The New Age of Article Marketing

By Neil Jones

Article marketing has always been one of those tried and tested marketing mediums that has stood the test of time. With the constant changes that are evident in the online world and the new and sexy marketing methods being introduced daily, article marketing is still firmly rooted as a stalwart for website promotion.

But as competition in the online marketing industry has grown the ability to generate large amounts of traffic from articles submitted to directories has significantly dissipated. It wouldn’t be uncommon for one article to receive fewer than 10 views each month, revealing that article marketing might be losing its effectiveness. But guess what? At this very point in time there are marketers who are generating five figure monthly incomes from article marketing alone. Article marketing is still alive and kicking!

However, these marketers are utilizing an innovative technique to drive traffic to their sites through the use of article directories, a technique that defers from the traditional article marketing methodology. In this post I will reveal to you what this technique is and why it so effective.

What is the new age of article marketing?

Traditionally, article marketing was used to drive traffic to an internet marketer’s site from articles submitted to directories like Ezine Articles. In today’s environment this isn’t effective as the traffic generated is less than acceptable. For a marketer to succeed with this method he/she will have to submit 5-10 articles a day to receive a respectable amount of traffic from the directories.

The new age of article marketing goes against this trend and relies on article syndication. Article syndication is when an article you’ve written is picked up by other webmasters and published on their sites with proper attribution (links to your site to credit you). What these 5-figure article marketers are doing is basically writing an informative, engaging, and compelling article and submitting it to the top article directories. These articles are then used as web content, or newsletters by webmasters who feel the content will add value to their visitors or subscribers.

The power of this strategy is that one well written article can be syndicated to hundreds of traffic intensive websites. And this will result in traffic being generated from unlikely sources. Beside the traffic there will also be a number of strong backlinks that are built as well. An article written for syndication will have to follow certain criteria:

The article should:

• be engaging, value-adding, and informational
• not be hyped or “salesy”
• not be written to generate a click as a sales letter will

Article syndication does have its disadvantages as well and very often an excellently written article will go unnoticed, but don’t let this deter you as perseverance is the key to success using this model.

When your articles are re-published on other sites you will have the opportunity to form a relationship with the webmaster who published the article and this will lead to a greater amount of opportunities. You will find that the webmaster in question will begin re-publishing your articles more often when you have established a relationship with him/her.

And don’t forget: the traffic that you acquire from your republished articles will be passive in nature. This will result in a never-ending flow of traffic to your site, which will equate to multiple streams of passive income.

Author Information

Neil Jones specializes in launching ecommerce sites and is currently plying his trade as head of marketing for eMobileScan. With 18 websites based all around Europe this company is on course to become one of Europe’s largest online retailers of Industrial handheld computers like the Motorola MC75 and Zebra ZM400. Neil has been an online marketer for the past six years, and has owned and run a range of ecommerce sites.

Split-Testing Content: Four Awesome Tips to Boost Article Marketing Conversion Rates

By Roko Nastic

Who says split testing is only for landing pages and usability comparisons? The smartest marketers on the internet have taken general split testing to a whole new level, using it to improve their content’s performance, the effects of their social media marketing campaigns, and the powerful results made possible by their e-commerce properties.

However, split testing is not a simple exercise that anyone can set up, complete, and gain data from. Just like any other form of online testing, split testing requires a dedicated strategy and a clear system for measuring performance, value, and the effects of different marketing resources.

These four tips will help you get more from your split testing efforts; improving click-through rates and total sales quantities alike. If you are struggling to get readers that are biting into your content and retaining interest, these four strategies could undoubtedly help you hit that final goal in reader connection – interested, purchase-ready customers with the potential to instantly access your product.

Take the Huffington Post’s approach to headlines

The Huffington Post is one of the most popular blogs on the internet, and for good reason. A true giant of the online publishing world, the blog has been publishing amateur and professional political and social content for the better part of a decade.

But the reason for the Huffington Post’s success is not its longevity and age, but its approach to split-testing content and measuring results. Stories are posted with two different headlines, content arranged according to click-through rates, and advertising placement adjusted for every story.

Measure the performance of different article directories

There are hundreds of online article directories, each offering different benefits for marketers. Some are jam-packed with valuable content to link to, others blessed by high PR ratings, and others popular for their outbound linking policies.

Whenever you are picking an article directory for publishing, do not do it in isolation. Measure the traffic and sales effects of different article directories, and tailor your strategy to incorporate the most effective and valuable publishing platforms into your routine.

Host on-site, and use design to boost reader involvement

Design does boost engagement, especially on content-heavy websites. The standard black-text-on-white approach works wonders for readability, as do almost all high-contrast publishing styles. For most writers, putting up a theme and placing content is all that is required for satisfactory performance.

But you are not just an ordinary writer, you are a marketer with performance goals to achieve. As well as split-testing your content, a dedicated effort towards split-testing your design will help you boost reader involvement and actively improve your conversion rates.

Use pay-per-click advertisements to choose keywords for your content

There is a common fallacy in SEO – the desire to build a website around keywords and measure effectiveness after the fact. Marketing “experts” spend years building a website, only to find it completely devoid of any value once it has reached its search engine position and traffic targets.

Test your content before you invest time into ranking it. With a pay-per-click network and complimentary voucher, you could split-test hundreds of articles before you put the effort into ranking them on your own web properties.

Author Information

Roko Nastic is a writer and member at WebmasterFormat – place where webmasters can learn how to build and maintain successful websites and find the best web hosting services.