Today’s guest, Bonnie Jo Davis, has made her career by writing articles that sell. Check out this excellent article by Bonnie as a taste of what you will be learning on today’s show.
What’s gone wrong when you put forth your best efforts in submitting your top article to dozens of sites and yet the results are lackluster? You’ve followed all the generic advice offered by article marketing experts, including writing about a riveting topic, tweaking the catchy headline and paying good money to an editor to refine your jewel.
Despite this all your efforts seem wasted. You aren’t seeing the results you expected despite your hard work. Unfortunately, there are multiple steps to maximizing the results of article marketing and a great deal of advice fails to go deep enough to give you the edge in winning the game. Many article marketers don’t realize that two-thirds of the work involved should be done prior to submitting your article. Ask yourself these questions to determine if you’ve truly laid the groundwork for success.
How’s Your Aim?
If your current clients are medium to large sized companies, you should target the same audience with your articles. You can’t expect great results from an article submitted to sites targeting entrepreneurs unless you actually have something valuable to sell to entrepreneurs. It is essential that you target the right audience.
Annoying pop-ups?
First impressions are everything. Don’t reference a web site in your byline unless you have your own domain with no pop-ups. Invest a few bucks for your own domain and host to help establish your credibility.
Playing cat and mouse with visitors?
You should always feature your contact information in plain view on every page. Hide your contact information and none of your marketing efforts will work very well.
Optimizing your landing page?
If the page you publicized in your byline is sub-standard, you have wasted your time. Impress your first time visitor with a professional looking and resourceful page that includes information about your company. Always include a call to action at the bottom of the page. Use testimonials from current and/or past customers at the top and bottom of the page.
A unique name for your landing page?
Your byline should always contain a landing page that has an original name. For instance, you could name a page on your site such as http://www.YourURL.com/XXX.htm The “XXX” keywords should be replaced by words in your article title. Yes, this can still be a version of your home page but you can track article readers more accurately by using a unique URL in your byline.
A human voice or voice mail hell?
It is impractical to put your phone number in your byline if you aren’t willing to actually answer your phone during business hours. New customers aren’t likely to leave a message if they can’t reach you. They assume that if answering your own phone isn’t a priority with you, then calling you isn’t a priority for them.
Is it time yet?
Article marketing efforts take a minimum of three months to hit critical mass. Some e-zines are written so far in advance that it could take six months to get them to use your article. Don’t submit an article and race to Google the title unless a reasonable amount of time has passed.
Betting on one article to save your business?
If you are struggling with your business and desperate to make some quick money then article marketing is not for you. Article marketing only works when you put forth a driven effort, write articles regularly and submit often. This is not a one-shot marketing technique and one article will not save your business from bankruptcy.
As you can see, there is a great deal of upfront work needed before your article submissions come into fruition. It is never too late to make a good impression. Tweak your site as much as you can and make changes to your unpublished articles. Do something every day to improve your article marketing results. You’ll be humming happily instead of singing the article submission blues!
© 2007, Davis Virtual Assistance.
Bonnie Jo Davis is an article marketing expert and prolific writer who helps small business owners exploit the power of the written word. Visit http://www.WriteYourWayToProfit.com to sign-up for the Write Your Way To Profit e-course.
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This Wednesday’s guest on Online Marketing with RSS Ray has written the book on search engine optimization, literally! He has been mentioned in news publications like The Wall Street Journal, Wired, BusinessWeek, Time Magazine, MSNBC, Slashdot, and The Guardian, and has one of the top 10,000 most popular websites according to Alexa. This guest is none other then Aaron Wall, author of the SEO Book and the creator of numerous free SEO tools.
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