Article marketing is a powerful method of sending traffic to your site, building backlinks, and selling products. After a year of hand approving over 5,000 articles, I have put together some tips on how to present your articles to make them more attractive to readers and techniques to avoid.
Choose a Realistic Pen Name
Even if you choose not to use your real name, choose a name that sounds real. Choose a first and last name with proper capitalization. Some article directories insist on using this format. Avoid using your site name as your pen name.
Read the Site’s Submission Guidelines Page
Take a few minutes to go over the editorial or submission guidelines. Article sites have different rules for the type of content they accept. Most do not accept adult, drug or hate oriented material. Pay attention to the range of article length that is accepted. Administrators may set flags that will reject an article based on length. Abide by the number of links that are allowed in your content. Most sites do not allow affiliate links within the body of the content.
Edit Your Article
Sounds like a given, but I receive countless articles with syntactical errors that could easily be fixed. Spell check your articles before submission. Article directory admins don’t like to correct spelling errors. Check the article’s grammar as well. I spot check each article I receive to check to see if the article makes sense. If it doesn’t not I reject it. Use your discretion when using italics, bold, capitalization. Some sites, like mine, strip out text decoration due to the fact that it is commonly abused.
Don’t Abuse the Resource Box
The resource box commonly contains your bio, contact information, and a link to your site. A well written resource box comes through as a bit more credible than one that contains excessive capitalization, links, and length.
Don’t Go Overboard With Keyword Density
If you are targeting a term within an article, for instance, “metal widgets”, then don’t have every sentence contain the same term “metal widgets”. It looks spammy, and quality directories will reject those type of articles.
Submit Quality Content
Content is king. There is no denying it. Not only for the search engines, but for the readers. It starts with a meaningful, attention grabbing title. One you get the attention of the reader, give them something interesting to read. Then, earn their click. Make your article compelling enough that they want to know more about the topic, or read more from you, the author.
I am the administrator at ArticleOnRamp.com and I see good and bad examples of articles. It is my experience that quality articles get picked up much more often in the SERPs than poorly written articles.
