Article Marketing is one of the best free effective methods you can use to promote your website and all your marketing campaigns.
If you’ve gone through my blog archives, you would have noticed that I don’t have many posts on article marketing. That’s not to say I don’t believe in it or know how essential it is for getting backlinks and free traffic to your website or blog.
I stopped writing to article directories temporarily for at least a year because I wasn’t getting any traffic then, despite getting lots of backlinks. I used that break to focus on other aspects of the business, blogging being one of them. Well now I’ve resumed doing article marketing. Want to know the reason why? Well I am now doing freelance writing articles and every week I write at least 5 articles and publish them at selected article directories. But most importantly I found the mistakes I made that caused me not to get much traffic for the articles I posted one year ago.
Article Writing Mistake #1 – Lack of Article Marketing Research
When I first started article writing I did so without doing any research on how successful authors write and the techniques they used. My mistake was to just focus on the relevant keywords and start cracking. As a result, my posts were generally too long. The correct technique is to write short articles about 270 – 300 words.
Article Writing Mistake #2 – Article Contents not Scannable
Whenever I visit an ezine site looking for ideas, I usually don’t like to read long articles. I’ll just read the first paragraph and moved on. However if it’s long and has good sub headers, I’ll just read these headers only. If they are long, without eye catching presentation, I skip them. I realized now I was guilty of many of these same article writing mistakes then.
Article Writing Mistake #3 – Article Headlines didn’t grab my readers’ attention
I learned that in an article, there are just 2 places where you can grab the attention of a reader. The first is the title or headlines and the other is the bio text. Looking back, I have to admit most of my articles’ headlines or bio text could have been better written in these 2 areas.
How you can use these article marketing tips to help improve your web traffic?
1. Reaching out to more people
If you think you have written a good article, don’t you want to share it with others. When you choose this method of submitting your articles to ezine directories, nothing really stops you getting the traffic. If you are are new marketer, it gives you better results than writing on your new blog which may not be indexed, have no traffic or no search engine ranking. But when you submit to article directories, all it needs is good content and good article writing technique to bring in traffic.
2. Get High Search Engine Ranking
Even with a short article, you could make it search-engine friendly by optimizing your article using good keyword phrases that can give your articles a high search engine ranking.However avoid using too many keywords. In fact for a 300 word article, I usually use about 3 keywords.
3. The Use of Readers’ Comments and Testimonials
When you received good reviews and testimonial, put them to good use on your website or blog. Find a relevant post in which you can use them to promote your products or substantiate an opinion on your topic of discussion. It does give you that extra weight besides looking nice on your blog or website as it helps to build your reputation, or the authority that you site projects or at least tries to.
IMHO testimonials are very powerful statements as they come from people who shared similar experiences or who have just used and loved your product or services. Sometimes they serve as your customers’ deciding vote before buying your product.
Final Thoughts
Even after one year of neglecting article marketing, I’ve finally realized how much I could have gained had I known some of the things I learned only recently. But on the other hand I prefer to look to the future and not what could have been. I’m pretty fired up on article writing especially after having learned some of the best kept Article Marketing Secrets from the gurus.
I’ve been very encouraged by the good article stats I’m seeing in my Ezinearticles submission. In fact it was this one post which got 100+ views the day after it was published that got me curious as to how that came about, something unheard of when I last wrote articles for them.
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Did you miss any of these?:
- Lessons Learned From My Article Writing
- Does Article Marketing Really Help With SEO?
- Writing Good Articles Will Bring More Traffic To Your Website
- My Article Directories Submission Service Kicks Off On This Blog
- Article Marketing
May 29, 2009 at 3:44 am
Hi Peter,
glad that you are back to write articles. I have done that for a couple of years now ( over 400 written) and will not stop as far as my brains are working. With article the content is the king especially as to the title, teaser and the AuthorBox. So the tech – things, like high se-rankings, are just side benefits. Article marketing is a wide process, where we have to plan every detail, including the landing page. But I think, you already knew that.
May 29, 2009 at 9:48 am
Thanks for the article Peter, very helpful. Good to see such a good focus on quality content too. Do you “spin” your articles? I've been reading a lot about the penalties of duplicate content lately and wonder if you just submit your articles to one Article Directory or more?
Thanks!
May 29, 2009 at 10:31 am
@cycler: Hi Juhani, Wow 400 articles that's incredible. May I ask what benefits can you share now that you've done so many articles. Would you say they have helped propelled your site and the keywords you were ranking to top search engine ranking. I'm seeing you on #1 in 'home internet business'. Congrats.
May 29, 2009 at 10:45 am
@ Home-Work-Newbie: Thanks for dropping by. No I don't spin my articles as the end result look alien to me. I used to fear that submitting the same article to various article directories will be considered as duplicate content. But I have recently learned from my mentor that duplicate contents are only if it is found on the same site, so there is nothing to worry from submitting the same articles to different directories.
May 29, 2009 at 10:28 pm
Hi Peter,
I have not done Article Marketing in quite some time either. I've gotten sidetracked trying to learn other traffic tactics. Writing articles takes focus and time away from the internet. I find I get to distracted with emails, stats and other things. Thanks for the post – great reminder.
How many directories do you submit to?
May 29, 2009 at 10:41 pm
Good article, Peter. I haven't been big on article writing, mainly because I've always preferred to add any articles I write to my blogs instead. I may explore that again, though, as I've started writing articles for other people, and I know they're using some of those articles on these article directories. And Ezine Articles even sent me a mug; can't be mad at that.
Sidebar question; did you decide to stop taking paid ads?
May 30, 2009 at 1:51 am
@ Luca:Well we do have something in common and I'm sure you'll come back to writing again. I mostly submit to Ezinearticles, as they are the best. I used to take a long time to write until I found these new techniques and learned them. I now take about 20 min to write one article.
May 30, 2009 at 2:02 am
@MItch: I used to think of it this way too and that's why I stopped for one year. But it's funny how things come one big circle and I'm at it again. No regrets. Article marketing is really beneficial.
Yes I stopped all external ads keeping only OIO as that allows me to put them as nofollow. Everything else have been removed including any trace of the scripts. I realized you can't have the best of both worlds, either that or higher PR which helps 20% of getting top search engine ranking. So I made the obvious choice and chose the latter. But I see that you are still status quo. Well that's your decision but if the money is good I guess you can still do that.Mine wasn't that fantastic so it's not worth the risk.
May 30, 2009 at 3:57 am
Hi Peter,
Your right there. And if we have talent in writing, let us utilize it. Write and write and write and optimize. BTW, I included your blog in my list of business blogs and bloggers whom I owe a lot of lessons in blogging. You can check my post at my blog.
Thanks.
May 30, 2009 at 4:26 am
@ viclogic: Hi Vic, yes I believe a good part of our time is used in writing and learning new things and making new friends in the process. Thanks for including my blog in your list. I just visited your blog and I really like your blog and its design.
May 30, 2009 at 1:02 pm
I used to write articles some time ago but once the term Bum Marketing came about it seemed as though everyone began submitting so many articles to let's say Ezine Articles that it was taking more than a week in certain niches to get an article approved.
I stopped doing articles but now that I see this post I am going to start doing articles again but this time I will publish them directly to my website as a way to expand my own content since that is one thing that everyone even Google agrees helps websites rankings.
Paul
May 31, 2009 at 10:23 am
Hi Peter,
if I look at the stats, I have to say that most targeted traffic comes from the search engines. I always write optimized articles with long tail keywords, which form a keyword family. They work best and have increased se-rankings well.
May 31, 2009 at 6:27 pm
@ Medical Billing Sitemap: Hi Paul, EZA is pretty fast, usually it takes about 2 days to approve my articles. EZA is recognized by many as the best one. In fact some people just submit to EZA and nowhere else.
June 1, 2009 at 5:11 am
Thanks Peter, good advice. I thought article spinning did look a little odd, and not to mention time consuming! You've saved me a lot of time I think
Ed
June 1, 2009 at 7:20 am
i visit your blog and i like it very much, even your designs are very unique.
June 1, 2009 at 9:47 am
Peter, I've dropped you a comment here before this but it doesn't appear, do you mind to check it for me? Thank you very much!
Regards,
Lee
June 1, 2009 at 4:06 pm
Hi Paul,
I highly recommend posting your articles on your own site over submitting them to directories. I would post it to your blog, if you have one, and then wait a week or so and then submit it to directories.
EZA is slow if you don't have a lot of articles already submitted. My last article took about two days to get approved, which is far better than over a week that it took before. I think you're right that it depends on the niche of the article.
June 1, 2009 at 6:44 pm
@ Make Money Online: Lee I found your comment in my spam folder, did approve it but somehow it did not show up. Sorry could you resubmit. Apologies.
June 1, 2009 at 7:44 pm
Yes Peter, that's the comment I left yesterday. Thanks for retrieve it.
Between, my EzineArticle account just reinstated yesterday, I'm going to write some articles to there and see how's going.
Regards,
Lee
June 2, 2009 at 9:02 am
Great post on article marketing, Peter. I am personally struggling with it a little, because writing is not my strong subject. But I thought I knew the basic rules, and still learned something from your post. One thing I would like to hear more of – because it is still a little unclear to me – is the submission of your written article to different article directories. Could you write a “to the point” post on how it is done correctly?
June 2, 2009 at 2:32 pm
Nice post Peter. As you know I am a bid advocate of article marketing as it has been one of my main sources to great SE ranking. All I have found that it takes is enough articles and some long term persistence. Eventually all the backlinks you'll create will help you get to the top of the search engines.
/Mikael
June 3, 2009 at 8:32 pm
how hard is it increase a page rank?
June 4, 2009 at 3:42 am
in short … your Article should be so creative that it raise some question or message in peoples mind , for what they are looking for…. wold provide unlimited traffic and makes your article raking good..
June 4, 2009 at 6:45 am
Good post! I think article marketing is realy very useful but only when the article is written attractive to get the many visitors to your site for promoting the site well. Article should be unique and subjec related.
June 5, 2009 at 8:01 pm
Thanks for the tips!
June 6, 2009 at 1:40 am
Your tips are really very impressive and seems effective. Nice to share us.
June 6, 2009 at 1:44 am
Whenever i use to read your post i found always very valuable tips and ideas. Tell me wheres you get. Thanks Buddy.
June 7, 2009 at 12:44 am
@ Make Money Online: Great! Good luck. BTW how did your EZA account get suspended?
June 7, 2009 at 12:47 am
@ Petra Weiss: Actually I'm not an expert in this area, but you may wish to learn from the real masters. I read the interviews which Franck Silvestre conducted with these super gurus and I've learned a lot from reading this interview. The link is in the post.
June 7, 2009 at 12:49 am
@ Mikael @ Retire Early: Hey Mikael, thanks for the compliment. Thanks for the sharing of this information. It sure is good motivation. I'm starting to enjoy my writing to article directories but mostly I submit to EZA. They're the undisputed king!
June 7, 2009 at 12:52 am
@ Brad Wilson: I believe I've not seen you on this blog before so welcome. Thanks for your comment.
June 7, 2009 at 12:54 am
@ bathroom shower: Yes I agree with you. The key is to write a very good article with a eye catching title. It just can't fail to get your reader to read more or visit your blog.
June 7, 2009 at 11:40 pm
Yup even until now i am still getting traffic from my old old submissions..
June 10, 2009 at 1:22 am
Article Marketing is also the most inexpensive method of driving traffic to your site. Plus the traffic that comes to your site is very active meaning the buy more of your stuff and read more of your content.
June 15, 2009 at 2:21 am
I'm supposed to find an article that describes the targeting strategy or a particular organization, describe the target market, and explain the strategy being used to reach that market. It such nice article for me. Thanks.
June 20, 2009 at 1:07 am
He is right article marketing is one of the great way to promote the website but the article strategy should be effective. which tips he have given in the post really effective. nice post.
June 26, 2009 at 5:29 am
Article marketing is a wide process, where we have to plan every detail, including the landing page. But I think, you already knew that.
June 26, 2009 at 5:32 am
So I made the obvious choice and chose the latter. But I see that you are still status quo. Well that's your decision but if the money is good I guess you can still do that.Mine wasn't that fantastic so it's not worth the risk.
July 9, 2009 at 1:14 am
What is the best Article Marketing strategy?please tell me.
January 23, 2010 at 7:57 pm
I have been submitting articles to a few places. What I have found is that it may be effective, but it is painstaking. To go to each site, add the article and then add all of the other info like keywords and bio and so on takes some time. I have been looking into paying for an article submission service. Any suggestions for good article submission services that don't cost too much Peter?
January 24, 2010 at 5:33 pm
I have tried Brad Callen's Free Article Submitter before and that helps cut down some of the work so you may like to see if that helps you. I have also heard a lot of good things said about Magic Article Rewriter but I've not tried it out myself.
January 24, 2010 at 11:33 pm
I have tried Brad Callen's Free Article Submitter before and that helps cut down some of the work so you may like to see if that helps you. I have also heard a lot of good things said about Magic Article Rewriter but I've not tried it out myself.