Ezinearticles, Squidoo and Hubpages are all extremely popular article directories and they will make your article popular. Search Engine Optimisation is ultimately your goal so when writing articles, quality of content is what is absolutely imperative as your articles will not be optimised for the search engines otherwise. Apart from this, the search engines also take into account the popularity of your site, if the sites linking to your article are relevant to your article. Keyword density is key, because if it is too high it can be marked as spam by the search engines. You can bookmark your articles on social networks like Digg.com and Stumbleupon.com to create backlinks to your site.
Your article should follow a similar format; an introduction, the body of the article, and a bio box, resource or byline box in which the author publishes their contact details. Incorporate the 5 W's to follow the correct format, that is, why, what, who, when, where.
What is known as traditional article marketing has been used by businesses to advertise their products for as long as newspapers have been in print; they provide useful information to newspapers and then an article in the newspaper is written and printed. This is beneficial to both parties.
It is so important to provide unique content for each article to each directory or the article might be picked up as spam. The top article directories all have page ranking status on search engines and it is possible to develop the ranking of these directories to optimise your web pages and achieve a good ranking. Publishing an article on different article directories can boost optimisation and increase the traffic you receive to your web page. This is known as search engine optimisation, and article marketing is a free method to achieve this. Other forms of search engine optimisation require investment.
There are many article directories and it is important that you join more than three in order to optimise your content. The only drawback is is that it takes time and effort. Firstly, you will need to research keywords.
You will need to write several articles, and the more you write the quicker and easier it will become. It is far better to write two or three articles a day than to concentrate all your efforts in getting one article absolutely word perfect. Do not concentrate your efforts too much; it will mean that your content is not diverse or unique enough.
Early 2011, Google updated its quality score algorithm; this became known as the 'panda' update. Google did this to weed out what it determined as 'content' farms, and it has made article marketing even more difficult because duplicate content is penalised, so where it had been possible to submit to sites like Ezinearticles and achieve a high page ranking, the parameters have now changed. This has changed article marketing, and it is now necessary to produce unique, quality content for each article directory.
Formulate an Article Schedule
You will benefit from drawing up an article submission schedule. If you plan an article schedule for the week, you will have good direction and a plan for getting more than one article published on the key directories. Remember, you will need to write fresh content for each article, but this is possible if you keep a schedule handy. Join four or five key article directories, do a bit of research on market trends, or research what is hot in the marketplace, then plan your articles around this. If your articles are consistently keeping up with hot trends, then you will be more likely to get huge amounts of traffic and followers.
Top Tips For Writing Articles
In order to achieve the best possible optimisation and to ensure that your articles are accepted by the article directories, they should be written following a specific format; all article directories require articles to follow a similar structure. Follow these simple rules to ensure that your articles are accepted, optimised and drive the relevant traffic to your web pages:
Goal - your goal is to write a unique articles and get it published on at least three good article directories and to get it listed in the search engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN. In order to achieve page ranking and for your article to appear on the first page of the search engines, your article will need to optimise keywords relevant to the topic and your web page.
What search engines want – search engines such as Google and Yahoo rate articles on content and quality. They employ an algorithm, Google uses a Quality Score, that will seek out relevance, quality and content within articles. The search engine spiders crawl your web page looking for relevant keywords. The spiders will then search your content to ensure that it is relevant to your target keyword and keyword phrase (read about keyword research)
Experience - writing your first article will take time and effort, but as you gain experience through writing more articles, it will become second nature. Always begin writing about a topic or product that you have some experience and knowledge about, or at least something that you are interested in. That way, you will stand a good chance of producing a quality article; if you are passionate about your subject, it will be evident in your writing. If you are unable to write about a topic that you have knowledge about, then make sure that you research your topic so that you can provide quality content.
Structure - your article should have a minimum of 500 words and no more than 1,000, ideally between 500-700 words.
Relevant Content – your article must be relevant to your topic and your web pages and the content must be relevant to your target keyword. The search engines demand relevant content. For example, if writing about dog training, do not include products related to ‘keeping cats out of your garden’.
Keywords – your article must contain keywords that are optimised for the search engines; you will need to conduct research to find the relevant keywords. You will need to base your article on one specific target keyword. You will be able to find the relevant keywords for your article by conducting keyword research. However, your keyword density must follow particular rules, or your article will be deemed as spam. It is best to ensure that your articles contain a keyword density of approximately 1-2%, so, for 500 words, your article should include your keyword phrase no more than 10 times.
Keyword phrase – you will need to conduct research to find the relevant keyword phrase. Your article title must include the target keyword and the keyword phrase must be relevant to the target keyword. Include your keyword phrase in the title, headline and in the first paragraph in order to achieve optimisation. Your article will be included in the database of the search engines tagged with your target keyword.
Address your audience – your audience is key to your success. It is imperative that you provide them with quality content and information and address them as you would someone you know. It is important to make them feel that the article is targeted specifically at them.
Call to Action - in order to break up your article, you should use call to action phrases where you can. These are the “click here to learn more” phrases embedded with links. These will keep the audience active, and on your web page.
Saturation – conduct your research and make sure that the article you choose to write is the only article about the specific topic you have chosen on the first page of the search engines. If there is another article, with the same keyword phrase, listed on the first page of the search engines, then don’t waste your time; rather choose another topic.
Value Of A Good Review
Articles written as reviews of products or services provide the author with a unique opportunity to gain status and credibility in their sector. Audiences enjoy reading reviews and comparisons on products or services; visitors will soon use your website as a one-stop-shop to gain useful information about chosen subjects. This is an ideal way to target specific keywords. You will be directly connecting with an audience that is searching out this information. It will enable you to become an expert in your market and if you are able to provide honest and informative reviews to assist your audience with their purchasing decisions, this audience will keep coming back to your site.
Six Simple Review Style Rules
- Test the product. It is no good writing a review about a product you have yet to inform an opinion on. You may get away with blagging it a couple of times, but if you are caught out, you run the risk of losing all credibility. Better to test a product or service; that is what your audience expects.
- Don’t be afraid to provide honest opinion. If you have tested a product or service that everyone else is raving about, and you feel that there are certain issues that you need to highlight, be honest and write about it; you will gain much credence for going out on a limb for your audience.
- Start by writing a basic list of questions you would want the review to answer. What is the product and what does it do. Do you have enough information to share with the audience eg, technical specs. What are the benefits of using the product and what are the disadvantages. Would you purchase the product, if so why, if not why? What does it cost and is this amount justified; provide an argument. What would you expect the product to do for you and does it live up to its expectations.
- Justify yourself; you need to share with the audience why you believe your opinion matters, what experience you offer.
- Comparison with similar products is essential. It is no good providing an opinion on something if you have no comparisons to draw from.
- Include a rating, either a star rating or a bar chart rating. Make the rating as user-friendly as possible so that the audience is able to see, at a glance, which product stands out.
Follow these writing tips to ensure that your review-style article is structured correctly:
Start with a really catchy title; think about the headlines used by newspapers. They are captivating and draw attention so that the reader has to read on. Don’t be afraid to use controversial titles; they seem to attract the larger audience, for instance, “why is product x a scam” and then an explanation about your product and how you rank it. Your title must include your keywords, such as “My Review of Product A”, “Product A Is A Scam” or “Product A Makes A Great Book”.
First paragraph – you need to connect with your audience here and you will do so by making the content as relevant as possible for your audience. Use relevant keywords in your article and ensure that you make the audience aware that they have chosen the right platform to inform them about their subject, ie, your review. Explain why your review is the best one and what it will offer to your audience.
Second paragraph – this is where you will confirm why your opinion is important and establish your credibility. Why are you writing about this product and why does your opinion matter.
Third paragraph – go into detail here and provide an explanation of the product, technical information, pro’s and con’s and why you would and would not use the product. Write three or four paragraphs and lay them out in an easy-to-follow format.
Sixth paragraph – this is your conclusion and your opinion of the industry. You can include your link in this paragraph and ask the audience to follow the link for more information and to learn more about why your opinion counts.
Now you know how to write and present your articles; have fun article marketing.
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