Article Marketing Do’s and Don’ts

Last Updated: Nov 13, 2018
Is article marketing a good way to get traffic to your website? The answer is maybe. Here are facts to know before spending time and money on article marketing. We’ve included some do’s and don’ts to help you learn the right way to use articles to market your business online. 

Look around the web for tips on getting traffic to your website and you’re likely to stumble on claims that tout the virtues of article marketing. The process, the self-proclaimed article-marketing gurus will tell you (as they try to drive you into their own marketing funnels), works like magic. Write some short articles (or have someone else write them for you), include anchor text links to your site in the articles, and then shoot them off to every website that has a section that says “Write for Us,” or “Article Submission Guidelines.” 

It all sounds like a great idea. But does it work? And if you already are somewhat familiar with Internet marketing, does it work in a post-Panda/ post-Penguin/ post-“We’ve detected unnatural links” world? 

The answer is, “It depends.” Article marketing can work if the articles you produce are authoritative, well-written, original and focused on providing information of true value to your target market. In fact, having articles published to get exposure for a business is a concept that predates the Internet.

The problem today, though, is that so many of the articles that get distributed online are either unsuitable for publication on quality sites, or are written by individuals or agencies that are trying to get links to a client site – without disclosing that fact.

BusinessKnowHow.com contains a mixture of staff-written content and content from subject matter experts who have contributed articles. We had an article submission form on the website in the past, but we had to take it down because we received more than 2500 articles submitted to us for publication each month. It was rare that we found any that were publishable.

The reason? Very often, the articles addressed a subject the website or newsletter doesn’t cover; were poorly written; were “spun” by “article writing” software; and read like advertorials, white papers, or direct mail copy.

Even though we removed the article submission page from our website several years ago, we still receive dozens of article submissions and requests to submit articles each week. They contain everything from requests to publish articles about health issues, gambling, and other topics we would never cover, to articles that are being submitted just to build buzz for an SEO client.

Although mass submitting such articles may get them used on some websites (and get links to your site as a result), the sites that do use your content may not be sites you’d want links from, and they may not be sites that will bring you likely prospects for what you sell. The links may also be discredited by the search engines.

There’s another, related problem with most article marketing campaigns, too. They focus on getting keyword links to a site instead of focusing on what really matters: the customers’ needs – and what should be your real goal of article marketing: attracting targeted customers to your site based on the quality of the content you distribute.

As we noted above, article marketing can work if you focus on customer interests instead of SEO tactics. Here are some do’s and don’ts to remember to help you use article publishing successfully as part of your marketing campaign.

There are several ways individuals use software to create articles. Sometimes they just “spin” a new article by changing a few words and rearranging the sentences a little in an article they’ve already written. Other times they use software to scour the web for articles on a chosen topic. Then they proceed to steal phrases and sentences from each of the articles and string them together into a “new” article. In both cases, the articles that are produced tend to be poor quality; sometimes they’re pretty close to gibberish. Where content has been stolen from other people’s websites – even small amounts – the “new” article may also contain one or more copyright violations.

Established websites and online newsletters cover specific topics, just like print publications do. That’s because whether a publication is online or offline, the way to attract and keep an audience is to consistently provide readers with well-written articles that are accurate, timely, and provide practical tips or solutions to real-life problems related to the subject matter of the publication.

So, just as you aren’t likely to find articles telling you how to lose weight or learn Yoga in Entrepreneur Magazine, you won’t find articles like that on Business Know-How or on other popular business websites or online publications. Nor will you find articles in business magazines about one man’s experience when he had to take care of his kids one Sunday when his wife was sick.

Yes, the purpose of article marketing is to market your business, but pushing out articles that have your self-interests in mind instead of your customers’ is self-defeating. Material that is nothing more than a new product release, thin white paper, or advertorial won’t get you published on good sites. For instance, we get articles submitted at least once a week by web hosting companies or web designers about how to choose a web host or web designer. Most of those articles are deleted immediately because their sole purpose is to point people back to the authors’ sites to buy web hosting or design services.

In high school and college, you may have been encouraged to read numerous articles on an assigned topic and then write a paper based on what you read. That’s fine for school papers, but it doesn’t work for either Internet or newsstand publications. Research is definitely important, but you need current, original research and real-life examples to give your article a chance at being published on popular websites. Don’t waste your time writing or submitting articles that deal in generalities. If your article reads like this recent submission to Business Know-How, it will quickly be deleted.

“These days there are plenty of articles
on the troubling issue of …. The general
consensus seems to be …”

There are a number of individuals and small firms that offer article writing and submission services to website owners who want to drive traffic to their site. A few of these services are good, but like anything else, you often get what you pay for. And there are some services that seem to rewrite the same tired articles slightly for each new client.

The result: editors quickly learn what email addresses are associated with such writing and submission services. And here at Business Know-How, at least, we often delete those submissions without ever reading them.

Then there are the articles that sound interesting but contain multiple common misspellings (such as loose instead of lose), or that contain factual inaccuracies. Good editors know the subject area their publications cover and know when something doesn’t ring true. And while most editors realize it’s easy for an occasional typo to slip through, the second time we read “You can avoid loosing customers by…” will be the time when we click the X to send the open email to the trash.

Not surprisingly, the secret to getting published by popular websites and online newsletters isn’t much different than the “secret” to getting published in more traditional publications. If you want your article published by a website or online newsletter that reaches a large audience, keep these tips in mind:

Read back issues of newsletters and browse through articles visible on a website to see if your subject matter and approach fits in with the type of articles they regularly publish. Keep in mind that while a site for home businesses might occasionally publish an article about home storage solutions, such an article would need to focus exclusively on storage solutions for home offices. If the article talks about hanging onto your furnishings for years or how to make more space in your clothes closet, a business publication isn’t going to use it.

But do so without overtly promoting your own product or service. Offer little known-facts, productivity tips, or other information that readers can use and benefit from regardless of whether they use your services or not.

Websites like to have a steady stream of exclusive content on their sites. It helps keep visitors coming back. But if you’re going to offer to write content, be sure you have samples of your writing available to show the editor.  They’ll want to know how well you write – and may want to see the finished piece, too, before agreeing to publish any articles you write.

Use specific examples to flesh out your articles. Instead of saying that many people are afraid to speak in public, give a real-life example of someone who was stressed out by the thought of speaking in public, and what steps they took to conquer the problem.

Authors who distribute articles for free usually include a resource box at the end of their articles. Typically this includes their name, email address, brief credentials (just a couple of lines), and a link to their website. However, some authors insist the entire resource box be included unchanged and then include calls to action similar to what one would find in direct marketing campaigns. For instance “Subscribe to our free email newsletter today and save 10% on your next purchase.” Here at Business Know-How, and on other sites as well, an ad in your resource box and a statement requiring the complete resource box to be included unchanged in the published article will get your submission deleted.

If you are sure the article you submitted to a website or online newsletter was appropriate and well written, and that the publication to which you submitted it uses material from its audience, follow up once to be sure the editor got the article. Sometimes articles get overlooked or accidentally deleted due to the large volume of email and spam editors receive

© 2018 Attard Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved. May not be reproduced, reprinted or redistributed without written permission from Attard Communications, Inc.

About the author:
Janet Attard is the founder of the award-winning  Business Know-How small business web site and information resource. Janet is also the author of The Home Office And Small Business Answer Book and of Business Know-How: An Operational Guide For Home-Based and Micro-Sized Businesses with Limited Budgets.  Follow Janet on Twitter and on LinkedIn

Research & References of Article Marketing Do’s and Don’ts|A&C Accounting And Tax Services
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