How To Profit With Article Marketing

Internet marketers who have been around the block a time or two know that article marketing is one of the best, low-cost ways to drive traffic to your web site. And traffic (visitors to your site) can translate into buyers, right?

That, right there, is the main idea of article marketing. Let me give you a real-world example (and then in a minute I'll give you another idea how you can use articles).

Suppose you have written a book (either a physical book, or even an ebook) and offer it for sale on your web site. Web site traffic doesn't just appear, you have to drive it to your site in some way. Probably the easiest way is with pay-per-click traffic - but the downside is that, as the name says, you will *pay* per click. Even if you're paying 10 or 20 cents per click, that can add up to real money in no time.

The other obvious way to get traffic to your site is through the search engines. But anyone who's looked into SEO, or search engine optimization, knows it's time-consuming and seems to need a healthy dose of voodoo in order to work.

So this brings up article marketing - a way to promote your product or service by writing short articles about the subject.

If the book we're pretending you've written is about gardening, you need to find a way to get gardeners to your site - so write an article about some aspect of gardening that will really excite those people with green thumbs.

At the end of that article you can put a resource, or bio (biography) box. Most people put in a blurb about the author, but since you're trying to drive traffic to your site, you'll want to give them a reason to visit. Offer them more of what they just received in the article and a lot of them will click the link and visit your site.

Once you've written your article you will distribute it to article directories online - and then people who need articles on gardening (or every other subject) will see your article and, if it's written well, use it on their web sites, in the blogs, ezines, etc. And every time they use your article, the link to your web site is right there for the reader to click on!

That's the main way article marketing is used. There's another way that's similar, but it's done for a different reason.

If you don't have a product for sale yourself, you can still use article marketing to promote someone else's product. Find a product you believe in (it'll probably be one you've purchased yourself) from a company that offers an affiliate program, and sign up for it. As an affiliate you can promote the product with a special link and will receive a commission for each sale you make.

Now, you do the same thing as the person who's promoting their own product - write articles about some aspect of the product you're promoting and drive people to the sales page with the link in your resource box.

Sidebar: Some article directories do not let you point directly to a product using an affiliate link. In that case, you'll lead the reader back to your site, and then to the product sales page. Be sure and check the terms of service for each article directory to whom you submit an article to make sure you follow the rules.

One of the biggest "secrets" in article marketing is in writing more than one article. A lot of people write one article and when they don't see an avalanche of traffic, they decide it doesn't work and give up on it.

But the people who continue to write articles and submit them to the directories will see their traffic build and build. Article marketing is a tried and true method of creating web site traffic - and once you can get them to your web site, you have a chance to close the sale and make some money!

Jay Jennings has created software that makes article marketing quick and easy, even if you're not a writer. See Article Architect right now at http://articlearchitect.com and find out how more traffic to your web site will impact your online business.