Article marketing for SEO is nothing new, but what’s new in the last few years is that many online businesses have switched their focus from traditional forms of article writing to this newer form. What has changed? Basically, everything!
Article marketing has been around since the beginning of print. It’s been around as long as newspapers have been around. Article marketing back then was usually done by selling spun articles and the like, but now it’s all about resource sharing, link building, authority, and the ever-changing Search Engine algorithms. Now that SEO is such an important part of any Internet marketing campaign, it’s no wonder that so many companies are turning to articles as the way to promote themselves.
Spun articles used to be all about the designer looking for a creative outlet for their talents. Nowadays, article marketing for SEO includes more of a business approach. An online business purchases a piece of content in a magazine or newspaper and inserts an advertorial, a (usually) well-designed article (or series of articles), and a (more often than not) catchy theme to match their (topic) interests. The whole idea was that you customized an article or series of articles to fit the interests and needs of a certain audience and then custom-tailor them to fit the search engine optimization criteria.
The problem with this strategy is that the search engines are always changing their algorithm requirements. They’re doing it because they can detect a certain pattern that shows them that the person sending emails is likely to be an online user who is searching for information relating to (and probably buying) the product being marketed. Therefore, if you want your article marketing for SEO to work, you need to change the theme to something that isn’t too generic and doesn’t have your target customer’s attention wandering away from the main topic. This can be accomplished by focusing on more specific information rather than writing a generic article with no real connection to the product you are trying to sell.
Another SEO article marketing method that continues to see some success these days is link building. Link building works by placing one or more of your own links within the text of an article, on your website, in an HTML page (if you have one), or on any number of other places online where your target audience might be interested. The more back links you have pointing back to your site, the higher your website will rank in the search engine results. The basic idea is that when people read your article and visit your website, they will find one or more links that lead back to your site, and the more links you have, the higher your search engine optimization scores will be.
Lastly, and most obviously, is article marketing for seo through guest blogging. Guest blogging is simply writing an article for another website or blog and then placing their URL at the bottom of your article. This gives your target readers a direct way to learn more about what you are doing, and it gives the other website free advertising by showing them that you are willing to engage in a guest post. While guest blogging can be effective in SEO, you will probably only benefit from it if you have a substantial readership. For most people, it is not worth the time and effort involved in doing so.