Article Writing Basics: Winning With Article Submissions

I’ve been doing a lot of playing around with article marketing lately with great results. Just to prove that I know what I’m talking about, here’s a screen shot of my current EzineArticles.com statistics:

As you can see I’ve submitted over 140 articles. Most of those have been within the last six months.  I’ve found that the immediate result is a new flow of traffic to my website. But the long term results will also include more inbound links, business branding and potential opportunities (interviews, joint ventures, etc).

What I want to do today is give you some article writing basics on how I’ve worked my article writing and submissions so you can go and duplicate it with your own business.

Keyword Research

Before I write any of my articles I spend about two to three hours doing keyword research. The tools I use are Wordtracker Free Keyword Tool and Google Adwords Keyword Tool. I use both these tools to think of all the possible keyword phrases someone might type into the search engines to find my website and my seven internet marketing training lists.

For example, I have a email training list about blogging. So I would search through the tools for all the possible terms about blogging. Here are some examples:

As you can see there are a number of titles I can use to create articles from this list.

I aim to find hundreds of keyword phrases in my research and then pull as many article titles as I can from that large list.

Article Writing

I’m using only EzineArticles.com for now. I don’t feel the need to submit to multiple directories at once. I don’t want to dilute my results with more websites to track and I love how easy Ezine Articles makes it for me with their awesome statistics.

Since I’ve done my keyword research all I need to do next is take those titles, make sure I understand what the people searching were really looking for and write an article about it.

Author Resource Box

The author resource box is key to promoting your website’s product, service or opt-in offer through article marketing. You need to have a clear purpose with your article, author resource box and call to action. Make sure they all match and that your article leads perfectly to your resource box which leads perfectly to a call to action on the landing page you send them to.

Here’s an example:
I have an email list where I tell people how to make money as an affiliate marketer and have written a number of articles on affiliate marketing.

My author resource box is not the typical “Angela Wills is the owner of Marketers Mojo. Sign up for her email list here.”  Instead I make the resource box like an extension of the article. With Ezine Articles you have 300 words for the resource box and I often try to make use of as many as I can. This is what one of my resource boxes look like:

Oh and by the way, I customize every since resource box I write so that it has that perfect match with the article and the landing page offer.

So there you have it. My article marketing strategy. It’s working very well for me and I’m getting a steady stream of traffic coming from Ezine Articles as a result.

I’d love to hear your thoughts and experiences on article marketing.

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The Benefits of Seasonal Content

With Christmas almost here, I’d first like to wish all of our readers a happy and safe holiday season and a wonderful, healthy and profitable new year. And second, I’d like to discuss the benefits of seasonal content.

Yes, it’s a little late to start thinking about putting up Christmas content for this year. But if you’re really feeling the Christmas spirit, there’s no reason you can’t put that creative energy to use and start writing for next Christmas. And there are plenty of other seasons and holidays coming up between now and then, so seasonal content is something that should always be on our minds.

Why? Because it brings in traffic year after year!

There are plenty of websites that focus solely on seasonal content. They bring in very little traffic during most of the year, but when the season for which they were designed rolls around, they experience a surge in visitors. These types of sites are usually owned by webmasters with lots of online real estate, and they often create sites that are focused on various seasons or holidays to keep overall traffic (and hence income) coming in year-round.

But what if you only own one website, or a few sites that aren’t seasonal in nature? Is incorporating seasonal content still a good idea?

Actually, it is, as long as it’s relevant to your site’s niche. Here are a few reasons that it works so well:

• It gives the impression that your site contains fresh, new content. Even if your strategy is to build websites filled with content and then concentrate more on getting traffic than creating new content, visitors that find seasonal content will feel that you’re providing timely information. And that will keep them coming back for more.
• Relatively few websites feature seasonal content. That means that it’s easier to get good search engine rankings for seasonal keywords than it is for more general ones. And higher rankings, as we all know, equal more traffic.
• It gives you good topics for blogging. If you’re stuck for something to blog about, you can always write a post about the current or upcoming season or holiday. Your readers will like it now, and by the same time next year, the search engines will be familiar enough with it to send plenty of extra traffic your way.
• Holiday traffic can be quite profitable. Just about every holiday has become very consumer-oriented. For Christmas, we buy gifts for friends and family. On Valentine’s Day, we buy cards, chocolates and other goodies for our sweethearts. On Independence Day, we buy fireworks and flags. And so on. Create holiday content and surround it with appropriate advertising and affiliate links, and your traffic will quickly turn into dollars.

Seasonal content can provide a welcome boost in visitors to virtually any website, so don’t let the holidays pass you by! Plan your holiday content ahead of time, and reap the rewards when the holidays arrive.

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Evergreen Content: What Is It and Why Should You Care?

There was a time when those who wanted the latest news had to wait until 6:00 pm and turn on the TV. Then came cable news networks, which featured top headlines 24 hours a day. Now, if you want to know what’s going on right now, all you have to do is go online.

There’s no doubt that some of the most popular sites online are those that feature the latest news, gossip, technology and such. But if you’re focusing your content exclusively on what’s hot right now, you could be doing yourself a disservice, especially if you are looking for long-term search engine traffic. Including some evergreen content will help you keep the traffic coming in.

Content that’s evergreen will stand the test of time. It’s about subjects that are relevant today, but that will also be relevant years from now. Whereas that smoking hot news story that everybody wants to know about right now might be long since forgotten a month from now, evergreen content is always useful and interesting.

That’s not to say that evergreen content can’t be seasonal. While articles about Christmas aren’t particularly relevant in June, they are highly sought after later in the year. They make good content for sites that feature information about various seasons, or for stand-alone Christmas sites belonging to webmasters who have other sites that do well the rest of the year.

Need some ideas for evergreen topics? Try these on for size:

• How-to articles – People are always looking for articles that explain how to do one thing or another. Most sites can work how-tos into their content very nicely.
• Historical articles and accounts – History was once news, but the history that we still find interesting today will likely still be interesting years from now. Articles that offer a fresh take on something that happened a long time ago can bring in traffic quickly, and they can also keep it coming well into the future. Encyclopedic articles are useful for many years as well.
• Hobby-related content – While new technology might change the way we participate in certain hobbies, the hobbies themselves will probably be popular for generations to come. Take sewing, for example. It was once done by hand, and now we have programmable sewing machines. But the subject of sewing is still relevant.
• Articles about money – Money is one topic that people are always interested in. They want to know how to make more of it, how to save it, and how to put what they have to use more wisely. And that’s not going to change any time soon.

Every site should have at least some evergreen content. It helps bring readers in from the search engines, and those readers tend to be very interested in your site’s niche. There’s nothing wrong with sharing the latest news, but if you’ll add in some evergreen content too, you won’t have to worry about losing traffic when news is slow.

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Social Media: Don’t Set It and Forget It

It’s amazing how far social media has come in such a short time. Ten years ago, people who used their computers to communicate with others were often referred to as geeks. Now, the tables have been turned. If you don’t use Facebook, MySpace or Twitter, people begin to wonder which rock you just crawled out from under.

That’s not to say that everybody is using social media. There are still plenty of people who aren’t. But there are enough people who are using it that if you’re not, there’s a good chance that you’re alienating at least some of your customers.

I just finished reading a post over at the Outspoken Media blog about businesses using Twitter. Most of the corporate big dogs are doing it, as well as a rapidly increasing number of small business owners. But as Lisa Barone pointed out in that thought-provoking post, hiring someone to do your tweeting for you and then forgetting about it can easily backfire.

If you’ve been following White House news, you might have heard that President Obama recently let it slip that he has never used Twitter. Seeing how he has well over two million followers, it’s obviously well known that he has a Twitter account. And being the President of the United States and all, few of us would expect (or want) him to sit around and write tweets all day. But to learn that none of the tweets came from the man himself? I found that a little bit disheartening.

Still, I can get over that. At least he is aware of his social media presence, and the importance of it. Sadly, the same can’t be said for a lot of businesses.

In large corporations, social media is generally handled by the marketing department. They can afford to pay someone to use Twitter and Facebook, and they do so because they know that such efforts can cement relationships with existing customers and attract new ones. But they often make the mistake of assigning someone to handle social media and leaving everyone else in the dark about it. So when a customer mentions that they found out about that big sale through Twitter, the clerk might have no idea what he’s talking about.

True, nobody should expect every representative of a big company to be completely up to date on the latest post to its Facebook account. But they should know about the important stuff, like exclusive promotional offers and such. If they don’t, the company could end up with a lot of angry customers who who can easily get the word out to the rest of the world via their own social media accounts.

And when it comes to small businesses, being literate in social media is even more important. The business owner might hire a virtual assistant to handle it because she doesn’t have time to do it herself, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But if you want to harness the power of social media, you must know a little about how it works. And as a small businessperson, your customers will also expect you to know what’s being said, even if you didn’t write it yourself.

Bottom line: You don’t have to oversee every aspect of your social media presence yourself. But it’s a good idea to know how to do so, and to keep tabs on the person who’s doing the writing for you is saying.

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Recipes for Traffic

Not too long ago, if you needed a recipe, you either consulted a cookbook or called your great aunt Martha. Today, more and more recipe seekers are going online to find out how to make their favorite dishes.

And it’s not just wannabe chefs that hit the Web to search for recipes. It’s everyday cooks who want to try something new. It’s budget-minded individuals who are looking to lower their food bill. It’s health-conscious eaters who can’t find suitable prepared meals. It’s people who want to lose weight but don’t want to follow a diet that involves frozen meals or pills. The list goes on and on.

What does this mean for Internet marketers? It means that there are lots of great recipe niches to fill!

Maybe you’re thinking that there’s no shortage of recipe sites online. And quite frankly, there’s not. But most of those sites aren’t focused on a niche. Most of them provide a wide variety of recipes. They do well because they have lots of advertising dollars to work with, and they are often associated with well-known magazines or parent sites. But marketers with smaller budgets can do very well with sites that feature specific types of recipes.

Even if you don’t have a ready-made following, it’s not all that difficult to get a recipe site off the ground. If your niche is sufficiently focused, search engine optimization will be pretty easy. And even if you’re just including an occasional recipe on your blog, the name of the recipe is likely to draw some search engine traffic.

Right about now, you’re probably wondering how you can monetize recipes. Here are a few tips.

• First and foremost, make sure that the recipes you feature are relevant to your audience. If you’re starting a recipe site, use only recipes that fit within your niche. If you’re featuring recipes on an existing site or blog, make them recipes that will appeal to your audience. For instance, don’t publish high-cost recipes on a budget-oriented blog, and don’t publish recipes for decadent desserts on a weight loss site.
• Consider becoming an affiliate for a company that sells some of the ingredients. Then link the name of the ingredient to your affiliate page. This works best for items like hard-to-find herbs and sauces, because people aren’t as likely to buy things that they can easily find at their local grocery store online.
• Become an affiliate for a grocery delivery service. This idea works best for those who run sites with a local focus, because most online grocery stores serve only a limited geographical area.
• Sell your readers a cookbook with similar recipes. Print cookbooks are still good sellers, and recipe ebooks are quite popular as well. You could buy resale rights to an ebook, become an affiliate for a cookbook publisher, or even publish your own.

If you’re looking for an effective way to gain traffic, recipes could be just the thing. And if you play your cards right, that traffic can easily translate into dollars!

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Potential Content Marketing “Mistakes” – Here Are 3 to Avoid

Following up on last week’s Top 3 Content Marketing Plan Tips, let’s consider the “mistakes” (well, nothing is really a mistake, but we can always do better) many of us make…maybe you?

1. Not being consistent. You can just write a few articles or blog posts and be done with it. You also can’t create a 5-day auto responder series and thinks that’s enough. You need to stay in the mind of you prospect and your customer – so they will buy and they’ll buy over and over again. And helpful content is the perfect way to prime them to do that.

2. Not having a traffic plan. A lot of people have an “if you build it, they will come” attitude when it comes to content. They may have been told that great content will attract an audience through word-of-mouth and people will keep coming back for more. To some extent, good content travels but you need to reach a good size audience before it takes off like that.

a. Do keyword research and basic search engine optimization for phrases that people search for. You can do keyword research at wordtracker.com. Search engine optimization can be a complex subject, but at it’s most basic if you:

• Research keywords people are looking for (again wordtracker.com)
• Include that keyword phrase near the beginning of the title of your article
• Link to the article with that phrase

…it will go a long way for you.

b. Distribute your articles to article directories like ezinearticles.com, go articles.com. Article directories allow you to post content with a link back to your site. Those links can provide with traffic and also gain you favor with search engines as they see links coming into your site.

c. Offer to guest post on other popular blogs. If you’ve got great content to share, contact a blogger with a built-in audience and ask if you post some original content for them in return for a link back.

d. Give distribution rights to affiliate partners. If you have your own product and affiliate program, give your content to your affiliates to publish. Allow them to use their affiliate link, so they get a commission on every sale they refer through the content.

e. Turn your content into press releases and distribute them online (and to offline media). A press release is a more formal piece than an article or blog post, but it is content that can bring you plenty of exposure for your business.

f. Participate in social media like Twitter and Facebook. Share your content and the content of others. When you readily share, the favor is often returned.

g. Give distribution rights to affiliate partners. If you have your own product and affiliate program, give your content to your affiliates to publish. Allow them to use their affiliate link, so they get a commission on every sale they refer through the content.

Those are just 6 ideas to start you out with and the last idea of keeping your traffic brings me to third common mistake. I think the two mistakes we’ve talked about (not being consistent and not having a traffic plan) are common to all people, but there is one in particular that I find common in women. I am not sure if it’s a fear of selling or appearing too pushy, but it truly is self-sabotage to your content marketing efforts and that’s…

3. Not having a call-to-action or specific end goal in mind with their content. Many people think if they create the great content, it will automatically result in more subscribers and sales…but you have to put yourself into the perspective of your reader and how the experience content.

Let’s look at just a couple scenarios:

Scenario #1 People search for content via the Internet. For example, they might search for “how to train my Doberman” and they come across your articles. It’s very informative and they find your tips helpful. You don’t bother to tell them you have an ebook they might want to purchase or a free ecourse on the topic, so they leave. They never come back. Never assume that any ads on the margins of your page are going to do the job. You need to tell them within the article/piece of content what you want them to do next.

Scenario #2 You have regular readers of your blog or newsletter recipients. No matter how great your stuff, a large portion of your readers won’t read all your messages, they won’t know about all your products. You have to tell them and you have to remind them. People are busy with their lives, are concerned about what they have going on…if you have something that can help them, you can to tell them. Sometimes over and over again.

Your call-to-action doesn’t always have to be to buy something. It could be to click a link to read another article, to sign up for a free offer, leave a comment…any number of things. The thing is, you need your readers to be accustomed to taking action when you tell them to.

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