One of the most constructive ways to build credibility with your market is through article writing and submission via article submission directories. A relatively new topic for small business, this social marketing technique has been on the rise in recent years, proving beneficial to almost any market.
A standard length article is 300-750 words, and should be geared to some aspect of interest to your specific market. When your articles appear frequently on submission sites with a clear message and content value, your readers begin to view you as one to be referred to, or the expert on a given topic.
Article writing through sites such as Ezines.com (our pick), Ask.com, About.com, and others, offer free content to marketers and small to large size businesses as a way to easily provide informative documentation to their specific readership, which includes your audience. The stipulation to them is that your personal information, which you provide in a bio box, is distributed with it.
A carefully thought out bio box should include a brief, professional description of your company, a picture of yourself, and a direct link back to your website. As your work is picked up by viewers and published, your name and company develop a much larger audience than you could have achieved approaching these viewers independently. In this way they are in effect, screened, because they are searching the sites specifically for the information on your topic. Instead of authoring their own work, with all the research and time that implies, one expert will use another’s work and give him/her credit for doing so. This is a major time convenience for a news magazine or niche writer, and a win-win for everybody.
The trick is to update regularly and keep the content relevant and valuable to your readers. Make sure you’re writing beneficial insights that will make them want to come back for more, and find out more about your service or product offerings.
What’s your favorite article submission site?
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Select your niche, write as many good articles as possible.
Article marketing has been used by professionals for nearly as long as mass print has been available. In paper-print form (as opposed to online forms), article marketing is utilized commonly by business owners as a means of obtaining free press space. A local business provides useful content to the newspaper free of charge, and in return the newspaper prints the business’ contact information with the article. Because newspapers and other traditional media are expected to present content on limited budgets, this arrangement is generally advantageous for all parties involved.
Great article…I think you hit the nail on the head when you referred to keeping the content relevant.
Even the most ambitious article marketer isn’t going to get very far if they are putting junk out there. But when you are publishing reallly good content, you can expect to get some serious results.