The first content type we’re going to talk about is articles. Articles are probably what most people think about when they think about content for the web. Articles are widely used for a variety of different purposes. That’s part of what makes them so great – they can be used many times over for many different reasons, driving you traffic from this corner of the web and that corner of the web.
You can use articles on your website, as sort of pillar content that people revisit time and time again. This might be your very best, most well thought out and well researched content. This is the sort of content people like to link to and share all around the web. This is also the sort of content that gets ranked highly in Google and other search engines.
You can also use articles on websites that allow for submissions. There are many niche websites out there that take submissions and this can be a nice way to get your name in front of a whole new audience. You don’t want to just stick with the audience that’s going to find your website specifically – you want to take advantage of the traffic other popular websites are getting. You want to take advantage of their search engine traffic, social traffic, and the traffic that has them bookmarked and is a huge fan of theirs… You want them to become a huge fan of yours as well.
There are article directories that allow for article submissions. These directories exist for the sole purpose of accepting article submissions. Some people visit these article directories to search for and find articles of interest. More often than not, though, it’s the search engine traffic that occurs as a result of having a lot of content that’s the main benefit of these article directories.
There might be a newsletter in your niche that accepts submissions. You can use articles you’ve written, or write fresh articles, that will be of interest to this audience. Newsletters are exciting because they go straight to people’s inboxes and people have actively signed up to read them.
Think about all the ways you can use articles in your business. Go ahead and brainstorm and really think about what you can do with the articles you write. Sure, as part of this exercise you are going to be writing 10 articles. That doesn’t mean you’re going to write 10 articles and put those articles up in 10 different places. You could write 10 articles and re-purpose those articles 100 different ways, putting them up 100 different places, over time. Focusing on content and having a fantastic plan for content can truly be a game changer for your business, and I mean that.
Consider all the different places your competition has placed their articles. Where do you run into their content around the web? Consider where you find competing content and that can be a great clue for you as to where you should be putting your content. Think about the websites, directories, newsletters, and other spots where competing content appears. Focus your efforts on getting your content in those places as well.
You can also use article distribution sites like Scribd to get your content in more places. Scribd has a fantastic distribution model, and it’s definitely one that fewer people take advantage of. Maybe your competition isn’t even using Scribd for articles yet and they should be. You can be the first. Yes, it can be a good sign to see your competition doing something, but sometimes it’s worth submitting your article somewhere where you know there’s an audience demand and not much supply.
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