Writing Articles - What to Avoid

Writing articles is seen as a way to make money on the Internet. But there is a right way and a wrong way.

The purpose of an article, whether written for the Internet or to the local newspaper or magazine, is used to show either your opinion or your expert knowledge on the subject.

What you have got to decide when you write the article is what you are trying to achieve. Are you blatantly trying to make money by selling the article, or have you far more knowledge on the subject which you have put on a website, which you want to direct the reader to. Or if it is a review on a piece of software or equipment, or even about a vacation you have just taken. These can be placed on review sites where people can use your knowledge to select where they are going to take their vacation or which hotel they're going to stay in.

Let's start with the example that you have written an article with the intention of guiding people to your website to give them more information on the subject matter. On your website, you probably have affiliate links or adsense links relating to the subject matter. This means that the article you have written will give you a residual income of some sort. There is a lot of information on the intranet on how to optimize your site to be able to generate more more income. When you write in article with this in mind, and you are an expert an enthusiast on the subject this will show in the article. Your site will become an authority site on the subject and traffic to, and the status of, the site will grow. This is a great way of sharing your knowledge and enthusiasm on the subject and be able to make some money from that knowledge. The same principle goes if you are writing to a magazine, in most cases you will actually get paid for the article, with in that article will also be your contact details, or websites or company name, where people can contact you and either give you commissions for more articles or buy goods from you. Both of these methods will generate an income.

Some people use private-label rights articles and submit these to article sites or use them within their websites. This is not a very good idea. The editors of the better article sites are aware of what PLR subjects are available at that time, and it is quite rare for one of these articles to actually be published. And if you are using a complete generic site bought as a PLR site it will not receive a high enough ranking through the search engines to be found by anybody, unless you were the first to get it indexed by the main search engines. You read in some e-books sold by so-called gurus that all you need to do is change a few words. The introductory paragraph, and the final paragraph, and nobody will notice it is a PLR article. Believe me, they will.

Another way of making money from writing articles, is to go through all the market places on the Internet where people are looking for people to write articles for them. You might be an expert on the subject they are requiring articles about, the problem with that is that nobody will ever know that you are the expert. They will think that the person who publishes the articles and books on their website are the experts. You will probably get between three and five dollars for your expertise. Whereas, if you had put it on an article site and had back links to your own website or your affiliate program, where allowed.. you would have more than matched that payment in a few days and the income would be residual,

Article that relate more to current affairs, or are reviews on new equipment that is available have a limited lifespan. This kind of article is probably better suited to a blog or to magazine or newspapers, that is willing to pay for it. Some letters columns in magazines and newspapers pay a weekly prize for the star letter. Though saying that, there are review sites all over the web, which would welcome your articles and some allow back links to your site, blog, or even affiliate links to show where you bought the product from. These kind of articles aren't really suitable, in my opinion, for article directories. This is because some of the links that you might have used in the article would cease to be live after the product or news story you had written about has become a distant memory.

So in conclusion, the best articles to write are on subjects you are enthusiastic about or knowledgeable about. Then decide whether you feel this article has a limited life. If it is a general knowledge or information article it is worth distributing it to article sites, though some are far better than others. But with a bit of research. You'll soon find the most suitable sites for your articles. If you must use PLR articles, used sparingly on your website, but don't attempt to submit them to article sites or you could be blacklisted. And unless you are desperate for quick cash, do not write articles on your specialist subjects and sell them to people on Marketplace sites, unless you feel you are getting a sensible payment, something in an order that it would take a long while to achieve by using adsense and affiliate marketing as income.

Submit Articles For Money Or Love?

Targeted traffic to your website is the lifeblood of free money online. Submit articles for free article directories such as ezinearticles and you are assured of success. Submitting articles has been a proven method of generating free traffic, and free money from advertisers willing and eager to capture some of your traffic to their more lucrative websites.

There are many advantages to yourself and your advertisers if you submit articles for money making websites. Firstly there is the advantage of a generous back link to your website targeted to entice the search engines spiders to follow along. Secondly, there is also the benefits of a reader of your submitted article being interested in your content and duplicating it for the benefits of their readers, this again brings additional benefits.

Submit articles for money generating purposes and you could be in serious danger of making it to the front pages of google and other search engines if you can possibly write interesting enough content with sufficient keyword optimization skills to satisfy the search engines. I am not here to discuss all the merits of submitting an article, however I do suggest you add article writing and article submission to your arsenal of online marketing strategies.

Our advice is to submit articles about those things you feel at ease writing about. It tends to assist your article submission when published to the world wide web. Words always tend to flow with ease when articles are written in this way.

Now, the fun part begins when you begin to submit articles for money making websites online. These particular articles are genuinely written with the sole intention of driving highly targeted visitors to your website. Their purpose as an article is to generate genuine interest in the subject written.

If we were to take this article as an example, it would obviously be written in such a style as to generate interest in article submission and the benefits thereof. We would suggest to submit articles written in this type of style and to do so on a regular basis. I personally submit articles on a two or three day basis, this of course is no more than maybe two or three articles per week, the subjects of those articles are never the same and they are spread across several topics of interest.

When you submit articles in this way, it allows for a larger catchment of people and as we mentioned earlier the purpose of the article is to generate additional traffic. I do not believe for an instant that there are authors that do not keep this in the forefront of their mind when creating a masterpiece to submit to article directories.

If you find manually inputting your article is too much like hard work, then why not submit articles to your favorite free article directories using purpose made article submitter software. They have the capabilities to automatically fill in forms and article content onto article submission pages at a breeze.

I am still a great believer in the personal approach when I submit articles. Creating an original article on one source, however, the day is fast approaching where this type of automated article submission will overtake the capacity of us die hard article writers. I guess the internet has room for us all, but for how much longer?

Article Marketing - The Second Step to a Prospect-Pulling Resource Box at the End of Your Articles

Article marketing on the article directories is a two fold process. In the body of the article you give - good, useable information. In the resource box you are ready to receive - the readers clicking through to your web site to become visitors, subscribers, prospects and customers.

Many people falsely believe that the resource box is the place to tell the reader all about you and your many accomplishments so they will know you are the expert.

To this notion I offer a loud and hearty NAY!

The first reason I say NAY! is because if you have not demonstrated in the article body that you are an expert, it is way too late to try to do so in the resource box, and the reader probably did not get as far as your resource box anyway.

The second reason I say NAY! is because the resource box is Not About You, hence the strongly spoken word NAY!

An invitation for THEM!

Your resource box is not the place for a virtual ego wall to tell the reader all about your accomplishments, books, and degrees, etc. In most of mine, if I mention my name at all, it is only at the very end of the resource box.

Your resource box is all about the reader and what more they can learn from you and your resources. The purpose of your resource box is to invite the reader into your world by clicking through to your web site or blog and offering them something of value that will improve their lives. Offer them something of value and you can get a very loyal and responsive new prospect.

Article Marketing When You Are First Getting Started - Including Examples

My first bit of advice here is that when you are first getting started you need to find a niche and you need to become an expert at one thing. For example, let's imagine that you are in the business opportunities niche.

You don't need to learn everything there is to know about business opportunities. Find one thing, one little thing about ... it may be particularly your home business opportunity. Something your home business opportunity does better than anybody else out there, and then become an expert in that. Once you become an expert in that and really... it shouldn't take you long. If you'll go find that information, really look hard for that information, really specialize. Become an expert and begin writing articles about that information. The thing is, you can write articles before you know everything there is to know about the subject.

Here is another example. Imagine you needed to write some articles about dog training, and you don't know anything about dog training. How would you do it?

You'd go on line and in 15 or 20 minutes, you could research enough information to give me some valuable information about dog training. If you were to write 25 articles for me on 25 different aspects of dog training, at the end of writing those 25 articles, you would be becoming sort of an expert in that. And of course your business opportunity, you're going to be able to become more of an expert, so I think that's the key--get good at what you're doing and then write articles about it.

The next step is to submit your articles to the online article directories.

Making the Most of Motivation Speaking- Some Advice for the Newbie

Motivational Speakers have a tough job. They have to take a room filled with sourpusses and turn them into smiling jacks. Easier said than done. Especially if the Speaker is a survivor of some nightmare experience and has to revisit that event every speech just to collect a speaking stipend. If not, they have to find something interesting, funny or stirring to say that will move a crowd.

I have presented over 1200 live speeches or programs over the years. Not an easy thing to do, but it has taught me some important lessons. What I have learned will help any newbie break out from the multitude of Motivational Speakers to become a highly-paid speaking superstar. Considering most of competition, it isn't that hard.

The Professional Speaker Community can be a scary place. It's filled with screamers, actors, story tellers, sellers and people trying to do bad impressions of Elvis, Dracula, the Beverly Hillbillies and Mike Wallace. Most of these types come, go and have a speaking shelf life of about two to five years (thank goodness). The last thing you want to be is some flash in the pan and people forget about the next day.

While times, technologies and audiences change, a Speaker's appeal should not. Long-term popularity is not based on a spur of the moment topic or the Speaker's ability to drown out noise from a 747 taking off with the volume of their voice. It's about reaching out and touching an audience in a way that makes you memorable.

Martin Luther King Jr. was an average Speaker for his venue, but what he had to say was well above average and set him apart from other preachers. He had an important, inspiring and informative message that caught the attention of everyone. Love or hate what he had to say, you still listened and some of us were inspired enough to learn. The same can be said of the Reverend Jonathan Edwards.

Born in 1703, he attended Yale and challenged most of the popular thought and philosophy of his day. Despite having a squeaky voice and bad eyesight that made him hold written sermons close to his face while speaking, his words hit like thunderbolts. It is said that when he presented his sermon "Sinners in the hands of an angry God" for the first time in July of 1741, people grabbed on to support beams and hold on tight to their pews for fear of being instantly pulled into hell.

Two memorable, talented and completely difference examples of great modern motivational speakers are Zig Ziglar and Curtis Sliwa. "I'll see you at the top" is an expression most Zig Fans know well. He has inspired and influenced the field of motivational speaking by combining home-spun stories with sound principles that encourage people to positively market themselves and move forward in their careers.

As a founder of the Guardian Angels and urban recovery pioneer, Curtis has been essential in teaching people how to take back their streets from gangs and drug dealers. These guys are in it for the long haul. There are tons of speakers that deserve honorable mention, but most of them come and go, are better known as writers or find a more comfortable fit in other speaking categories.

The toughest job for someone new to speaking is the development of their presentation. Most audiences have an attention span of 5-10 minutes. That means you have to make a list of about 8 topics or subtopics an hour. For the most part it's about honesty. People love honest, passionate speakers that believe in a topic and have great stories to tell. They can spot a phony a mile off.

If you were born installed with a microchip processor installed in your brain, make use of the wonderful tools available through PowerPoint. These presentations can easily be loaded on to a disc for presentation almost anywhere. Some speakers still use slide projectors, but those are quickly going out of style.

Apart from the bells and whistles of impressive graphics, music and video, it's still what you say that will get you noticed. That makes the development of your speech the most important part of the presentation.

Here are some basics to creating a good Speech:

1. When creating your message, make it yours. Don't listen to or compare yourself with any other speaker.

2. Don't whine. Too many speakers spend audience time trying to settle old scores or target enemies.

3. Always leave them wanting more. Never try and tell your life story in one speech. Less is always more.

4. Speak to satisfy your audience, not yourself. They want to be emotionally moved, lifted and satisfied. If they just wanted information, they have the internet for that.

5. Be constantly aware of your timing. Find transition areas in your speech that will allow you to smoothly move to the next point without sounding like you're working off a bullet list.

6. Be honest and unafraid to share your deepest thoughts, most private experiences and lessons learned. No one likes to revisit bad or soul-testing experiences, but they make us who we are just as much as the good ones do. A good speaker can turn these kinds of experiences into an object lesson for an audience.

7. Whenever possible, keep it upbeat. People's lives are filled with bad news and aggravation. They look to a motivational speaker to say something that will give them enough inspiration to get up in the morning.

8. Allow for changes. Speaking is a learning process. After a few speeches, it's going to be obvious what works and what does not. Get rid of what doesn't no matter how you feel about it.

9. Entertain, inspire and inform. Most speakers get it backwards. They try to inform, inspire and entertain. Motivational Speaking is very different from teaching, giving a how-to speech or presenting a sales seminar. People are not going to associate a topic with you; they will associate you with a topic. YOU are the attraction. Anyone can talk about chickens, but when Frank Perdue and Colonel Harland Saunders were alive, they were the ones we expected to talk about them.

10. Treat your audience with tough love when necessary. People listen to Dr Phil (God help us all) because they like what he says and the way he says it. He tells people what they want and need to hear, even though it sometimes seems insulting and degrading. Many of his colleagues say he gets it wrong sometimes and a few have tried to have his license to practice yanked, but people love him.

10. Speak with your audience, not to them. Think of your speech as a comfortable one-sided conversation. It's like going to a party, get together or meet up. There are always a few people everyone likes listening to. They have a way of smoothly communicating wonderful ideas or tidbits of information without hitting you over the head. They are polite, courteous, tolerant, intelligent and well-informed.

11. Learn from Oprah: Create a target audience. Oprah Winfrey is one of the most influential people in the world, especially with working women. That was no accident. Some years ago she decided to break out of the standard daytime talk show model of hosting fights between feuding lovers and exposing the fathers of babies live on the air through DNA tests. Instead, she took the high road and began to cover topics that were important to working and professional women. That change lead to a higher value audience, books, book clubs and you know the rest. If you really want to stand out as a Speaker, find and feed your target audience.

12. Test drive your talent. It might be a good idea to try out your speech a couple of times on a local level before seeking representation or trying to land high-paying gigs yourself. I started speaking as a young teen and, believe me, there is nothing more frightening than a local Rotary Club, Lions Club, Jaycees, the Shriners or Masons. Women's Groups, Senior Centers and Church Clubs also present a challenge for Speakers; but all these are nothing compared to presenting material at university student activity events, private corporate functions, conventions or reunions. Big time paid gigs are the wrong places to try material out or test your speaking abilities.

Once you get your presentation together, call some of the not-for-profit groups and offer to present a free program for their organization. Rotary Clubs make a good starting point because you'll be speaking to professionals and business people. If nothing else, you'll end up with some nice certificates honoring you for your speaking efforts. They always look good on any speaking resume and I've got a drawer full. Speaking for local clubs, groups and churches will give you a chance to get your act together.

High Schools are next. High Schools can sometimes give you a taste of what speaking before college students is like and help you develop a thick skin. You'll need it. Many colleges offer speaking conditions that range from primitive and annoying to dangerous. Problems can include no heat or air, bad information and directions, contact people that could care less, zero promotion of your event and hostile audiences that don't like your topic. But that's where the speaking fees can be lucrative, so learn to deal with it.

Public Libraries are normally wonderful places to speak and provide a good opportunity to gage audience reactions to your presentation. Most Library Program Coordinators care, promote an event to the best of their ability and provide a reasonably comfortable setting for speakers and audiences alike. The audiences represent all ages and backgrounds giving you a chance to find out who your topic and presentation appeals to the most. Some libraries offer small stipends for speaking, so you'll also get some gas money out of the deal in most cases.

Speaking for local groups, schools and libraries gives you the opportunity to shake down your presentation until it best serves you and your audience. It will also get you in shape for the rigors of extensive public speaking. Anyone who thinks that it's an easy job should try it sometime. I can recall presenting five programs over seven days in four different cities on several occasions and remember how completely exhausting that was.

When it comes to motivational speaking, it's going to be just you and the audience. Make sure you have something of value to say and that you say it well. Turn those sourpusses into smiling jacks and give your audiences a reason to remember your name.

Read more at http://www.BillKnell.com

Article Marketing and List Building - The New Internet Marketing?

The most interesting thing has happened. I have stumbled into it.

You see, when I first got started online, I heard about article marketing and I heard about list building.

And I started building a list, and I used article marketing to drive traffic to my list.

I was just trying to do what I thought would make me money.

And article marketing was driving nice traffic. And the list building of course is the only way to go online, if you want to create long term income.

But what has happened is that I think I am the number one, premier article marketing list builder on earth.

Now before you get cranky – I am not tooting my own horn here, not really. I am just stating the facts. I have looked, and I cannot find one other person on earth who drives more traffic using just articles, directly to a single squeeze page for list building, than I do.

So if you do, let me know – please. I will work hard to upseat this one person on earth that has done it.

How will I do that?

I will write more articles and drive more traffic with article marketing. It is just that simple.

How have I done it?

I am relentless in my article writing. I am relentless with my email marketing campaign.

Is it hard work? Yes, it is hard work. Is it worth it? Yes. When I pay myself, it is worth it.

Why Article Marketing Is Important To Your Online Business

I'm sure that by now you are well aware that Article Marketing is a very valuable tool that helps you build a very successful business. All you hear now is that you need to write articles to build your business, and how articles will attract tons of traffic to your site. But, do you really know why Article Marketing Is Important To Your Business? In this article I will go over some of the reasons that article writing is so very important.

If you are writing articles for your online business then you already know it is an important tool. One of the main reasons to write articles is to attract quality targeted traffic to your website. What I mean by this is you want to attract people to your site who are interested in what you are selling, or in the information your are making available to them. In other words you would not write an article about "The Best Ways To Bake A Cake ", and post it in a niche article directory that is about Outside Gardening. That would be a waste of your efforts because you would not generate quality traffic, if any at all by doing that. Remember what ever the topic of your article is, that is the group that you want to make the article available to.

Aside from attracting targeted traffic, your articles will get endless exposure. Once you submit an article and it gets posted in a directory you can only imagine how many people your article will reach. There are many webmasters who surf the web on a daily basis just looking for articles to put on their web sites, blogs or e-zines. And there are virtually thousands of people looking at these websites and subscribed to e-zines. As you can see that alone will give your online business endless exposure.

As well as endless exposure, article marketing gives you fresh content for your own website and or blog. As you add articles to your website or blog you are letting the search engines know that your site is constantly being updated with fresh relevant content. This puts you in good grace with them, which results in a steady climb in the search engine rankings. Simultaneously you are obtaining good quality back links to your site by people who are surfing the directories, blogs, and e-zines. You see they too are looking for fresh content to put on their sites.

As outlined above you can see why article marketing is important to your online business. First of all you get great quality targeted traffic to your site that eventually will get endless exposure for your business. Secondly you will be putting fresh content on your sites that in time will help you gain good search engine placement. Simultaneously you will be building good quality back links by providing fresh content for other webmasters to put on their sites. And finally by following these few very important steps you will be well on your way to building credibility as an Internet Marketer. And being considered an expert in niche is not too bad either. So get writing and build yourself a nice profitable business.

Prologue, Dedication, Introduction, Prelude, Preface, Forward and Acknowledgements - How to Choose

When writing a book whether it is a book of fiction or non-fiction, novel or petite eBook the author must choose which general information to include in the beginning. Often the publisher will have something to say as well. Some authors go all out and have many different intro-style pieces, but one should be forewarned that if you go overboard on the beginning, often readers will get confused. Yet, it is widely known that if you jump right in you may indeed confuse the reader even more.

So, how does one choose what to call the beginning information and what should these pre-chapter writings be labeled? Perhaps you have seen many of these typical pre-chapter pages in books that you have read?

• Prologue
• Dedication
• Introduction
• Prelude
• Preface
• Forward
• Acknowledgements

The choices as you can see are vast and therefore it really makes sense to carefully consider your options. I have only seen one book which had all these in it and it was a non-fiction book on the winery industry and the authors wanted to thank everyone and each co-author made a contribution to the pre-chapter information and each pre-chapter was written by a different person although the dedication was packed with paragraphs of names.

This strategy worked for this particular work although it is not advised, picking 2 or 3 makes sense and if you feel there is something very important to say perhaps 4. If the work is a second or third in a series for instance a fiction novel "trilogy" then you need to bring the reader up to speed or if it is a 5th or later addition of a non-fiction work that too might be a reason to go past 4 pre-chapter pieces.

You must of course be weary of over loading the reader or sounding like a verbose writer, as this will take away from your work. For many authors "introduction" or "preface" sounds too plain and therefore they prefer to use other words. A dedication page is always a smart move, as it shows that the author is in full faculty, with friends and family and is duly grounded in society.

Acknowledgements can be used in place of a dedication page or combined, although it certainly does not take away to have both. Perhaps one to thank your mom, dad, wife and kids or someone who is the sole inspiration of such a work, while the acknowledgements can include all those who contributed or are worthy colleagues that you discuss such information with regularly. It is okay to fully load up on the acknowledgements, but a dedication page is more about good use of white space and a 2-3 lines exhibiting emotional intelligence and sincere-ness, even straight out empathy.

For shortened eBooks (under 150 pages) more than four pre-chapter components is over doing it. It is not proper, similar to calling someone out for a first date before the two-day period. There are instances where 5 or more pre-chapter components are appropriate, but not many and four is generally considered okay. If you are going to have more than that, make sure there is a good reason and make them count.

Make Money With Your Articles - How To Create And Market Short Reports Using Articles

5 Mistakes that Could Kill Your Article Marketing Strategy

Article marketing is a well known strategy for bringing targeted traffic to a website, when done correctly. But if you don't understand the basics, then it will all be for nothing. Your business could suffer greatly if your article marketing strategy is flawed.

Here are five common mistakes you must avoid:

1. Boring Titles

It doesn't matter how good your article marketing strategy is if nobody is interested enough to read your articles. The title is the first thing potential readers see, and if it doesn't interest them in a few seconds consider them gone. Make sure you spend a little time on a title that will pop right out at people. You need to catch their interest in the very beginning in order for them to read your article.

2. Not Thinking About Your Readers First

Your article internet marketing strategy is all about your readers. You want them to read your article, check out your resource box and visit your site. Give them what they want, and make sure they get some useful information from your articles.

3. Not Having a Target Audience

A common error in an article marketing strategy is writing your article without thinking about who will be reading it. The article suffers as such because it was written for a general audience instead of a specific one. The more successful article marketers already have a clear idea of their targeted readers. This way your article caters to your target audience's interests more.

4. Not Using Spell-check and Grammar-Check

Maybe the article you wrote is really helpful and is sure to bring in more traffic. But you spelled a word incorrectly. No matter how minor it is, it always puts a dent in your readers' respect for you. As such, your image as an authority and your article marketing strategy suffer. So take a little time to check your spelling and grammar before distributing your articles. It will be well worth it.

5. Spamming the Internet with Your Articles

Sometimes internet marketers may get desperate. So instead of focusing their article marketing strategy on their target audience, they'll try and market to anyone and everyone. They try to get their articles published in all kinds of newsletters and ezines, but eventually the owners catch on to their spam. There goes a lot of time and effort. You may also lose your credibility with these kinds of actions.

Having an article marketing strategy is a very popular way of generating traffic, and for good reason. Keep working to avoid these mistakes and you will see results.

Article Marketing - What Can You Do To Get More Reads and Click Throughs II

So the last thing you should do is write all your articles like that . So, maybe write half your titles with the keyword twice, write half the titles with the keyword once. Through the course of the article, use the keyword naturally.

I don't want to go into all the background about how the search engines work and all that . But the bottom line is don't worry so much about using the keyword 5 times or 10 times or some certain percentage, use the keyword naturally.

If you're writing an article about, for example, muscle building and weight gaining, then use those words when it's natural. Write your articles for humans. I think that too many times people write articles for search engines.

Every 3 months or so the search engines change their algorithms and the articles get shuffled around, if you write your articles for humans, humans are the ones that are actually doing the searching, humans are the ones that are actually writing the questions, and humans are the ones that are going to click through to your website. You certainly want to write your articles to humans, increase the chance of bios, links if they are on the article, of being seen.

I am just a real big fan of writing articles for humans, not search engines, and I believe that if I do that, I will make more money in the long run. I believe that if I write for humans, I will get more traffic long run.