When Article Marketing is THE Perfect Marketing Strategy
In the post, Getting Something for Nothing: Is it Time to Give Up on Free Article Marketing?, I basically questioned if this was still a viable marketing method. I’ve since fallen in love with it again. Here’s how I made a bit of a sharper U-turn.
A recently acquired client of mine has a multi-dimensional firm. She does web design, document management and computer repair. Her advertising budget is limited, and as her SEO writer (I’m rewriting her entire site), she asked if I had any ideas on how she could promote her many services without breaking the bank. Without thinking, article marketing kind of popped out of my mouth.
Why Article Marketing is Like an Ex You Can’t Let Go Of
For me, article marketing has evolved into some kind of ex-lover, you know the one who pisses you off to the point where you can’t see straight, but is so right on other levels (if you get my drift). For her, I thought it would be an ideal marketing tactic, for the following reasons:
Multiple Services: As her firm offers multiple services that really need to be advertised separately, the best way to start getting the word out is to distribute informative articles about each service separately. One of the biggest mistakes that many small business owners make is trying to cram too much information into one marketing message.
When consumers are confused or overloaded with information, they tend to become indecisive. Indecisiveness leads to inaction (as in they put off buying until a later date – or maybe never). So, she has to pitch each service separately. The best way to do this is via free content.
The Nature of the Service: The nature of her services lends itself to questions from potential clients. For example, take computer repair. When someone’s computer freezes, there are a number of common reasons for that. Writing and distributing an article entitled, 3 Common Reasons Your Computer Might Freeze Up, would be picked up by googobs of newsletters, websites and ezines.
The best way to get this type of article to them – free article directories.
Backlinks: When you submit articles to free article directories, you get tons of backlinks to your site, which leads to more customers over time.
I could go on and on about the benefits of free article marketing. The reason I wrote about it today is that for some businesses, not only is it a marketing strategy, it is THE free marketing strategy that shouldn’t be ignored.
A lesson I almost forgot.
Jordan Pearce | May 28th, 2008 at 9:49 pm #
More marketers should use article marketing. It is a great way to build back links and a good add on for selling your writing services. I’ve always liked article marketing so I loved the post.
Roberto | May 28th, 2008 at 10:26 pm #
interesting, thanks. and i think you’re right.
wellsworth - Internet Business | May 29th, 2008 at 2:39 am #
Thanks Yuwanda for confirming this. We sometimes get away from techniques that work, for some glittery new whiz-bang that has just hit the market.
The concept of putting good thoughts to pen will get lost if we get sidetracked with what seems to be quick and easy. When readers actually learn something because we took time to make content the helps, rather than just attracts for the purpose of a quick-buy, then we’re helping each other, and the article directories are a good source for that helpful content to get out quickly.
Thanks for keeping the focus on good content.
Arwen Taylor | May 29th, 2008 at 8:20 pm #
I was looking at my marketing options and I wasn’t really sure about article marketing. Only because it seems like the market is saturated and on top of that I’d hate to see my articles end up on spam sites. But I suppose it couldn’t hurt to give it a try.
HAlim | June 1st, 2008 at 9:29 am #
I never tried article marketing, something I must do after this.
Making money online | June 2nd, 2008 at 6:39 am #
Can you suggest the article sites that have large subsidaries?
I would like to submit to just the main players and they pass the article on to their associated article sites for me. This saves me submitting unnecessarily and saves me time, so I can spend more time writing quality articles.
Arwen Taylor | June 2nd, 2008 at 6:45 am #
As far as I know, none of the main article directories have “subsidiaries” that they will submit your article to besides their own site. Pretty much you will have to sign up and submit your article to each individual site or you would have to pay someone to do it for you.
Good luck
The Freelance Writer's Blog | June 2nd, 2008 at 8:21 am #
@Making Money Online, Arwen is right.
@Arwen: The main thing with article marketing is to get backlinks. Unfortunately, you have no control over where your article lands when you submit to article directories. However, in my opinion, the good outweighs the bad. As long as you submit good content, even if it does end up on a spam site, you still look good.
Thanks everybody for chiming in.
Allen Lundy | June 3rd, 2008 at 10:36 pm #
I believe that article marketing and article promotions through article directories, Internet and Affiliate marketers can make a solid income and drive more traffic to their websites and blogs than through any other means of marketing. I personally beliee that Article Marketing IS the Perfect Marketing Strategy.