Not too long ago, article marketing was the be-all and end-all for a successful content strategy. Articles, we thought, were a sure-fire way to get our brands, websites and products noticed on search engines like Google. Marketers touted their power to brands; SEO professionals told clients to get on the article marketing train or perish.
Six or some years later, however, things have really changed. Thanks to social media marketing, the image sharing revolution, digital PR and stricter search engine algorithms, the way we market online rarely relies on articles anymore. So should we still bother with the practice of article marketing?
“Yes, article marketing still converts and converts well, but only if it is done right,” writes journalist and SEO expert Warren Wooden in a recent blog post for Business2Community.com. “Where most people fail at article marketing is they are not placing their articles on sites that get read much, they are not writing about a related topic, and they don’t bother linking to their site with an appropriate link.”
Wooden isn’t alone in the opinion that article marketing is still worth marketers’ time. In fact, the channels for distribution have quadrupled over the years, making it even easier for folks to read your articles. Sites like LinkedIn work wonders for getting technical and professional pieces in front of the right eyes. Twitter is another great social media channel to promote links to articles. Also, business and industry blogs have exploded since the inception of article marketing and there now thousands of blogs to market your articles to.
Yet there’s just one little catch about today’s article marketing: Unlike in the past, only good articles with dynamic and engaging content stay alive and put you on the search engine map. Crappy, spammy articles with no soul will be bounced and are essentially a waste of your time. As Wooden put it, “Just know that article marketing is something that many people are still doing and because of that you should know that it still works. The only way to get article marketing traffic to convert is to make sure you stay on top of it and are constantly publishing new articles on article directories, guest blogs, and Web 2.0 sites. Trust me on this one, article marketing traffic will convert much better than you can imagine as long as you write high quality content.”
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