When we first start out in blogging we are driven to create content that is focused towards a goal – the whole reason we started blogging. This could be to educate or to entertain. To inspire or to inform. Whatever the reason you started blogging, I bet that right from the gate you were posting content that lined up with that focus, because that is how you get new readers and subscribers – right?

Isn’t it funny that as we grow our blogs, whether they become successful or seem to stagnate. That after time the majority of them seem to start to slowly start to lose their focus as bloggers start to run out of things to say, or get caught up in the latest fad – even though it provides no value to the focus and direction of the blog.bet that right from the gate you were posting content that lined up with that focus, because that is how you get new readers and subscribers – right?

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Over the last 18 months since I created StandOutBlogger.com, I have met a lot of bloggers and made a lot of friends through this blog, and like to think of my visitors and subscribers as part of the SOB s family (BTW the family is almost 2000 people strong now!!). This is why I wanted to show you a few photos from my wedding (which happened in June, but Fiona and I only recently returned home to Australia from Canada). I hope you enjoy them.

Make a Smilebox slideshow

(sorry about using SmileBox, I find it annoying, but couldn’t find another way to add the photos without making people scroll for ages!)

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Glen Allsopp has been blogging for over three years. He runs PluginHQ which is a site about internet business and also one on the other end of the niche scale about personal development.

My blog is almost one year old now and in that time I’ve received visitors from hundreds of different sources. Of course the usual suspects are there such as search engine traffic, traffic from stumbleupon and even a trickle of visitors from my comments on other blogs.

There may be one type of visitor you have not had in common with me though, and that’s visitors from guest posting on other blogs. I can tell you now, looking at the time on site stats and bounce ratio for all the types of traffic I receive, guest posts bring the most targeted and loyal type of visitor.

And, not only do they send visitors, guest posts bring your site more links and more subscribers. When you look at the fact that one guest post on a large blog sent me over 300 subscribers, you start to see the potential of this traffic source. I don’t think there are enough tips out there for people on how to guest post effectively so, as I have written around 40 in the last two years, I thought I would share some of my top tips.

1. Make Sure Your Own Blog is Prepared

I decided to put this at the top of my list not because it is necessarily the most important point but because so many people forget to share this crucial information. To understand what I mean by this point, let’s look at a little scenario.

you spend an hour one afternoon writing an article for a site in your niche that is expecting your guest post submission. you’ve worked hard on the piece, you send it off and then a few days later the post goes live. Through a combination of RSS, Email and website visitors to the host blog, you get an extra 150 eyeballs on your content that day.

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