Article Marketing Mistakes to Avoid

Article Marketing Mistakes

These are mistakes I see over and over again. People are complaining that even though they're working hard and submitting articles, they're just not getting the traffic. I've said it before and I won't shut up until everyone gets it... if you're not getting traffic from articles, you're doing it wrong.

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• Improper expectations

  Certain failure will result from having the wrong expectations about what your articles are meant to accomplish. If you understand the principles and benefits I've outlined here, then you're on your way to properly using article marketing. That puts way ahead of 95 percent of other webmasters.

  Remember that the main purpose of article marketing is as an SEO technique to increase website traffic. The way you do that is to create keyword focused backlinks to your site. These keyword focused backlinks then increase your site's search engine positioning for those keywords. All of your article marketing efforts should be directed towards this objective.

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• Keyword selection

  Our main objective here is to generate higher search engine placement for pages on our site, and increase the traffic coming from particular keywords. Although most people do not do this correctly, if at all, proper keyword selection is vital to a successful campaign.

  There are two main ways to choose your keywords for your articles. You can choose either the highest demand keywords, or choose the relatively low competition keywords that are easier to rank for. These are typically lower demand and so will not bring as much traffic. But, if you choose wisely that traffic will be very targeted. You know your market better than anybody, so you'll have to make that judgment call.

  The reason why you can choose higher competition keywords is because you're using the power of other sites to overcome the usual inertia that comes from not having trust and authority. Basically, you're "borrowing" the authority of these other sites. If that appeals to you, I'll warn you. It sometimes takes multiple article campaigns around the same high traffic/high competition keyword to see any movement in your site's rankings.

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• Linking to an affiliate site

  I've seen a fair number of people who don't even link to their own sites in their resource box. There are several problems with that approach. First, you can't control what happens at an affiliate site. Second, you may drop that affiliate or they may drop you at some point. Third, you have no opportunity for branding if you don't send people to your own site or blog. Fourth, the whole point is to own your traffic so that you can do whatever you want with it. You can't own your traffic if you're sending it to someone else's site.

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• Submitting non-unique articles

  You can submit the same version of your article to each article directory and it won't do any damage. I have done this myself. I highly recommend, however, that you change your article content so that it is unique. In my testing I have shown that you will yield far greater results by submitting a unique version of your article to each article directory. The difference in results is on an order of magnitude.

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• Not creating unique resource boxes

  A unique resource box is vital. Even if you submit the same version of your article to multiple article directories, you should be creating a unique version of the resource box and varying your linking when you do. Failure to do this will produce less than optimal results for your site.

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• Not using the correct mix of links in the resource box

  This is related to the unique resource box concept. It's extremely important that you create at least two links in every resource box. Typically, one should be to your home page, and the other should be a deep link. For a small percentage of these, you can switch up the keywords so that the home page inherits the reputation of the deep linked page, and vice versa.

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• Failure to deep link

  Just to hammer this point home, ensure that you deep link in your resource box.

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• Failure to create an appropriate landing page

  Just as in Pay Per Click (PPC) advertising, you need to have a landing page for your article. If your landing page is lousy, inappropriate, or off-theme, then your efforts will be diluted. You should be telling a story of sorts. The story starts with the headline of your article to attract the reader and goes all the way through to the page on your site. Don't write an article on "the 7 myths of dog training" and then send people to a page on recipes for home-made dog biscuits. Yes, you can argue that the topics are related, but you have to admit that there is a break in the continuity there somewhere.

  Also, for search engine purposes, we're trying to rank for particular keywords. While biscuits can probably be used for dog training, we really want to keep the theme consistent here for both engines and visitors. Don't break theme. Consistency and continuity are important.

  This applies also to your most wanted response (MWR). Take that into account when you create your article and the page it leads to. If you're collecting email addresses, then that is where it leads. If it's Adsense clicks, then that's where it leads. If it's to get more exposure to other pages, then that's where it leads. This article is not about how to write for your most wanted response, so I won't go into detail. If you're an SBI! owner, you already know how to do that because it's a big part of the training you receive when you build your site.

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• Linking without anchor text

  Possibly the most widespread article marketing mistake I see is not using anchor text. All that unique resource box creation and deep linking goes to waste without anchor text. If you get everything else right and this one wrong, you defeat the purpose. Linking to your website with your url and no anchor text is like writing a letter to the President, but never sending it. You are wasting Web real estate unless you use your keywords in your link!

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• Poorly written article - the biggest killer

  A poorly written article will get you no where, so you can't mess this one up either. We want to create our articles with the engines, visitors, and webmasters in mind. A quality article will do better all the way around, and a poor article can be a disaster.