Article Marketing Best Practices

Article Marketing Is Not for Everyone…Or Is It?

Have you ever thought that article marketing is not for everyone? If you have, you wouldn't be alone in your thinking but you would be mistaken. You would also be passing up a golden opportunity to spread valuable information about the products you're offering.

It's easy to understand why some would be reluctant to get involved with writing articles. For some, writing ranks as high on the fun meter as paying a large tax bill on April 15th every year. But even if writing articles isn't your idea of a good time, there's still no need to pass up using this powerful tool.

Remember that for those who can't or those who can't find the time - there's always outsourcing. Outsourcing means that you find someone who will write the articles you need for you.

You can find writers at different freelance sites as well as on writer forums. If hiring a writer isn't in your budget for the time being, then you might want to consider the option of purchasing private label rights (or PLR) articles to use.

All you have to do to turn PLR articles into personalized content is to tweak the words a bit and add your own touch - or just put your name on them and use them as is. You can take these articles and then use them as if you'd written them.

Article marketing is good for both beginning business owners as well as those who've been in the business for awhile. It's not important just because it's a free tool to use, but also because it gets results.

What you want to do when you get started (or if you've been at it awhile and you want to send out a fresh batch of articles) is to make a list of all of the article directory sites. Write out five important main points about your product or service. Under each point, write four sentences pertaining to each main point.

Once you have those five main points, draw on them again and again to write your articles. For example, if you were writing about a self help product to stop smoking, some of your main points might be things like 'why smoking is addictive - why people enjoy smoking - what the triggers are (after meals, before bed, etc.).'

You can then branch that out into something like 'replacement therapy'- going for walks, getting up from the table after a meal, etc. Then in your resource box, you could have something personal like, "I once had a tough time quitting smoking too. That is, until I discovered one product that changed my life forever. Click here to find out what it was…"

Article marketing isn't for those who feel they can post articles anywhere with tons of affiliate links, long winded bios and absolutely nothing helpful to say. Not only will you probably be shown the door at the marketing site, but readers won't have any reason to follow you.

How to Conduct Article Marketing Research for Your Niche

Sometimes it's not the writing that has you bogged down, but it's conducting your article marketing research that has you stumped. Where do you get ideas from? How do you know what to write about? Here are six fail proof methods to give you plenty of fodder for your article marketing brainstorming sessions - and I'll give you good examples for them.

Spy on competitors.

There's a difference between spying and plagiarizing. You can go to dozens of article directories and see what topics your competitors are writing about. So let's pretend your niche is dog food, okay?

You could take a peek at some article directories and see that people are writing about the danger of fillers in dry dog food, homemade versus commercial dog food, and how to stop your dogs from being aggressive over their food (to name a few). Simmer over the ideas and write your own slant - don't even click through to read your competitor's articles if you might be tempted to steal their ideas.

Go to Yahoo Answers.

Type in your keyword and Yahoo Answers will spit out a bunch of article titles and ideas for you. When I type in "dog food" I instantly have several ideas, including: how much dog food should you feed your dog, how to tell if your dog's food has been poisoned, and what type of dog food is good for dogs with sensitive scratching issues.

Take a peek in forums.

Forums are a wealth of information and ideas. If I type in "dog forum" to Google, I can click on a forum and find a section for my topic, dog food. I then see many article ideas, such as:

·         "Can I feed my dog raw eggs?"

·         "What do I feed a dog with diarrhea?" and

·         "What's the best cancer fighting food for my two adult dogs?"

Pick up a trade or consumer magazine.

You don't have to buy a hard copy of a magazine. You can do it online. Type in "dog magazine" and then go to articles and nutrition sections. There, I see many ideas, including:

·         "What people food is safe for dogs to eat?"

·         "How to make meatballs for your dog," and

·         "How to put your dog on a diet with the right dog food."

Buy a Dummies Guide.

Dummies Guides or Idiots Guides are a whole library of well-organized information and ideas. You can even search online at Amazon for the book and look inside the cover to see the table of contents. In it, it gives you ideas like these:

·         "Basic nutritional requirements for dogs"

·         "Do you have to buy food from your veterinarian?" and

·         "How to treat your dog with biscuits and chews."

Watch the news.

Most news channels now put their live content online, so that means you can go to Google and type in something like, "Fox news dog food" and get results for this topic that were on their site. Using this tactic, I find ideas about "dog food recalls, and "how to make your own dog food."

Ideas are all around you - you just have to dig around and look for them. Make a list for future articles, if you can't use them all right away, or outsource them to someone else to write for you so they can be put to use instantly.

Does Article Marketing Have Any Drawbacks?

One question those unsure about promoting businesses often ask is, "Does article marketing have any drawbacks?" and the answer is yes. There are always cons for pros and negatives for positives. There are never any perfect systems to use. However, you can make it nearly perfect for you if you know how to maximize the potential you have for article marketing.

Some of the drawbacks are that it's not instantaneous like Pay Per Click marketing. You won't see results that fast. Sometimes, you might get articles put up and wonder if anyone's paying attention.

It takes more patience to get the content right. Giving customers pertinent information takes time and if you're already in a time crunch, you're going to feel the pressure in that area. If you're unsure if you're capable of writing decent articles, then you'll have to hire a ghostwriter, which will cost you.

Then when the articles are done, if you're submitting to article directories, it's up to the editors to decide if the article passes their line of acceptability. Plus, you don't want to submit one article and be done.

You have to submit regular entries - not only to the directories, but on other sites like Squidoo, Hub Pages and Google Knol. All of that takes effort. While it will pay off in the long run, sometimes it can try your patience to have to wait for results.

To be effective using this method, you have to be consistent. You also need to practice the art of giving in order to get. Give the potential customers who read your article something worth reading.

Give them a reason to want to know more. But do it carefully. Readers know when they're being pressured and they can smell a 'buy now' set up. So make it worth their time.

When you get to the end of your article, tell them you'd like to give them more information (and maybe a free email tip, some advice, a report, or whatever) but because the articles have a word limit, they can click on your page link to learn more. If the article is written in a way that leaves them interested, hungry to learn or you've offered a potential solution to a problem, they will click through to your website.

Does article marketing work for everyone? Yes, it does - but it's just a tool like anything else in business. It's how you pick it up, how you hammer it, how you nail it in, and how you use the saw that gets the results.

Web 2.0 Article Marketing Strategies

To understand the importance of article marketing strategies in computer language, take a look at a mighty oak tree. Or rather, take a look at the roots of the tree. The older and stronger the tree is, the further spread out the roots will be. To stand firm and not get blown over in the marketing world, you have to employ strategies to spread the roots of your business far and wide.

Putting articles up in directories is always a great idea and helps your business gain exposure and for you to get branded as an expert in your niche. However, you don't ever want to put all of your articles in one directory basket so to speak.

Because if something happens to that directory, say for whatever reason it shuts down, then all of your hard work would go right down the drain along with it. So what you want to do is to make sure you use sites that aren't part of a directory.

Some of the sites out there, such as Squidoo, let you post as many articles on a particular topic as you'd like to post. You can employ article marketing strategies by posting to a lot of different lenses talking about your product and best of all, you can create a relationship between yourself and the reader. You can harness the power of social media and watch your conversion rate rise simply because of word of mouth.

Readers love to interact with Squidoo writers in their guestbooks. You can also put affiliate links in the lens as well as have the buttons so that readers can follow you on Facebook or you can set up a button so that they can share your information with others. Visitors who feel like your content was helpful or that they enjoyed it can tweet about it on their Twitter account.

Hub Pages is another place you can put articles on that directly impacts your business. These articles are listed on pages (called Hubs) and the more interesting and relevant the article, the higher the readers will help it get via rankings. Since Hub Pages rank high in Google, just by having your information on the pages, your business will benefit from the added traffic.

Google Knol is another way to effectively employ article marketing strategies. You can write articles - even numerous ones on the same topic - and post them in your account there.

Google Knol is a handy tool to use to get a greater web presence. Knol features the highest rated articles, new articles, the ones that are being talked about the most and they even feature the top authors on the home page. There's a lot of power available to you for free that can greatly impact your business. All you have to do is harness that power.

7 Article Marketing Tips to Help Increase Views and Conversions

Everyone can use a little help with his or her article conversions. Even the best marketers tweak their style to try to achieve the very best rates possible. Here are seven article marketing tips that can help you have even greater success with your campaigns:

Tip #1: Treat Your Title Like the Star Attraction

If they don't like your title, they're not going to read the body of your article, much less make it to the resource box where you've placed your hyperlinks. Take more time to create a traffic pulling title than you do with any other part of your article.

Tip #2: Maintain a Perfect Keyword Density

Most article directories don't set limits, but the good ones do. That's because they know what search engine spiders consider keyword stuffing. Keep it to a healthy 2%, which means for every 400-word article, you could use your keyword phrase 8 times total.

Tip #3: Break It Up with Bullet Points

Make your article easy to read by creating lists in bullet point form. People love to quickly skim an article first and then click on to the next chunk. Or, if they like what they see in the bullet points, they'll go back to the beginning and read your article more thoroughly.

Tip #4: Check Your Spelling Before You Submit Your Article

Don't simply use spellcheck to check the quality of your work. It doesn't always catch the mistakes. Go through your article word by word and make sure it's correct. Some readers will click out if they encounter a spelling error.

Tip #5: Watch for Trends You Can Use in Your Article Marketing

Magazines and news shows will touch on a wide variety of niche topics, and you can watch for trends or topics and then use them to rank high quickly with your articles.

Tip #6: Share Your Articles in a Viral Nature Once They're Published

Your article marketing campaign doesn't end the moment the directory accepts and publishes your article. Give it a boost by pinging your article link, bookmarking it on sites like StumbleUpon, and publishing it on your own blogs and websites!

Tip #7: Run a Few Different Versions of Your Resource Box

Don't make the common mistake of writing a short bio or "about me" in your author's resource area. With article marketing, this is the prime spot where you're supposed to guide your reader from the body of the article to your call to action. Go out with a bang and invite them to download a freebie or follow up for some deeper information. And test a few variations to see what works best.

Employ all or some of these seven article marketing tips and you'll be well on your way to designing a content campaign that produces great results every time and lasts for years to come.