment
Will you pay the salary once or twice every month? Some people have no problem with either option, but some might want to receive payment twice a month. Just be open to this option, as writers may ask about it.
Transaction fee
If you will pay via PayPal, mention if you can or cannot shoulder the transaction fee. If not, it could take a fraction of their income when withdrawing the money from PayPal. While it may not be a big deal to some, it could prove crucial for some.
Other benefits
If you’re not offering much money, you can compensate by offering benefits. Paid leaves, regular government contributions, discounts to establishments, and other perks can go a long way to some. In fact, some people prefer working for a client that leaves room for fast, professional growth. It sounds cliche, but if you can offer this opportunity with proof to back it up, it would make for a very enticing offer for writers.
As a freelance writer, I believe clients should pay at least 50% before starting a project with me. I believe that if the client is serious about working with me, s/he needs to put up half of the total amount first. It helps to have a proven track record of published content online to command this request. I don’t offer a refund for the 50% if they are unhappy with the results. So far, everybody is satisfied with the work I’m putting out for them.
Paying half of the payment upfront may sound like a big risk to some, but it is an occupational hazard. You need to trust the writer for him/her to be able to write great content for you. Putting up with half the payment is a great way to show your trust.
5. Prime your writer with an onboarding process
Once you have finally agreed with the writer and s/he signed on the dotted line of your contract, you should onboard him/her to your business culture.
You can show a glimpse of your company’s personality during the interview and screening process. However, now that the writer is part of your vibrant time, it’s time to show him/her the whole picture.
If you don’t have an employee onboarding process for your business yet, then consider developing one now, as Lauren Moon suggests:
Like all first impressions, you only have one shot to get it right. The first week is the time to be as thorough as possible with management and HR logistics as well as intangibles throughout the onboarding process. Important information that falls through the cracks or isn’t conveyed properly means that employees’ knowledge bases are inconsistent. Inconsistencies at work, when multiplied, can turn into a disparate company culture. – Lauren Moon, “New Employee Onboarding: A Success Template For Every Hire“
A simple tool like Trello will help you build a simple onboarding process to help get freelance writers up to speed.
Here is a screen capture of Trello’s New Hire Onboarding board. Each task is organized accordingly so new hires know what to do after signing the contract with you. Click on the “Copy Board” button if you want to use the same template for your business.
The things you need to include in your onboarding process depend on the maturity of your business. At the very least, however, it should include the following:
What to do on your first day – Include modules, introductory videos, and tasks s/he needs to accomplish to help get the writer’s thumb on the pulse of your business.
FAQ – Create an internal knowledge base that covers basic questions that your writer and every new employee need to know.
Meet the team – Introduce your writer to all your staff and team members. If done through Trello, you can make the introductions fun by requiring the writers to answer questions posed by the members.
Of course, your onboarding process doesn’t have to go through Trello. The tool makes it easier for remote team members to communicate and collaborate on projects. If you have other methods that let you effectively onboard your freelance writer, then, by all means, stick with that.
Conclusion
The process of how to hire a freelance writer is painstaking. It will require you to jump a couple of hoops and probably hire the wrong ones at first. However, by following the ways in this post, you will find a diamond in the rough that will take your content efforts to new heights.
It’s just a matter of being patient and taking your time to scout the right people for the writing job. Again, it won’t be easy, but this post and the perspective that comes with up should prepare you for the challenge ahead.
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To make sure that you hire the best freelance writer from the lot, unlock the gated content below to learn the questions you need to ask them during the interview!
As a site owner, you want to publish the most actionable and useful content for your target audience. You need to write content that packs a punch to build readership and increase your organic search visibility. Long gone are mediocre articles that repeat what’s already been mentioned online. By providing new insights and ideas about a tried and true topic, you open the doors to your blog for more visitors and subscribers.
This reason is why you hired first-class bloggers to write your bidding. By enlisting the top writers you can find with the task of writing great content, you ease the burden of worrying about churning out content that’ll keep your readers happy and grow your readership even more.
In line with excellent content, you need to make sure that each post you publish is fresh and unique. While Google has changed its stance regarding duplicate content, it still puts the premium on unique articles. There’s no room for plagiarism at the top stop of search results.
Therefore, while you can sleep tight knowing that your writers will do a great job with your blog content, you can’t be too sure that the content they’ll be publishing on your site is as unique as you think. Some writers are “savvy” enough to plagiarize the content they write and get to pass it off as 100% unique. You shouldn’t tolerate these tactics, especially if your goal is to make money with your blog.
As your solution to this problem, you need a tool that will help you keep tabs on your writers and make sure that the content they submit to you is unique enough to your like. PlagiarismCheck.org is a tool that you want to consider using down the line.
PlagiarismCheck.org is an online tool that helps you analyze content using its sophisticated plagiarism detection engine. It will draw data from online resources and cross-reference it with the content for review and provide you with information on whether the article cites uncredited resources or copied text verbatim.
A quick look at the tool
Upon signing up for an account and logging in, you are directed to your account dashboard, where you can drag the file for checking.
The UX allows you to drag and drop the document onto the screen and proceed with checking it for plagiarism issues. Another cool thing about PlagiarismCheck.org is the ability to review documents in multiple formats. Most of the plagiarism checkers only support .doc and .docx formats. PlagiarismCheck.org not only supports both file types and similar ones (.odt, .rtf), but also .pdf files.
For testing on the tool, I’ll be reviewing an unpublished article I wrote a while back. I am sure that I didn’t plagiarize content for this article (from my recollection at least). Using the tool, we’ll see if my thoughts hold up.
After dragging the file to the box, click on Proceed.
A pop-up box will open to show you if you have enough credits to run the plagiarism check. A page contains 275 words, so the article I upload has between 551-825 words.
Once you have enough credits to push through with the review, click the Continue button.
It will take a couple of seconds to complete the review. Once done, you will see the overview of the check and the ability to click on the PDF file of the review for your reference.
Here’s a screenshot of the report of the file:
The formatting of the document is stripped down of its format features. It would probably be nice if PlagiarismCheck.org retained the appearance of the text so users can identify the sections of the article they wrote.
However, as it stands, you can show the PDF file to the student or writer who plagiarized the content as proof that they took someone else’s work and tried to make it their own. You can take the necessary actions from here.
Who is PlagiarismCheck.org for?
Ideally, PlagiarismCheck.org is perfect for educators who check essays, theses, and term papers submitted by students and ensure that they didn’t plagiarize their work. Using PlagiarismCheck.org, they can automate the process of checking for stolen content so they can filter the copied work and focus on the work of those with unique content.
Conversely, students will benefit from using PlagiarismCheck.org if they want to ensure that their paper is 100% unique before submitting it to their teachers.
So, as a website owner, how is a tool geared towards the academe help me build better content for my blog/s?
Aside from the benefits mentioned above, PlagiarismCheck.org is a perfect companion for marketers building websites for link building. If you buy expired domains with existing link equity and turn them into functional sites, then you’ll need to publish content on them. At the same time, to lower costs, you want to hire writers who are good enough to help you post unique content on your sites. Since Google values fresh content and undermines plagiarized ones, PlagiarismCheck.org will keep your writers in check. Using this tool, you can vet out content with duplicate content with a few clicks of a button and get the author to rewrite it.
Use tool to review plagiarized content
I will run another check using the tool. This time, I will examine content that is copied from a published post and see how PlagiarismCheck.org picks up the source where I lifted the text from. The article in question is this one, which I posted less than a week ago.
From the dashboard, you can paste the text into the box and click Proceed.
Upon proceeding and waiting for the results to come in, I was surprised to see that it failed to pick up the link where I lifted the text word for word. Also, you can view all documents on My Documents for your reviews.
You can expand the report without downloading the PDF file by clicking on the View Results.
I was initially surprised that the tool wasn’t able to pick up the source where the text was originally published. A hypothesis I could think of is that the page was published less than a week and the tool’s algorithm hasn’t picked up the page yet.
To test my hypothesis further, I will run another plagiarism check on the same domain but use content that’s been published for a year. I’m referring to this post. It is possible that the tool wasn’t able to update its algorithm yet. We’ll see if it can pick up the plagiarized content from there.
After posting and uploading the copied and pasted text for processing PlagiarismCheck.org was able to detect the text as duplicate content.
Here’s a peek of the review:
Use the tool to review rewritten content
For people to pass through content off as unique, they replace different words in an existing article with synonym and rearrange the order of the content. Technically, while Google may consider the content as unique, it’s not fresh at all. Of course, the naked eye can’t spot these rewritten or spun content, which is why you need a tool like PlagiarismCheck.org to help you determine these types of content.
For this example, I will be taking a block of text from Wikipedia about Orange is the New Black.
I will then spin it using The Best Spinner’s demo tool here:
Now that I’ve automatically rewritten the content, I will copy and paste the text on PlagiarismCheck.org to see if the tool can detect that the article is rewritten and spun from Wikipedia’s page.
After the review, the results were positive – PlagiarismCheck.org was able to identify the plagiarized content.
Below is the screen caps of the report:
Compared to Grammarly Premium
I have covered Grammarly Premium extensively on my blog. I think that it’s a tool that all content writers and bloggers must have in their arsenal. However, aside from its grammar checking features, I’d like to focus on its plagiarism checker feature, which I feel is not as strong as it is.
To compare Grammarly Premium and PlagiarismCheck.org, I took this article from Ezinearticles.com and used it on both tools. My goal is to see how good their plagiarism checkers are and which one is better.
Here’s the result from Grammarly Premium:
Keep in mind that I copied and pasted the text from EzineArticles to Grammarly Premium, and it only revealed 19 copies words.
Looking at PlagiarismCheck.org, we will see why this tool is a much superior choice for your all plagiarism checking needs.
This comparison goes to show you that PlagiarismCheck.org is unlike any other tool that you’ve come across with. While it does one thing, it does it better than even one of the best writing tools can ever imagine.
Pricing
PlagiarismCheck.org offers competitive pricing for its tool.
The pricing is geared towards educators who want to filter student essays to see if they plagiarized their papers. The most affordable plan for people who check papers from hundreds of students is the Premium one, which costs $0.17 per page (150 pages in total).
For site owners, I would imagine that the price would be a bit high, given that it only checks for plagiarized content. However, if anything, PlagiarismCheck.org complements your existing reviewing and publishing process. Tools there claim to do everything but can’t deliver on all fronts. If you truly value the ability to produce high-quality and unique content on your blog, then PlagiarismCheck.org is a good tool for you.
As seen above, PlagiarismCheck.org is everything you can expect from a plagiarism-checking tool. It helps you determine whether a piece of content is copied or not. It’s a no-frills tool that gets the job done, plain and simple.
While I mentioned earlier that the tool cannot check the content recently published online, I think it goes to all plagiarism-checking tools. Indexing content and including them in the database takes time and resources. I assume that the tool waits for Google to cache the content before including it in their database. The process may take more than a week for the tool to pick, which is reasonable enough given to the volume of content published daily. Therefore, it’s unfair to criticize tools like PlagiarismCheck.org if they can’t deliver up-to-the-second data for duplicate content.
While the tool is perfect for educators, there is space for site owners to use PlagiarismCheck.org as part of their content publishing strategy. It’s easy to use upon signing up – no learning curve necessary.
The process of optimizing for organic search involves research, critical thinking, and a bit of elbow grease all rolled into one. Only people who have the patience to analyze hard data and put them into concrete actions will succeed in getting their sites ranked at the top of Google search results.
However, it’s one thing that you know the process. It’s another to actually do it.
Ideally, an effective SEO strategy runs for years in order to keep your site on the first page of search results at the very least. That includes mining organic search for relevant information to help you develop the tactics that will comprise your strategy.
Manually combing through search results is not recommended because it will take too much of your time just to collect the data. Even then, some of the information you will have collected may change over time due to the changes in the Google algorithm.
Therefore, you need all the help you can get regarding developing and implementing an SEO campaign. The help usually comes in the form of an SEO tool that will:
help you determine the best target keywords to optimize for each of your pages
crafting content based on the keyword you’ve chosen
acquiring backlinks for your content through competitor research
All these things can be done effectively using SEMrush*.
In this post, I will discuss how to use SEMrush to help you choose target keywords for your content, develop the best content possible for your post, and build relevant and contextual links to your post based on your competition.
For the sake of example, I will be using the post “MASSIVE LIST: 1,343 Blogs that Accept Guest Posts” and share with you how I developed the post from the ground up using SEMrush and some examples on how to run a link building strategy for it.
Let’s jump right to it, shall we?
Keyword Difficulty Tool
For keyword ideas before writing your post, go to the Keyword Difficulty Tool page under the Keywords Analytics category.
On this page, you should already have a keyword phrase in mind that you want to optimize for. The purpose of the Keyword Overview is to validate whether the keyword has lots of search volume and is not difficult to rank for relative to other related search phrases.
At the same time, you want to look for better-related keywords to optimize for.
Initially, I was torn between “sites that accept guest posts” and “blogs that accept guest posts” as my keyword. Using this tool, let’s see which between the two is better.
From the screenshot above, “blogs that accept guest posts” returns with data and the other keyword doesn’t. This means that the former keyword phrase is search more often than the other one, so It’s best to optimize for the keyword with better performance based on the data.
Keyword Overview
I clicked on the “blogs that accept guest posts,” which brought me to the Keyword Overview page of that keyword.
What you want to look for in this section are the related keywords. You may see better-performing keywords based on volume.
Looking at the screenshot above, it seems like there is.
To make sure that “blogs that accept guest blogging” is the best option among related keywords, click on it and look for related keywords again. If you can’t find a keyword phrase with higher search volume, then I may have unearthed the keyword to use for my blog post.
However, search volume is just one of the many factors to consider when choosing keywords. You also need to factor in the difficulty of ranking on top of search results for that keyword.
Initially, you should look for the SERP that is displayed at the bottom of the Keyword Overview page.
SEMrush will show you the top 100 site pages ranking for the keyword that is clustered into 20s.
From here, you need to analyze each page and manually identify the strengths and weaknesses of each. Once you’ve gathered data from at least the top 10 results for your keyword, you can take actions on your findings and develop the necessary content that is better than the ones appearing on the first page.
While this process remains the best way to analyze each page, it takes a lot of times to open all the pages and see them for yourself. If you want to hasten the process of finding the difficulty of your chosen keyword, SEMrush has features that suit your needs.
Keyword Analytics
Semrush has a pretty solid keyword research tool for finding the best search terms to optimize your site pages with. It is arguably much better than the data provided by the free keyword tools.
It is best practice to gather as many viable keywords that you can find. While search volume is important, you also need to look at other factors like keyword relevance and difficult (more on this later). Therefore, I took the opportunity to look into other related keywords by viewing the full report.
You will be redirected to a page with the complete list of related keywords.
Among the data featured on the table, you need to look into keyword difficulty. This metric factors into the pages from the SERP and aggregates the data into a figure with 100 as the highest score, which means that it is next to impossible to rank for the keyword. Therefore, the lower the KD, the better your chances of ranking for that page on the first page of search results.
You can arrange the list according to KD.
However, doing this showed me keywords will little relevance to the initial keyword I entered.You need to factor in the Related % column of the list so you can choose from highly similar and related keywords.
Upon further inspection, I have narrowed down the keywords to two:
blogs that accept guest posts
blogs looking for guest posts
In the end, I decided to go with “blogs that accept guest posts” for the following reasons:
Higher relevance – Both keywords have 75%, which is the highest relevance score from the list
(Relatively) competitive search volume – My chosen keyword has 70 search volume compared to 10 with the other one.
Low KD – It has a relatively low keyword difficulty with 56.6, which ranks the 59th out of the 310 related keywords.
Verifying the keywords one more time
Since the related keywords are derived from the original chosen keyword “blogs that accept guest blogging,” I would like to pit it with the chosen phrase from the Related Keyword page to settle on which KW to use for the content.
After running both using the Keyword Difficulty page, it appears that there is a clear winner.
Sine “blogs that accept guest blogging” does not have available data, it makes “blogs that accept guest posts” as the de facto winner!
SEO Content Template
Now that I have chosen the keyword for my content, it’s time for me to use tool’s SEO Content Template feature. This feature allows you to create content that people want to link out to and site owners would want to publish as a guest post (yep, this tactic still works).
As mentioned earlier, manually analyzing each page from search results for my keyword is a time-consuming process. Therefore, I can just bank this feature from SEMrush so I can simply focus on the data and use the suggestions in crafting my post.
Enter the keyword on the search bar to create the SEO template.
The screenshot above shows actionable information I can use with the content I will develop for my chosen keyword. Personally, I find the readability score and word count recommendation to be the most helpful.
Their purpose is to help you create better content than the ones appearing on search results. However, these are just suggestions so you can decide on whether to do them or not for your content. For example,3,978 words for a post may be too much for my liking. After all, more words don’t necessarily mean better content in most cases.
Aside from the key recommendations (based on your Google top 10 rivals), the template also shows the general SEO recommendations regarding the H1, meta description, page title, and text.
Link Building Process
As part of SEO’s best practices, you need to build links for your site pages to increase your site’s SEO performance. Once the post has been published, marketers look for link building opportunities in the hopes of getting that all-valuable backlink from high-authority sites.
However, in my experience, it is best that you find the opportunities before writing the post. I have detailed the process in depth in this post I wrote for SEMrush which still holds up.
In a nutshell, by identifying opportunities, you can design your content that caters to the page or domain you want to acquire a link from.
This process will require me to do the following:
Uncover the backlinks of the 10 top-ranking pages for my keyword
Identify how I can link back to those pages
Use the findings to create content that will increase the chances of getting a link from that page
The method of link building requires you to consider all pages ranking on SERP to be your competitors. Your purpose is to try and hijack their position by analyzing the backlink profile of the ranking page so you can find a way to link to those pages as well.
Backlink analysis
Go to the Keyword Analysis and check the SERP of the first page. Click on the first result to show the Domain Analytics overview of the page.
The top-ranking page (EffectiveBusinessIdeas.com) has only four backlinks.
To analyze the kind of links the top-ranking page has, I need to click on all the pages with its backlink in it. In this case, I need to check the ProCoach.com page myself.
Before we check out the page, you need to understand the three types of backlinks that you can acquire from a page:
Within content – Author features the link in the article.
Comment – A blogger leaves a link to the page in his/her comment or enters the URL of the page which then is linked to his/her name.
List of links – The resource page is littered with links from relevant articles and content about its topic.
Now that we have that covered, let’s check one of the pages with the backlink of your competitor:
As you can see, the link is found within the content. A possible reason for this is that the author found the content on search results or s/he is connected with the owner of EffectiveBusinessIdeas.com. I’m leaning towards the former since it ranks at the very top of the keyword I’m also trying to rank for.
There are two ways that you can get a link from this page with the content you’re developing:
Comment with a link to your relevant post – Really simple and straightforward, but only if commenting is enabled on the page. However, it depends on whether the site owner is stingy when it comes to comments. If you’re not sure on how to proceed with crafting your blog comments, you need to read this excellent post at Smart Blogger.
Blogger outreach – Build a relationship with the site owner by sending him/her an email and mentioning your latest post that you want him/her to link to. Of course, you need to approach this strategy with a lighter hand to not turn off the site owner. Read this post I wrote about blogger outreach before you consider implementing this tactic.
Pitching your link
Once you have identified the process on how you plan on acquiring the link, you need to find an angle on how you can pitch your post to the site in order to get a backlink.
Looking at the EffectiveBusinessIndeas.com page, while there are a lot of things going for it, there are holes in the post that you can take advantage of, namely:
The limited number of sites to write for – At the beginning of the article, the author mentions that there are over 20 sites listed per category, which isn’t a lot. When developing my content, I can list down more than 20 – or even 3x – a number of sites that accept guest posts.
Find more niches – The post features 24 categories as of writing, which is exhaustive in itself. However, maybe there are other niches I can uncover that I could include in my post.
Content formatting – The post doesn’t have any images and doesn’t have social sharing buttons to make it easier for readers to like or tweet the post.
These are some initial factors that I can capitalize on when developing link building opportunities for my content. Now, the challenge is replicating the process on all backlinks of your competitors. I’m not gonna lie – this is a very time-consuming process, albeit a necessary one if you want to jumpstart the acquisition of link for your content. You could probably outsource someone or delegate this task to someone else so you can focus on developing the content.
You can even potential unearth more backlinks, you can try using Buzzsumo. Read this post I wrote about how to use Buzzsumo to create killer content. The process I shared in the post goes together well with creating content using SEO’s content template.
Wrapping it up
SEMrush is an excellent SEO and content tool to help you supercharge your blog’s SEO performance. Applying the process religiously on all your posts will help you reach your audience by ranking high up on Google organic search and increase your traffic in the process.
SEMrush costs $99/month but you can sign up for a free account and get limited access to some of the data. Doing so gives you an idea on how to use SEMrush and whether or not it’s the SEO tool for you. Click here to sign up for an account.
There are millions of possibilities to write a particular thought or idea, and a writer only has to settle on just one. As more ideas pile up, an author sticks to a specific style that defines him or her. It is the beauty that is inherent in writing, which paves the way for distinct storytellers, novelists, and nonfiction writers.
Part of what makes writing unique is the process. Each writer has their quirks and methods that compose how they come up with their content.
The problem starts when the writing process becomes too convoluted and is, therefore, counterproductive to the goal it is set to achieve. The method may work wonders for some, but what if there’s a way for them to make a much more streamlined writing process?
At least, that’s what this Airstory review is set to achieve.
In this objective and unbiased review, I attempt to take a closer look at Airstory and how it could benefit writers from all walks of life using a set of criteria that I believe are relevant to determine its effectiveness. Also, I will provide my take on why I feel the way I feel towards Airstory.
tl;dr
Airstory’s drag-and-drop card system is full of potential uses.
As a tool to help you create better content in less time, Airstory is not that valuable.
Aside from the card system, the Web Clipper is a great way to annotate content quickly and easily. The one-click import to WordPress saves you time from copying, pasting, and uploading content to your site.
For $25/month, it’s not necessarily a bad deal, considering how easy it’ll make content collaboration for users. At the same time, it’s not the most affordable deal, either.
Airstory provides enough tutorials and support on their site to help you get on board with the tool for your content needs.
Drag and drop cards to add content, a game-changer
Templates provide you with keys to success
Cons
Not very user-friendly
Ultimately unnecessary
My main gripe with Airstory is that it tries to homogenize the writing process, which is why some people will find the tool useless. I believe that some writing processes can be developed into much simpler tasks. However, if the process works, why fix it? Airstory seems to impose a specific workflow that can be considered radical by others already set with a writing process. Also, aside from the fact that you can create content using free and less constricting tools, why settle with Airstory?
Airstory is an app made for content creators who want to produce content on the go. Whether you’re a blogger, copywriter, or social media specialist, there is something to like about Airstory.
The team behind Airstory are the same people who run Copyhackers.
The ultimate plan developed by Joanna Wiebe is to make writing easy. While there are tools on the market that work perfectly fine and even help aid your writing process to create awesome content, Airstory aims to streamline all the tasks involved in writing to help you create killer content in less time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEu4PrK_rks
“While Copy Hackers teaches you to write copy that converts, Airstory helps you write it. It’s a drag-and-drop document builder. It is to document what LeadPages and Unbounce are to landing pages.1″
In simpler terms, I would describe it as “project management for writers.”
Similar to tools like Trello and Wrike, you can consolidate all your content projects in a single place, so you don’t have to sift through different folders in your local or cloud drive. Airstory is also perfect for multiple writers collaborating on a piece. The tool is agile enough to help writers get on track with their respective projects so they can meet their deadlines.
How to judge Airstory?
It is almost impossible to judge a tool that’s based on something purely subjective. There is no single correct answer when it comes to the writing process. It can be as convoluted and unproductive as it could be as long as it delivers results.
However, for the sake of reviewing Airstory, we need to establish variables to help see the tool from a more qualitative perspective.
Uniqueness – What sets Airstory apart from other writing tools and even SEO content software?
Usefulness – How valuable is Airstory as a tool to help you create better content in less time?
Features – Do the features present in Airstory fulfill the promise of making you write faster?
Price – Is the cost of using Airstory over a long period justified?
Support – Are the people behind Airstory providing you enough support to use the tool?
How to use Airstory to simplify your blogging process
Airstory feels like a mystery. It means what it says, and yet it is difficult, at least for me, to visualize how the tool works. The site offers enough support to help you get your feet off the ground using this tool. However, sometimes, it’s better to just push through with the tool head-on and see what you can create with it.
Therefore, instead of laying down the details for you, I published a YouTube video explaining how I use Airstory to write this review and other features you need to know about the tool.
In the video, you will learn:
what makes Airstory different from usual word processing tools
why the drag and drop cards innovates the way you approach content creation
how the Airstory Researcher Web Clipper can help you annotate content from other sites on the fly
how the different templates available in its library can help remove the guesswork from the writing process
Note from the Editor
This is the first time I’m using video in my reviews. I used Screencast-o-matic to record the video and publish it on Youtube for sharing. If you have thoughts about the review, please let me know so I can work on the kinks and provide you with better video content moving forward 🙂
Pros
Drag and drop cards to add content a game changer
Most of the writing tools offered in today’s market are limited to grammar editors, headline checkers, distraction-free editors, and the like. It doesn’t have the sophisticated UX seen in most project management tools, nor does it have functions that could really that your writing process to the next level.
Airstory is the bridge where writers can cross towards a more automated way of writing. The drag and drop card feature is a brazen way to make content creation possible with just a few clicks of a button.
This feature is perfect for some reasons. If you’re a writer, you can use cards to build your ideas and save citations using the Airstory Researcher Web Clipper Chrome extension that you can use later. Once you save your ideas using the browser extension, you can just drag the cards into the text editor and expand your thoughts from there.
If you like to curate content on your blog or site or build a writing portfolio to show prospects, you can use the Airstory Research to create citations from some of the best posts in your niche and publish a weekly post about them.
If you’re a manager of a writing team or an editor, you can assign them cards to fill out regarding the sections in the content that you are building. After that, you can simply form the content by dragging the cards and repositioning them as you see fit in the content. You can then comment on the sections if you want the writers to edit and elaborate on their ideas.
If you’re not on a desktop and need to create content, you can access Airstory from your tablet and use the pre-filled cards to build your content from scratch.
There are simply endless ways that you can do to create content using Airstory. It’s a very exciting feature that could challenge the way content is written and produced!
Templates provide you keys to success
I am not a fan of templates. The fact that you have the option to use them only makes them prone for other people to abuse them to no one. Therefore, what was once an effective template that aims to increase conversion and engagement or whatnot is now ineffective and run down the ground.
However, I don’t feel the same way about the templates found in Airstory. After all, the best copywriters in the industry developed the templates. So if there’s anything to abuse in this world, it has to be Airstory templates.
To access the templates, you need to download them by opening a new window to all the available files. Honestly, I’m not sure why I had to download them from a subdomain and not just have them readily available from the dashboard. My best guess is that they’re measuring the performance of each template and see which one gets the most downloads so they can develop more templates related to them. If that’s the case, it still bogs down the experience of using the tool.
Going back to the templates, there are currently 26 available ranging from headline hacks to blog post formulas and even an email sequence script. The template will help you build your version of the content without having to start from a clean slate.These allow you to supercharge your content writing so you can finish faster and quicker.
Cons
Not very user-friendly
Upon signing up for an account, Airstory greets users with a somewhat complex dashboard. There are lots of buttons and sections to choose from that it prevents me from a decision which one to click on.
Eventually, you’ll get the hang of the tool after playing around with it for a while. However. I think the tool would benefit from a more useful layout that engages and gets them on board with the tool even without having prior knowledge about it.
Ultimately unnecessary
While it seems like Airstory is reinventing the wheels with its features, it feels like it doesn’t. If you’re fine using Google Docs to collaborate with writers or Trello to manage all your writing tasks, then I don’t see why people have to line up for Airstory. It’s probably cool to drag and drop cards to create your content, or you can collaborate on Google Docs to build the article, which is pretty much the same thing.
It does complement your use of Google Docs and Evernote since both sync up nicely with the tool. However, I feel that something is lacking in Airstory in that you don’t need it in the grand scheme of things, at least for now. It’s a great tool if you want to simplify some of the more tedious and repetitive tasks in writing, which is a great selling point. But I feel that Airstory could be more than what it is.
Qualifying Airstory as a content tool
I sincerely feel that Airstory is something special. The drag-and-drop content cards are something to build on in the future and can probably revolutionize how online writing is done. There are also features like WordPress integration that allow you to collaborate on a post and save it as a draft on WordPress along with the images. This is an excellent way to upload your content on the CMS instead of copying and pasting the text while uploading the photos individually.
Still, I can’t shake off the fact that Airstory is something that I can’t wholeheartedly recommend to anyone, especially those whose writing habits are set.
Airstory has reiterated that it aims to complement the existing process and make it easier, and it also makes it seamless for non-writers to create content using the tool. Regardless, I feel that it’ll take more than drag-and-drop cards to get more people to buy into the idea of Airstory.
Airstory writing software by Copy Hackers, Today, We Are Fools. Happily. (Or why we built and are finally launching Airstory.), https://copyhackers.com/2017/02/airstory/
Bloggers initially are only concerned with publishing the best content for their audience and rightfully so. Since the purpose why they set out to create a blog in the first place is to share their ideas and establish themselves as experts in their respective fields, everything else seems secondary.
However, once you get a wind of blogging will you notice how it is so much more than just writing, publishing, and promoting.
When blogging, you seriously need to consider the best website hosting where you plan to carry out your blog.
In this post, you will learn how to find the best website hosting that fits your needs as a blogger by looking at the different factors that make for a fast and high-performing web host.
What constitutes the best website hosting?
What’s in a web hosting?
In layman’s terms, a web hosting is a place where all blogger files are located. Similar to a storage, you need your web hosting to accommodate all the files you need to make your blog work.
At the same time, a web hosting acts as an intermediary between your blog and audience. Your hosting is responsible for sending over data from your life to the browsers of visitors.
The importance of web hosting for bloggers becomes evident when visitors can’t access your site or when it’s taking too long to load all your files. If you chose a substandard web hosting for your blog, then you will only frustrate your target market for having an unreliable blog that doesn’t load fast enough.
As a result, you won’t be able to build a readership with a blog like that. This reason is why you need to invest in a solid web hosting that answers all your needs as a blogger as early as now.
To help guide you in the process of choosing, below is an infographic that details all the factors you need to know before making an informed decision regarding your web hosting:
To view the post where the infographic is derived from, click here!
Straight to the question:
What is the best web hosting solution for you?
This is a tricky question, as with most “best” questions simply because there is no one-size-fits-all answer. There are lots of factors that you need to consider with your decision regarding your web hosting. Below are some of the most crucial ones.
Kind of site you have
Not all sites are made equal. Some work under the pretense of disseminating information and ideas (blog) while others are created for the purpose of making lots of money (affiliate sites or e-commerce). Therefore, the purpose why you build your site in the first may dictate the kind of web hosting you should get for your blog.
Unlike e-commerce sites, blogs may not attract as much traffic. Therefore, you may not need a premium web hosting plan for your blog. For starters, a shared hosting should do the trick especially since you’re still building up your readership.
With shared hosting, you install your website on a server along with other sites. From the name itself, you don’t exclusively have the server by yourself. This reason is why this hosting type is the most affordable in the market. At the same time, it also presents problems when it comes to the distribution of resources in the server. For example, if one of the sites in your neighborhood is generating lots of traffic, most of the server’s resources will go work on that site. As a result, the server won’t be able to provide your site with the same resources compared to the better-performing site.
However, when all is said and done, a shared hosting is still a great choice for site owners who are looking for an affordable way to launch a site now.
Of course, it doesn’t mean that you won’t need any other plan to support your blog. For example, your blog may soon blow up and attract more traffic than you’d ever imagine. To support the changes, you may need to upgrade your web hosting plan to accommodate the changes in your blog. Therefore, from shared hosting, you are potentially looking at a VPS hosting upgrade. However, it is ideal to move to this hosting type only if your site is starting to slow down due to the massive amount of traffic to your site.
Budget
Let’s face it – if you have enough resources to spend on a web hosting, then you probably don’t have any use for this guide at all. You can simply choose the best web hosting service provider that money can buy and be done with it.
However, if you are spreading your resources thin to launch your blog, then you need to check out which among the web hosting platforms are the “best” in terms of budget.
If you want the initial list of affordable web hosting services, then feel free to run through this list of the seven web hosting services that matter. Each entry contains a review that will help you determine how each service performs under different factors. The post also discusses the most common problems of cheap web hosting so you know what you’re up against.
WordPress
This platform is one of the most widely used due to the customization features available for site owners. Due to its popularity and ease of use, WordPress has attracted the interest of hosting services by offering a hosting subscription dedicated to this CMS.
If you want to put your best foot forward with WordPress, then you simply cannot go wrong with any one of these WordPress hosting services. Most of the ones on the list offer unique services such as advanced caching, auto updates, and advanced monitoring of vulnerabilities to ensure that your blog loads fast and are safe from harm. Not to mention, if in any case, you experience problems with your blog, then a team of in-house expert will be more than happy to assist you.
What’s the best website hosting for me?
Wow, thanks for asking!
But seriously, whether you did ask or not, I have found what I feel is the best web hosting for me.
Just to be clear, I cannot speak for some of the best hosting companies that I won’t mention below. I’m pretty sure you’ve also done your research as to what some of the most highly-rated web hosts are. However, since I don’t have first-hand experience with any of them, I can’t s
objectively finding the best website hosting in the strictest sense is like squeezing blood from a stone – it’s next to impossible! What you can determine is what’s the best for you.
Since you are the one who’s manning the ship here, it doesn’t matter what people say is the best web hosting out there. What’s best for them isn’t necessarily what’s best for you. Therefore, to form an opinion about what makes the “best” website host, you need to test out different web hosting companies and see which one works best for you.
Namecheap
For years, I have been running my site on Namecheap* shared hosting. I use my blog primarily to push for my writing services but I don’t publish as many posts as I want. Therefore, if you see yourself doing the same as I’m doing, then a shared hosting should be up your alley.
I initially chose Namecheap because this is where I purchase my domains. Therefore, it’s easier to manage my domains because they are hosted by the same company. Not to mention, they offer affordable hosting rates especially for beginners who don’t have a lot of cash to spend on!
Some people don’t like Namecheap for a host of reasons, all of which I strongly disagree with. It’s not top-tier hosting when it comes to speed, but I’m all for convenience – you cannot beat having your domain and hosting in the same place. Also, the chat support team has been more than helpful to me whenever I have questions about their services, despite what other sites say.
If there’s a con to the pros I’ve mentioned about Namecheap, it’s probably too simple for site owners looking for more juice from their web hosting provider. It’s not really a knock against Namecheap as there’s beauty in simplicity. But
However, I’ve been testing the waters with my web hosting of choice for my site and I’m currently trying out Siteground* for now.
Siteground
I want to deliver my site the best way that I can which prompted me to switch web hosting for the time being. Will I stick around Siteground? It’s hard to say for now because it’s only been a couple of weeks since I last moved my site here. But so far, the transition has been pretty excellent. All the good reviews about Siteground is true – chat support is excellent, its WordPress hosting lives up to its name, and others.
Here’s a comprehensive breakdown of Siteground in this Bluehost vs Siteground post. I suggest you read this first before you proceed with this article.
Below are points that I consider the strengths of Siteground and why you should highly consider it as your web hosting of choice:
Dedicated WordPress hosting – Siteground even has a plugin that helps you speed up your site by cleaning your cache. It works in conjunction with popular caching plugins as well so you don’t run the risk of having redundant plugins for your site.
Easy migration – I think this is the best feature that Siteground offers to its customers who want to migrate their sites here from another hosting provider. The plugin is easy to use as it takes care of migrating all your WordPress files to Siteground painlessly. You can move multiple sites using the plugin in a matter of minutes instead of using an FTP client!
A lot of people claim that it’s one of the fastest web hosting available. According to them, the loading time of a site hosted on Siteground is 1.7 seconds (1.3 seconds using the SG Optimizer plugin) which is almost thrice as fast as the industry standard (4.7 seconds).
Also, Siteground prides itself on being one of the most responsive customer support in the web host. They pick up the phone immediately to answer your questions. There is no wait time if you have queries for Siteground which is something that you can’t say about other hosting companies.
Having contacted their customer support multiple times to facilitate the migration, Siteground really does answer the call the moment you open their online chat. Pretty impressive!
Given its features, Siteground costs a bit more than Namecheap. I am currently subscribed to the GrowBig plan ($5.95/month) that includes free SSL certificate, SG Optimizer plugin, and the Siteground SuperCacher, all of which are not available in Namecheap. If you truly want to provide fast loading speed for your site, then Siteground is at least worth a try.
It’s really hard to say in my case because I ran a test on my Siteground-hosted site using GTMetrix and Pingdom and the scores I got are even to when I hosted my site on Namecheap.
To show you what I mean, here’s the Pingdom score of my site hosted on Namecheap:
Here’s the GTMetrix score of my Namecheap-hosted site:
Here’s the Pingdom score of my site on Siteground:
Here’s the GTMetrix score of my Siteground-hosted site:
To be fair, the scores don’t really say the entire story. The screenshots of the score for my site hosted on Namecheap was from years ago and I’ve undergone a redesign since then. Also, I have been using much more plugins now compared to before. Therefore, I can’t really provide an accurate head-to-head comparison without controlling these variable, especially now that I’ve migrated from Namecheap to Siteground.
However, the results only go to show that there are lots of mitigating factors that affect site speed. It’s not just the web host that is responsible for making your site load faster.
Thankfully for you, I have written a post at BloggingPro that details the things you need to do for your WordPress site to make it load faster!
However, to unlock the link, I would appreciate it if you can share the post by using any of the social buttons below. It’s a very small price that you must pay to make your site much more accessible to your target audience! 🙂
As seen above, your ideas as a blogger won’t mean anything if you don’t have a great place where you can store them online. By choosing the most appropriate web hosting for your blog, you will be able to communicate your thoughts much better and drive more traffic to your blog. As a result, you will be able to reach your goals as a blogger!
Also, you can’t go wrong with Namecheap* and Siteground* as your website hosting of choice. The former is cheaper and provides the most basic hosting needs to get your site up and running. The latter is a more premium web hosting provider loaded with features to make your site load faster. Either way, your audience wins as you provide them with a cost-effective (Namecheap) or blazing-fast (Siteground) solutions to access your site!
* – The link is an affiliate link. If you click on this link and make a successful transaction by way of signing up for an account or buying a product from the tool, I may receive a commission.
Looking for blogs that accept guest posts? You’re in the right place.
I’ve compiled and manually verified 132 websites across 19 industries that actively accept guest post submissions. Every site on this list has a working “Write for Us” page with clear submission guidelines. Unlike other lists filled with dead links, this one is regularly maintained.
New to guest posting? Start with my guest posting tutorial to learn the fundamentals before diving into this list.
1. Read their existing content first. Understand the site’s tone, formatting, and what topics they’ve already covered. Don’t pitch something they published last month.
2. Follow guidelines exactly. If they say 1500 words minimum, don’t submit 1200. Editors reject submissions that ignore basic instructions.
3. Pitch before writing. Most sites prefer 2-3 topic ideas before you write the full article.
4. Write original content. Every site requires 100% original content. Don’t repurpose existing posts or submit AI-generated content.
5. Include quality images if the guidelines require them. Use original photos or properly licensed stock images.
6. Focus on value, not promotion. Guest posts are not advertisements. Keep promotional mentions to your author bio.
7. Respond quickly. If an editor responds with revision requests, reply within 24-48 hours.
Building relationships with blog editors is key to long-term guest posting success. Learn more in my blogger outreach basics guide.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I know if a site is worth guest posting on?
Look for active publication schedules (posts within the last 1-2 months), engaged comments, and clear submission guidelines. Avoid sites that haven’t published in 6+ months. For a deeper dive, read my guide on how to evaluate website quality for guest blogging.
Should I pay to guest post?
Legitimate sites typically don’t charge for guest posts since you’re providing free content. Some high-authority sites charge processing fees. Evaluate the site’s reputation before paying.
How many backlinks can I include?
Most sites allow 1-2 links: one in your author bio and sometimes one contextual link in the body. Check individual guidelines.
How long does it take to hear back?
Response times vary from 24 hours to several weeks. Send a polite follow-up if you haven’t heard back in 2-3 weeks.
Can I republish my guest post on my own blog?
Usually no. Most sites require exclusive content. You can link to your published guest post, but not republish it in full.
What if my guest post gets rejected?
Ask for feedback if possible, revise your approach, and try a different site. Rejection is normal.
Want to suggest a site for this list?Contact me with the details.
Last Updated: December 2025 | Total Sites: 132 | Next Review: March 2026
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