Article Marketing - How to Make It Work For You

Information based marketing is one of the oldest and most effective techniques for bringing targeted prospects to your site and converting them into buyers. This is part of the reason that software, and distribution services that make the process of article promotion easier are so popular lately.

Though the various tools you can use to make the process of distributing your articles more easily are invaluable in getting your content the most exposure, thatï¿½s only half of the story.

Getting article marketing to work for your site lies primarily in two things:

ï¿½ The article youï¿½re submitting, and
ï¿½ The preparation you do before you a single word of your content is written.

Since those two determining factors make at least 50% of the difference in bringing you success, letï¿½s take a look at what the most common mistakes are in that area, and how to overcome them.

Mistake #1 - Confusing the Reason to Promote with Articles with the Reason to Write Articles

There are three key benefits to promoting an article - branding, lead generation, and as a corollary, online promotion, particularly as part of your optimization efforts.

Yet there is only one reason to write an article, and that is to inform your audience. If your article is not geared towards this as its primary purpose, you will fail to see the three benefits of promotion - because no one will want to read your article.

How many links youï¿½re able to generate by submitting your article to hundreds of sites will matter little if youï¿½re unable to get them picked up by publications, or read by people who search for information.

Sure, if you know what youï¿½re doing all those links pointing back to your site will count for something in your search engine results - but remember that generating links to your site is only one part of optimizing your site for Google, Yahoo or MSN.

To overcome this issue, youï¿½ll need to figure out how to get people to read what is in your article, and then click through to your site from your resource box. The best start to a solution is to produce better content.

In the end itï¿½s a matter of choice. You can get a little exposure from increased link backs, on a very basic level, or enjoy massive exposure from a little extra work.

Mistake #2 - Starting The Article Promotion without a Plan

Not every article can fulfil all three purposes of promotion. Some will work better for branding, others can generate leads and increase sales. But if you donï¿½t start out with a plan for what the function of your article should be, youï¿½ll end up unhappy with the results.

To overcome this issue, before you write a single word, decide what purpose the article is supposed to serve. An article meant to brand you as an expert should display your knowledge. One for generating leads may need to be geared towards solving a very specific problem.

An article that gets published every where and helps to make you known is not meant to have the same level of exposure as hyper-targeted content geared towards a narrow group of people. Learning the difference will help you know what kinds of articles to write.

Mistake #3- Publishing Content That Doesnï¿½t Help Your Reader

Maybe youï¿½re thinking: ï¿½All I want is links back to my site - any visitors the article generates is gravy.ï¿½

Well guess what? Not all article banks and directories are going to accept your content automatically. You can double the number of sites you can submit to by writing articles that the directories want to share with readers. And all it takes is one publisher with a hundred thousand readers to increase your potential audience tenfold.

So if you want article marketing to work for you, write articles that publishers want in their publications.

This also means obeying the standard guidelines, running a spell check, researching a good topic to write about, or even hiring a writer to produce articles on your behalf.

Mistake #4 - Failing to Maximize the Promotional Opportunities of Article Marketing

You already know that articles marketing can help you generate additional links back to your site. But did you know that you can get more visitors and better search engine results from articles in a variety of ways?

You can mention your desired keyword in strategic places, though you should take care not to overdo this. Some people will also tell you to make use of anchor text, which can also is an effective method. However, you should know that the majority of directories and publications arenï¿½t able to support this.

There are alternatives to this method that are just as effective, if not more so, but they require more space to explain.

Itï¿½s not just about the links back to your site either. Part of doing well with article marketing is getting picked up by publishers with large audiences, or gaining the ability to leverage other brands due to the quality of your work.

Better search engine results are great.

But by themselves they donï¿½t put money in your pocket - there are a myriad of factors that can turn your article marketing efforts into an opportunity to increase your income, not just the number of visitors to your site.

Tinu Abayomi-Paul is a Web Promotion Specialist who runs the Free Traffic Tips Blog. You can read part two of this article at www.freetraffictip.com/article-marketing and learn about three more common mistakes even veteran article marketers make.

Related Information of Interest:

Advertising Divas and Consumer Queens
In the past, the saying has always been “don’t underestimate the power of branding” but now the best advice seems to be “don’t underestimate the power of women!” Ignore it at your peril.

If statistics out of the US are any guide for the rest of the world to follow, and in the past this has been the case, then everyone in the advertising industry should give their serious attention to this fact. Jupiter Research has concluded that women influence 83 percent of all purchase decisions. There are more women online today than men.

And looking forward, 70 percent of all US women will be online in 2006, and looking even further ahead, 85 million women will purchase products and services online by 2010.

These statistics are huge by anyone’s measurements. Does anyone out there still have doubts as to the potential of ecommerce? Or more importantly, guys, how do your doubts hold up as to the influence of women on the internet?

US women over 40 are devoting more time online per week than running errands, eating or preparing meals, relaxing, or spending time with friends. Their internet time outweighs watching TV, listening to the radio and other media activities.

So what does this really tell us?

Fact #1 Advertisers in both traditional and new media, have up until now, been seriously underestimating women power
Fact #2 Women are the dominant gender when it comes to online spending
Fact #3 Women know women better than men know women (I’m sure most husbands would agree.)

Who better to understand the consumer behavior of women than women themselves? This last fact should lend itself to a rush to employ or promote females into the positions of advertising executives and creative directors. Now guys, don’t get us gals wrong, sensitive men can still create great ads for women and vice versa, but if the above statistics can be believed, then surely you should be eagerly encouraging the women in your industry to play a greater role in both decision making and creativity.

This makes such common sense to me, nothing biased about it.

Penny Archer, herself a “Consumer Queen”, is a Director of SmartDames FZ LLC, an international email List Broker based in Dubai Media City, Dubai. Other articles that she has written can be found at http://www.smartdames.com or http://www.listownerlimbo.com

7 Winning Tips For Article Marketers
1. Follow up with your readers.

For example, you could offer a subscription to your ezine or
you could offer a free email course in your resource box.

2. Use lots of white space.

Increase your article's white space by going over it for
sentences you can shorten and also paragraphs you could
break up into two or three shorter paragraphs.

3. Use numbered lists.

Use your numbered lists to convey points in your articles or
your steps in your "how to" article.

Numbered lists can also be used to create the content of
your article, like I did with this simple list article.

4. Use the word "you" a lot in your articles.

Make your writing feel more personal by using the word you a
lot within your article.

That way your readers will feel like you are talking
directly to them and you'll be able to better draw them into
your article's content.

5. Write to one person.

Choose a person such as a friend or spouse to write your
article to.

By doing this, you will naturally use the word you a lot
within your article, and your readers will feel like you are
talking to them one to one.

6. Offer an article announcement list.

Keep people up to date on your latest articles by publishing
an email list that announces your new articles.

You could also announce your new articles by RSS to
publishers and webmasters that like your writing.

7. Let your affiliates use your articles to earn
commissions.

Make your articles available to your affiliates to publish
on their sites or in their ezines with their affiliate links
in your resource box.

You'll be able to successfully raise your profits by turning
your articles into an effective promotional tool for your
affiliates.

Ken runs the Net Pro Marketer where you'll find informative articles on business, marketing, and ezine publishing. Browse through the articles or submit your own at: www.netpromarketer.com

Article Marketing for Search Engine Traffic
There are sites on the net that serve tons of traffic everyday. Traffic you wish you had, right?
The web is made up of billions of links, much like a spiderï¿½s web but on a larger scale. Search engines spider the web looking for new content to add to their massive databases so they can rank how relevant it is to particular search phrases.
What are the search engines looking for?
New content! In order for any search engine to provide relevant results to their visitors (so their visitors will repeatedly use them) they must provide the best results possible for every search performed on their site.
The best search engine gets more traffic and more traffic means more advertising money for them - so search engines have to be up to date to stay competitive in their market.
The big sites on the net, people, who have page rankings of 5 upwards, obviously serve a ton of visitors per day, provide search engines with a mass of links to follow and index. Thatï¿½s why they go back to the big sites more often than the little ones.
High traffic, very popular sites are visited by the search engine robots more often than sites with little traffic. Some large sites are visited by search engines as much as 2-4 times per month.
How can article marketing increase your search engine traffic?
By submitting articles you can get links from these high traffic sites. Furthermore you can optimize your articles with your search terms to get high rankings for that particular page. This would otherwise take weeks on a new site as oppose to a well established one such as this.
Each of these sites will have its own resource area, at the end of the article, writers include a bit of Author information on where to find out more about them. Place your website link in here and bobï¿½s your uncle the search engines will find your site through that link.
The more articles you submit with your website link in them, the more pages on the net you have pointing to you from high traffic sites and the better your ranking and link popularity.
Many good article sites these days create RSS feeds for each category. This provides an additional opportunity to market your site and article to people who subscribe to the feeds.
Start submitting your articles today. You will be amazed at the results they yield.

Richard is the Publisher of Articleprobe a Free Article Distribution and Submisssion Service. Set up your account today and start submitting your articles to Articleprobe