I've been blogging occasionally over the last two months about my ongoing experiment with writing articles. This is a super hot topic lately with the changes going on at Google and Yahoo that are impacting many websites and basically freaking people out.
Now everybody knows that writing articles is a powerful technique. You knew that, right? And everybody is writing articles, right? No. Did I? Not until recently, though I wrote a lot in blogs and did post some articles I wrote on my sites. There's two parts to this for me. Writing, which I have been doing. Distributing. Which I hadn't been doing.
I finally came out of that fog and decided that I had to see what distribution might really do. Content, such as original articles is still the basic currency of the internet. People come onto the web looking for information. Content provides that information.
But, if the content is just sitting on a blog or posted in an article directory on one website, it has very limited exposure without links. Content may be the flesh of the web, but links are the bones, the underlying structure that allows things to found and accessed.
It's in our faces right here - the two basics that you can combine to really power a successful website. Content and links. Write articles AND publish/distribute them. Simple, basic, old style site building.
One technique many are using to build sites is to get other people's articles and put them up on their sites to provide related content. I do it, you do it, nearly everyone seems to. Other people publish ezines, but can't possibly write all the content they want to provide. This is the demand that exists, right now, for your articles. There is a deep, apparently bottomless need for quality content on nearly anything imaginable. And it won't go away.
Original content on your site is a great traffic booster. Distributing your content all over the internet gets you lots of incoming links - which over time could well continue to increase as your articles are picked up and redistributed. Plus you are generating a name for yourself and qualifying yourself as an expert. Experts write about what they know and discover. They share their knowledge. I'm not talking about anyone being a genius and discovering anti-gravity (and finally eliminating rocket science). I'm talking about what's already in your head and what you can learn, research and write about.
I wrote three articles on some basics concepts to keep in mind in building and developing successful eCommerce websites. They aren't hot hot hot 6 steps to infinite wealth type writing. They're basic and based on research. Then I distributed them to a couple (not all) of the big article directories and to a large group of relevant directories and lists through SubmitYourArticle.com (which I do recommend if you're looking for an excellent and reasonable article submission service). Here are the results as of this writing (June 28, 2005):
======== Pages Reported
======== Yahoo = Google = MSN = Pub Date
Article 1 . . . 610 . . . 320 . . . . 436 . . May 19th
Article 2 . . . 253 . . . 246 . . . . 269 . . June 1st
Article 3 . . 2060 . . .1000 . . . .239 . . June 14th
. . Total . . .2923 . . .1566 . . . .944
That's a lot of pages. Now, some of those won't have any live link. Yes, it does happen even though it really shouldn't. A lot of the sites it's on won't have much or any page rank and probably quite a few sites are not relevant. People aren't always careful about selecting relevant articles. Some will be on pages that won't pass rank. However, what's left are relevant incoming one-way links - some of which will be from sites with at least some authority. Say even 20% of the links are relevant and/or from sites with some rank. That's a minimum (I believe I'm being pretty conservative with the 20% figure) of over 1000 useful incoming links based on relevant content.
I was astonished. And then I felt really stupid - I knew this, but I really didn't GET it or I would have been writing and distributing from day 1. You're looking at the truth behind the power of articles and article distribution. No tricks, no fancy high powered tools, no big expensive anything at all.
Are you telling yourself you can't write articles? I'm telling you that you can. If you can talk, you can write. If you need help, there are lots of resources about how to write - some very good ones are free, some are quite inexpensive. Other tools are more expensive.
Ghostwriters are another alternative. A little tricky and possibly slightly expensive for really high quality work, but there's also a lot of information available on how to do it right.
My advice here is - whatever it takes, start publishing your own original content on your website and start distributing it now. For building long term success, there's very little you can do that will have anywhere near the same results.
Copyright 2005 Richard Keir
Richard teaches, trains and consults, on and off-line, on business and professional presentations, programming, site building and eCommerce. Visit http://www.building-ecommerce-websites.com for eCommerce articles, information, resources and links and check our blog at http://www.building-ecommerce-websites.com for opinion and ideas.
top rated cleaning service Lake Forest ..Have you been writing and submitting your free reprint articles... Read More
Article marketing is becoming more and more popular, especially as... Read More
What's the most powerful marketing technique on the Web? Search... Read More
Writing articles is one of the best and most effective... Read More
Every webmaster knows that to gain ranking positions in search... Read More
Thanks to recent information that leaked by Google within their... Read More
Ready to jump on the keyword article bandwagon? Billions of... Read More
Still following along on the Copywriter's Crash Course in article... Read More
These 7 Important Elements are your Blueprint to Article Writing... Read More
"But I've only been on the Internet 3 months! How... Read More
Do you have problems finding ideas for articles and speeches?I... Read More
The biggest challenge facing any online business today is how... Read More
Your publicity dreams may include being featured in Forbes, Fortune,... Read More
Don't let overwhelm hold you back- follow this expert advice... Read More
Writing articles for your site and for the use of... Read More
Been reading up on SEO? If so, you know that... Read More
The goal of free publicity is to get your name... Read More
Online publishers, ezine subscribers, and Web visitors want short, useful... Read More
You want your business to be noticed by thousands daily.... Read More
You've got to start somewhere, but once you've created your... Read More
One question I get asked all the time is how... Read More
I get tons of emails from people who want to... Read More
One of the best ways to promote your website is... Read More
Writing articles is by far the most effective online promotion... Read More
Well maybe it's not that "little known" but some people... Read More
insured cleaning company Morton Grove ..Not writing articles yet? You really should try it, if... Read More
I was asked to write an article on a short... Read More
If your business has a website, you're probably searching for... Read More
Why do so many internet marketers waste their time on... Read More
Sometimes when I am communicating with other webmasters and I... Read More
If you are going to be writing articles to promote... Read More
One of the best things you can do for your... Read More
Do you know one of the most powerful marketing techniques... Read More
Start by Being QuotableIt's tough to stand out online. With... Read More
Ok, today we are going to talk about one of... Read More
Having an article published is one of the fastest and... Read More
Do you have problems finding ideas for articles and speeches?I... Read More
You pick a pen, grab a piece of paper and... Read More
***What is the Resource box?'Resource box' is an information box... Read More
Writing a great deal of articles myself, I see a... Read More
A large portion of your business relies on your ability... Read More
There is no doubt that Spam has affected online business... Read More
Whether you own your own affiliate website, or subscription website,... Read More
Now that you know the secrets to writing great articles,... Read More
As we prepared to move our 12,000 article database from... Read More
"But I've only been on the Internet 3 months! How... Read More
As of July 1st, the year was half over! July... Read More
Many online marketers have crowed about the value of writing... Read More
You know that writing articles is the best free way... Read More
You say, I can't write an article, I have no... Read More
Article Writing |