Guest blog or promotional article?

Recently I was asked if there is any difference between a promotional article and a guest blog post.

The short answer is definitely 🙂

Here’s the longer answer! A promotional article is 500 – 600 words of information that you make available for people to use on websites and in newsletters. At the end of the article is your bio which is how you get promotion by letting people use your article.

A guest blog post is a blog post you write for someone else’s blog. The length will vary depending on the blog and topic involved but is probably 300 – 500 words long. You may have a bio at the end of the post, a bio elsewhere on the blog or simply a link from the author line. Generally, the blog post is not duplicated anywhere else.

So the promotional article will potentially be used in many places while a guest blog post is generally used once. Guest blog posts give you exposure almost exclusively though blogs (ie attracts people who read blogs to read your blog) whereas promotional articles get broader exposure and don’t require you to have a website, blog or newsletter.

Which do you prefer to write and use?