Write for us at the Jay Gaulard blog and have your guest posts presented to a highly targeted audience that’s interested in the outdoors, lifestyle, food, writing, traveling, and more. Enjoy the many SEO benefits of guest posting as well as the engagement of my readers.
Thanks so much for stopping by my write for us page and showing interest in writing a guest post for my Jay Gaulard blog. I’m truly grateful you’re here.
As a writer/blogger, I’m sure you already know how guest posting can validate your expertise in a given field as well as establish you as a defined authority. It’s no secret. Folks “promoting” themselves has been going on for years. The trick is to get your writing in front of the most targeted audience possible. If you’re interested in writing about the topics I cover on this website, you’re in the right place. You’ll not only receive exposure here, but you’ll also receive it on my social media channels as well. And, you’ll earn my trust and hopefully a long lasting relationship with me.
Take a moment to read farther down this page, as it explains the nitty gritty; my guest posting guidelines, the submission process, as well as the specific type of content I accept.
What I’m Looking For
There are only a handful of areas I’d like to touch on in regards to what I’m looking for in successful guest blog post submissions. These areas are important though. I’ll expand upon my ideas in the list below, but initially I’ll say each post should be comprehensive, based on actual experiences, interesting for my readers, and have an educational aspect to it. Your goal is to have your post published on this website. To increase those chances, your contribution should:
- Be at least 1000 words and be relevant to the topics I discuss myself. It should also be well-researched and you should appear as though you’re an expert on your subject. Also, after someone reads your post, they should have new information that they can base some sort of action upon. For example, if you decide to write about a walking trail or a small village in the Cotswolds area of England, include the best times to visit, general weather conditions for the time of year you visited, length of the trail, facts about the village, helpful tips for staying in hotels and the best places to shop, etc…
- The fasted way to have a submitted post rejected or removed from virtually any website is to have it published on another website as well. This is non-negotiable. I will not allow a guest post on these pages if it can be found someplace else on the web.
- If you make claims in your post, it’s best to back those claims up by data and/or photos. For example, if you submit a recipe post and you tell us the dish looked delicious after it was prepared, I would expect to see a photo of that dish. If you write about hiking on a specific trail in northern California and tell my readers it was full of roots and rocks and tough to traverse, a photo of the conditions would be extremely helpful. If you make some sort of statistical or debatable claim, you should cite your sources and offer urls to them.
- Promotional and affiliate links are not allowed in any published posts.
- All submitted guest posts should include original photos. Avoid using stock photos, as those will be rejected. Stock photos don’t add value.
- Make your post look good and easy to read by adding headings, subheadings, lists, bullet points, etc… Also, shorter paragraphs usually help readers digest content.
Topics I Cover
I like to think of my audience as consisting of those people who read my posts during a long conversation over a hot cup of coffee. I also think those who are looking for specific facts and tips on a variety of subjects browse these pages. Imagine someone browsing beautiful photos of the coast of Maine, a story about visiting a French antique store, a recipe for a wonderful dessert, an adventure about hiking a trail to the top of a cliff, a description of a lovely estate or inn. My readers enjoy seeing very nice pictures and they love learning about places they’ve never been and things they’ve never seen. With that in mind, I only accept clear and compelling content that falls into the fallowing categories:
- Outdoors (hiking, nature, environment, wildlife, adventure)
- Travel (destinations, inns, b&bs, tours, guides, tips, food, culture)
- Food (cuisine, recipes, cooking, ingredients, restaurants)
- Lifestyle (home, gardening, architecture, property/land, activities)
- Writing (short stories, technique, tutorials, reading/books)
This list is growing. Please check the description of each category on my blog for the latest. Also review the current posts to get an idea of the tone, layout, language, quality of the photos, as well as the quality of the writing.
Benefits to You
By putting forth the effort to create a stellar post and have it pass muster to reside on this website, you’ll be rewarded in a few different ways. You’ll receive:
- Exposure to a targeted, active, ambitious, and growing audience. Those who follow my blog are committed to it and value what’s contained on it. They bookmark its pages and return for later views. It’s all about the relationship. They’ll hopefully form the same type of relationship with you and your website.
- Inclusion in my posts by email mailing list. I’ve got an ever growing and quite active mailing list for this website. When a post is written, it’s sent out to this list the next morning. Imagine your post being sent to all these mailboxes. Imagine it being forwarded to friends and shared on the recipient’s social media.
- Inclusion on my social media properties. I currently share posts on my Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter channels. Your post will be shared as well.
- One dofollow link per post. Besides what I mentioned above, this is pretty much what everyone is after.
Submission Guidelines
To sum things up and to add a few more items in regards to submissions, I’ll share a list of guidelines here.
- All submissions must meet my standards. Please don’t send posts that you’ve sent to one hundred other website owners. The only posts I’m willing to accept are those from real people who have a real interest in connecting with my audience.
- I reserve the right to reject any submission for any reason. I also reserve the right to make minor edits to any submission. If an edit is made, you’ll be notified of the change.
- All submissions must be written by a human being. No automated article generator pieces will be accepted.
- Your piece must be a length of at least 1000 words, include photos, and must offer something of value to my audience.
- Only one self-serving link per post will be accepted. This will be contained in your bio section beneath your post. If you’ve guest posted for me before, you may include links to your other articles on my website if they’re related to your current one.
- Any included links in your post bio must be related to my website. Please don’t submit a post about Honfleur, France and then link to a sneaker brand in India.
- Once I publish your post on this website, it’s not to be published on any other website, including your own.
- If you have a video on YouTube that’s related to your post, you may embed it into the post.
- All images should be 1200×900 in dimension for the body of the post along with one that’s 1600×800 for the header. All images must be high quality. All submitted images must be owned by you or you must have rights to use the images. Once you submit them to be posted on this website, you grant me the rights to use them. Credit will be given to whomever owns the rights to the images beneath the post in the bio section.
Consider This…
Guest posting is alive and well on the web and it gives startups, bloggers, and entrepreneurs an effective method for connecting to larger audiences than the ones they currently have. I’ve seen guests on both blogs as well as YouTube shoot to the top, simply by being guests on various web properties. I’ve decided to open this blog up to guest posting because I’m a fan of this type of thing. It helps people build their brands. I see only upside on everyone’s part. Remember though, I only like to work with real people, not SEO agencies. To indicate to me that you’re an actual person who has a genuine interest in forming a relationship with me, consider following me on social media and leaving a comment here or there. That goes a long way.
Facebook
Instagram
Twitter
YouTube
It’s incredible how many guest post submissions I currently receive. If you decide to submit one, resist the temptation of contacting me asking if it’s going to be published or not. If it’s selected for presentation on this website, you’ll hear from me and you’ll quickly see it on these pages.
I know what I shared above was a lot to read and it seems like my requirements are stringent, but honestly, it’s to cut down on spam submissions. You’d be surprised what the SEO folks try to get away with out there. All I’m trying to do is cut down on those types of submissions. With that in mind, I’m looking forward to seeing what you have to share. If it’s a good fit, I’ll be in touch with you to give you the next steps and to indicate if there’s anything else I’ll need to move forward with your post. To get the ball rolling, send me an email at jay [at] gaulard.com and let me know your ideas. Please use the section below as a template for your message:
Name:
Email:
Job Title:
Social Media Profiles:
Links to Your 3 Best Articles:
Your Website URL:
Short Bio:
Post Title:
Post Description:
Comments or Questions:
Thanks!