Getting a guest post submitted for review on our blog is so great. It should fill us all with pride and joy that someone would rather dedicate their time to write on our blog rather than their own.
Getting guest posts isn’t always easy, and getting quality guest posts is even harder. In fact, unless you are a large, respected blogger, the quality of guest posts you get probably isn’t that great. Sure, we get some great submissions here anf there, but I bet you the higher percentage of guest posts on your blog were ones that didn’t quite “meet your standards.”
I know from experience, a lot of guest post submissions I have seen in my time just flat out suck. They’re terrible, had no format, it was a link barn – that just gets me mad. I received one guest post once that was literally five paragraphs with 10 or so links pointing back to their site. Were the serious, or just yanking my chain there?
Anyways, I want to go over some thoughts that pop into my own mind when it comes to dealing with guest posts that don’t quite meet your submission standards.
My First Thought: Edit/Revise It
This is always the first idea that comes into my mind when I see a guest post that I don’t want to immediately approve to the blog. While I suspect that every guest post submitted on any blog will probably be edited a little, some need more than others.
But isn’t that always your first thought? I mean, a guest post practically gives you a vacation day from writing on your blog if it’s up to your standards. But when it comes to editing someone elses work, is it always worth it? Why not instead of us editing it we just ask the author to re-write it for us? Chances are, they won’t because they obviously didn’t care to thoroughly read through your guest post guidelines (you do have those, right?) and get it right the first time.
If you have emailed the author telling them that their post won’t be approved to your blog because of the lack of quality, don’t expect them to really want to re-write it for you. Like I said above, they didn’t care the first time obviously so they probably won’t the next time.
So that leaves it to you to edit the post. Some bloggers get lucky, and it’s just an issue of formatting, or a little extra needs to be added to the post. But for the rest of us (like me) who see some horribly done posts, we may have to turn to editing.
Why Editing It Yourself May Not Be Ideal
It depends on how bad the post really is, but some posts were just never meant to be published. It may even turn out that in the time you edited that bad guest post, you could have written a whole other post yourself, where everything would have been perfect from your viewpoint.
That happened here. We received a guest post submission that had absolutely ZERO formatting. It was one giant paragraph of about 600 words. While the article had a good length, the content was poorly written, and too many links to the authors site were in it. It was decided that it would take way too much time to edit it, and I just used an idea that will be covered in the next point.
Create Your Own Post(s) Based off of it
I have done this once here, and I have to say that it turned out nicely. I won’t say which post, but it got a fairly decent reaction.
If the post is bad enough, I think that instead of trashing it, you should figure out what was missing from the post and write about it in a new post. It wouldn’t be fair to the author if you took the exact idea and then write about it yourself. It’s more fair, and even more beneficial to take that post and create ideas from it.
One way I do this a lot with just about every post I come up with is to use Mind Mapping. If you know what that is, then just simply use the exact idea the guest poster came up with, then come up with your own ideas from the left out information from the article. It works so great, and it’s technically not stealing, right?
Regardless of How You Do It – Give Credit Where Credit is Due!
Even if you mind map some ideas for posts, I still think you should leave credit to the original author somewhere in the post. This is especially true if you decided to totally re-write the post exactly as it was and pull some information from it to use yourself.
This is something we constantly talk about in my English class in school – plagiarism. If you don’t give credit where credit is due, then you can get in some serious trouble. One blog I can definitely recommend you read is Jonathan Bailey’s Plagiarism Today blog.
A Little Controversy: Submit It As Is
If you don’t want to edit it, and you don’t want to create your own posts off it, and you believe that another authors opinion should be stated the way the author intended it, then just hit the publish button. You might want to check for spelling mistakes and all of that basic stuff of course.
But I find that this is something that a lot of us, even myself, tend to overlook when it comes to the disapproval of guest posts. Just because the post doesn’t meet your standards doesn’t mean it isn’t quality.
Let’s Hear It!
What do you think about approving a guest post without editing it? What do you think should be done to a “bad” guest post instead of rejection? Share your thoughts, because I’d love to hear some more ideas from you guys.
Photo by Caren Litherland
{ 28 comments… read them below or add one }
Nice Alex, you put it everything in this nice write up. Read whole post in jiffy, as I am looking forward towards more and more guest blogging so It was really help full for me.
p.s. I am obsessed with this blog’s design
Hami’s last blog post..Awesome Free Symbian Themes
Glad you liked the post! While the next post is prepared, there are 142 other posts you can read in the mean time. :p
And I am so glad you like the design. I have to say I am obsessed with it too. I even leave it up when I am not on the computer just so I can see it when I return, haha!
Some interesting points. I have refused a few substandard guest posts, and to be hoest I just emailed them back and said that I thought that their guest post didnt fit with my blog. I don’t want to spend time rewriting someone elses post.
Tom – StandOutBlogger.com’s last blog post..Your Twitter Questions Answered!
It does seem like a waste of time to rewrite the post, I agree with you. But hey, some people don’t mind it. Whatever floats their boat, right?
Just out of curiosty, what did they say when they replied to you about the guest post? Did they even reply back to your email?
I feel some frustration in you Alex… people don’t usually write this kind of post unless they are filled with emotions…
I have save myself the trouble currently by not having guest posts, but that may change in the near future.
To me, if the person has taken the time to read the guidelines, they usually provide good quality work that can be published without editing or only minor ones (to fit the design of the site).
If people don’t respect you enough to supply proper work, I don’t think they deserve your time in return either. Being polite, I would email back stating the non-acceptance of their post, but I certainly won’t bother rewriting it.
Nicolas Prudhon’s last blog post..Are You Paying For “Real” SEO Services?
It is pretty annoying, what can I say? :p
You don’t have guest posts? Hmmm…have you ever gotten any offers for one?
I understand what you’re saying, if they don’t do it right the first time then forget them. It makes sense, but having a guest post is such a great thing that I can see why people would go as far as revising the thing.
Guest post is a great thing is the post is good, but if I have to revise it fully, then I don’t think it’s “that” good…
Nicolas Prudhon’s last blog post..Misspelled Keywords Optimization Nemesis
I wrote guest posts for lot of blogs and luckily no body rejected me
. The only link you should get from blogpost is should be from the author bio according to me .
That’s cool, what kind of posts do you write?
Great tips all around. What I’m most impressed about is that a 15-year old guy blogs a whole lot better than me.
Gotta work on my blogging skills now. LOL
Keep up the good work Alex.
And yeah, it’s better not to waste precious time editing nonsensical guest blog posts.
Thanks Terry, I do my best.
Now thats a lovely post Alex..
I’ll definitely have these points under consideration while approving a guest post..
Enk.’s last blog post..15 Great Comment Plugins for your Wordpress Blog
Cool Enk, glad I can help you!
Just tell me one thing Alex from where you got such awesome kind of idea about your post. Believe me your mind is really active and I think this one is god gifted.
We always got post relevant to our business and I think that’s why we keep waiting to get more and more from you and from your active brain.
Usually I write most of these blog posts from personal experiences. I received a pretty ugly guest post submission, and figured it would be a good idea to reflect on some of the paths I took to try to make the guest post “up to par” rather than reject i
I think you should submitt it as is. Afterall it’s those guest posters that are making the name for themselves, why would you care how people approach their posts.
You don’t believe in changing anything at all? How about instead of changing the content, the format was changed? What would you think of that?
I’ve been really lucky so far in getting great guest posts, some with unbelievable reader reactions (right Nicolas?) lol.
Anyway, I do edit formatting; nothing serious though, mainly issues regarding going from a word document to WP – there’s always issues there of no fault to the author.
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..12 Tips To Increase Sales On Your E-commerce Website
Honestly Dennis, I didn’t expect such reaction either! I’m still busy replying some comments from time to time there!
Nicolas Prudhon’s last blog post..Are You Paying For “Real” SEO Services?
I see that! Come back anytime.
Dennis Edell’s last blog post..12 Tips To Increase Sales On Your E-commerce Website
Personally I use a different system to the one on this blog (and many others), and it seems to work quite well.
Instead of asking people to write the article and then submit it, I try and connect with the guest poster first, then I can make sure they don’t waste their time. At the end of the day, I feel they’re doing me a favour by guest posting as it gives me a break, so for them to spend their time on an article I don’t use is, in my opinion, a massive waste of their time.
Like I mentioned, I try and connect with the person before they post. I look at their past writing experience and the idea they have for the guest post, then I confirm that they can do the guest post. That way they don’t write the article only for it to be rejected.
Simon | Teenius’s last blog post..Five Things That Bloggers Shouldn’t Think
That’s cool Simon, I guess that’s how we did our little guest post swap then?
I try not to edit a whole lot of guest posts because then It won’t be the guest poster’s post. It will become my post. I do add relevant images if the poster hasn’t to make it a bit spicy if needed.
If its not up to the par, I reject it.
Good post here.
Good point Syed, if they submit something you totally rewrite, it’s not their work, but yours.
Like Dennis, I have been pretty lucky to have solid guest posts. Usually before I agree to let someone guest post I will check out their blog and make sure that they know what they are doing.
I don’t know if I would just “hit publish” if the article was not high quality as I think that would reflect poorly on you even if you did not write it. There are many people who would totally miss that it was a guest post.
Tycoon Blogger’s last blog post..10 easy blog post ideas
That’s like the complete opposite for me here! I check a lot of people’s blogs, and they have great content there. But they come here and don’t post to the best of their abilities which is kind of frustrating for me!
In my case I mostly edit all the post submitted for review to maintain the post quality, either in terms of Image or Text editing.
Sometime it’s my lucky day when I get a perfect article .. I;m sure you know how it feels when you get a perfect article.
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Can’t say I do!