I have said many times what a fan I am of article marketing. I think it is the number one most efficient way to build links and drive traffic to your site. If you do it right.
The other day I found two examples of article marketing gone wrong. Horribly, catastrophically wrong.
Why Use Article Marketing
The first purpose of article marketing is to position yourself as an expert in your field. That means posting useful, informative articles on directories, in newsletters, on blogs, and on other sites. Gradually, readers come to know your name. They know you produce good stuff. The more they see your name around, the more influence you will have.
The second purpose of article marketing is link building. By using carefully chosen anchor text for the links in your author resource box, you’re improving the SEO for your site.
When Article Marketing Goes Bad
Take a look at these two author resource boxes I found.
The article is contributed by a professional content writer, having experiences of working in different industries. For further information on KEYWORDS REDACTED please visit http://www.WEBSITEREDACTED.com/
KEYWORDS REDACTED Brings in-depth market knowledge and the resources of KEYWORDS REDACTED, plus local expertise and global network access to your KEYWORD REDACTED transaction. This article powered by SHAMELESS PLUG TO THE CONTENT WRITER’S OWN SITE.
The first example is just plain bad. Not only does the marketer lose any hope of a reader clicking on their link, but they also lose credibility. Why would you allow your content provider to point out the fact that you don’t write your own articles?
The second example is somewhat better. At least the marketer got good anchor text with decent links back to her site. But then the content provider had to add that little link of his own. When you hire a copywriter or content specialist to write articles for you and you pay them, adding a parasitic link at the end of the article is unacceptable, and bad business on the content provider’s part.
What you can’t see about that second example is that the content provider submitted the article in his own name. Not only did the marketer get screwed on the linking, but she didn’t even get to build up her own expert status.
If you are hiring someone else to do your article marketing for you, make sure you approve the articles before they are posted, and make sure you are getting proper credit.
So what do you say? Am I right about the content provider leaches? Or is all fair in love and SEO? Talk to me.
To me when I see that what someone really is saying is “My content isn’t good enough to make you interested in me, now I’m going to spam you.”
If I see good content, as long as the authors name is there I will do all the searching myself to find more by them. Average to poor content seems to be thinking marketing first content second. The content will sell itself… content first, marketing second.
.-= Anthony Licari´s last blog ..Does Your Twitter Look Like Spam? Try Interesting Interaction. =-.
Thanks for commenting, Anthony! It’s nice to have you here.
You’re right about great content selling itself, but you and I are “Internet people.” Do you really think the average surfer (I’m talking about the guy who doesn’t quite know what a blog is and who never heard of Internet marketing) will put much effort into tracking down an author he likes or wants more information from? Give them great content, yes, but then you need to make it really easy for them to find you.
Sure, but it better be good. Which is fair in my mind. I mean, I don’t want to hear ads on the radio, signs all over town for some service and I show up and there’s nothing there and it was a complete waste of time. Thankfully being in a sea of bad content along with poor marketing helps the rest of us stand out without even trying.
.-= Anthony Licari´s last blog ..Does Your Twitter Look Like Spam? Try Interesting Interaction. =-.
I’m so glad you wrote this for people like myself. Learning how to write for the internet is quite a challenge. Marketing presents another learning curve for me. Now that I am more involved, I realized that I need to return to some article directories and update my resource box.
Still learning, still working to improve. Thanks!
You’re right Shelley, writing for the Internet is different from writing for print. People are scanning, looking for fast information, and they’re quick to move on to the next thing. Check out the guest post I did over at Dramatic Design about writing for the web: http://www.dramatic-design.com/monday-marketing-writing-for-the-web/