The Pros and Cons of Article Marketing for Business Owners

There is a lot of buzz about article marketing on the internet these days. Plenty of articles will tell you that it is the best way to get your website from a lonely place in a forgotten corner of the internet, to a buzzing hub of activity – and profit. The trouble is, most people are not completely sure what article marketing is, let alone how to do it themselves!

The first step in getting started with article marketing is to understand what it is about. Essentially, the internet is a vast storehouse of information, and that is what people who use the internet are looking for. When you market with articles, you write useful information in an easy to read format, that is not in any way sales driven, and give those people, who are hungry for information, what they are looking for.

Of course, there is also the marketing part, and that is where the art of article marketing comes into play. The trick is to give people enough information to satisfy their immediate curiosity, but also to have them read all the way to the bottom of your article, where your biography or resource box is located. In this box, you would give them a link to your website, and tell them that they can visit there for more information. Because you’ve already established yourself as somewhat of an expert, or at the very least knowledgeable about the topic you’re writing about, those readers are much more likely to visit your site to access that information, than they would be if you were simply trying to ‘sell them’ with an advertisement.

The next big question most people have is where to post their articles once they are written. The answer to this one is quite simple. There are literally hundreds of article directories on the internet, which allow people to post their articles on virtually any topic (within a few general guidelines) for free. Those article sites have different page ranks and reputations though, so choosing the right platforms for your marketing articles can be quite important.

Most article directories also have very specific requirements for the articles they will post. These include things like the word count, the formatting, the keyword density, and in some cases, the subject matter, so it is always wise to acquaint yourself with the specific requirements of the site you choose, before you start writing! The good news is that most of the larger article marketing directories have training materials available, which will tell you exactly how to write the articles you want to post, so with a little practice, you should not have too much trouble.

We’ve already covered how giving away a little bit of information in your articles can help to drive traffic to your site, and hopefully, increase your sales, but there are other benefits to article marketing that you should know about.

The first is that once you have posted your articles, they will be online for as long as the article directory exists. That means that unlike a newspaper ad, for instance, which is likely to be seen for at most a week, you will get years of service out of your articles.

The second important fact is that when you use article marketing, you can choose to include keywords in your articles, and, when done correctly, your articles should come up whenever someone uses that particular search term on the internet, and thereby funnel potential clients directly to your site.

The final benefit is to your site itself. Search engines use complex algorithms to calculate your site’s page rank, and one of the factors they take into account are back links. Those are links to your site from pages outside of your site itself. The more articles you have on the internet, with your site’s link in the resource box, the more links you have to your site, and if you are using a reputable article directory, you should start to see a rise in your sites page rank. Since a higher page rank usually means more traffic, which is exactly what you want!

The only downside to article marketing is that it can be time consuming. Even here, however, you have options. There are plenty of freelancers, both on the internet and off, who are well versed in writing for the web. They are more than willing to take on article writing projects, and write dozens, or even hundreds of articles for article marketing, usually at very affordable rates.

If you do decide to write your own articles, on the other hand, article marketing is free, but there are a few things to bear in mind. First, remember that the average internet user reads at high school, rather than college level. That means that you need to keep your articles simple and easy to follow. Second, remember that while you are not writing to win a prize, grammar and spelling do matter, and your articles are meant to show your business in the best possible light, so do not forget to spell check! Next, there’s the issue of content, and while it’s tempting to write articles full of ‘fluff’ merely to get your keywords and links out there, the people who read them aren’t likely to make it all the way to the bottom, and your link, so make the content valuable!

Done correctly, article marketing can be an enormous boost to your web traffic, and your business, so if you are looking for cost effective, easy ways to market your business online, it is definitely worth taking a closer look at article marketing.