Guest Post Blog Discovery

This drill builds a qualified, scored list of blogs that accept guest posts in your niche. It combines Ahrefs Content Explorer searches with Clay enrichment to produce a tiered target list ready for pitch outreach.

Input

• Company description and positioning
• ICP definition: who your customers are, what they read, what problems they search for
• 2-3 competitor company names (for cross-reference discovery)
• Target list size: 15 for Smoke, 50 for Baseline, 200 for Scalable
• Niche keywords: 5-10 terms your ICP would search (e.g., "sales automation", "cold email", "B2B marketing")

Steps

1. Search for blogs with guest post pages

Using ahrefs-content-explorer, run multiple queries to cast a wide net:

Query set 1 — Explicit guest post signals:

• "write for us" AND "{niche_keyword_1}"
• "guest post guidelines" AND "{niche_keyword_2}"
• "submit an article" AND "{niche_keyword_3}"
• "contribute" AND "guest" AND "{niche_keyword_4}"
• "become a contributor" AND "{niche_keyword_5}"

Filter: domain_rating >= 30 and organic_traffic >= 500.

Query set 2 — Blogs that have published guest content:

• intitle:"guest post by" AND "{niche_keyword}"
• intitle:"guest author" AND "{niche_keyword}"
• "this is a guest post" AND "{niche_keyword}"

These find blogs that already publish guest content, even if they lack a formal "write for us" page.

Query set 3 — Competitor guest posts:

• "{competitor_founder_1}" -site:{competitor_domain_1}
• "{competitor_company_2}" AND "guest" -site:{competitor_domain_2}

Find where competitors have placed guest posts. These blogs are high-probability targets.

Deduplicate results by domain. Keep a master list of unique blog domains.

2. Analyze each blog's profile

For each candidate blog domain, use ahrefs-content-explorer with site: queries to pull:

• Top-performing content (by organic traffic)
• Average word count of published articles
• Publishing frequency (estimate from published_date spread)
• Whether guest authors appear (check author field for non-staff names)

Use ahrefs-backlink-analysis to pull:

• Domain rating
• Total referring domains
• Organic traffic estimate

3. Create and enrich the prospect table in Clay

Use clay-table-setup to create a table called "Guest Post Targets - {date}" with columns:

| Column | Type | Notes | |--------|------|-------| | blog_domain | URL | Root domain of the blog | | blog_name | Text | Publication or blog name | | domain_rating | Number | From Ahrefs (0-100) | | organic_traffic | Number | Monthly estimated organic traffic | | guest_post_page_url | URL | Link to "write for us" or guidelines page | | editor_name | Text | Editor or content manager name | | editor_email | Email | Contact email for pitching | | editor_linkedin | URL | LinkedIn profile | | content_topics | Multi-select | Topics the blog covers | | avg_word_count | Number | Typical article length | | publishing_frequency | Select | daily / 2-3x_week / weekly / biweekly / monthly | | accepts_guest_posts | Boolean | Confirmed via guidelines page or past guest posts | | competitor_published | Boolean | Has a competitor published here? | | recent_article_url | URL | Most relevant recent article for pitch personalization | | recent_article_topic | Text | Summary of that article | | relevance_score | Number 1-5 | How well blog audience matches your ICP | | tier | Select | tier_1 / tier_2 / tier_3 | | pitch_status | Select | not_pitched / pitched / accepted / declined / published |

Import all candidate blogs from step 1.

4. Enrich editor contacts

Run clay-enrichment-waterfall on the table:

• Editor email: Clay email finder > Hunter.io > Apollo > Scrape the blog's about/contact page
• Editor LinkedIn: Clay LinkedIn enrichment > manual search
• Verify all emails before outreach

For blogs where you cannot find an editor email: check the blog's contact page, about page, or the "write for us" page itself. Many list a specific submission email.

5. Score and tier the list

Calculate a composite score for each blog:

• Domain Rating (30%): Higher DR = more valuable backlink. Normalize to 1-5 scale (DR 30-39 = 1, DR 40-49 = 2, DR 50-59 = 3, DR 60-74 = 4, DR 75+ = 5)
• Audience Relevance (30%): How closely does the blog's readership match your ICP? Score 1-5 based on topic overlap with your niche keywords.
• Traffic (20%): Monthly organic traffic indicates readership. Normalize to 1-5 scale.
• Accessibility (10%): Confirmed guest post page + verified email = 5. Past guest posts but no guidelines = 3. No clear signal = 1.
• Competitor presence (10%): Competitor published here = +2 bonus.

Sort by composite score. Assign tiers:

• Tier 1 (top 20%): DA 50+, strong audience match, confirmed guest posts. Maximum pitch personalization.
• Tier 2 (middle 50%): DA 30-50, decent audience match. Standard personalization.
• Tier 3 (bottom 30%): DA 20-30, moderate match. Template-based pitching at Scalable level only.

6. Push to Attio

Use attio-lists to create a list called "Guest Post Targets - {date}". Push the scored and tiered list from Clay with all enrichment data. Tag each entry with tier and discovery source.

Output

• Scored, tiered list of blogs accepting guest posts, stored in Attio
• Editor contact info verified and ready for outreach
• Recent article references for pitch personalization
• Clear tier ranking for prioritizing pitch effort

Triggers

• Run at play start (Smoke and Baseline)
• Run monthly at Scalable/Durable to discover new blogs and refresh stale contacts
• Run immediately when a new niche keyword or competitor emerges