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Article Marketing 101 The Basics of How To Write Articles

By: Donald Hammas Click author's name for more of his/her articles

Writing a article of good content is not that hard and once you have written your article, there are many places to distribute your content online, so that you have the largest audience possible, reading your articles. You can optimize your articles for specific keywords so that they appear in the search engines results when prospects search for your keyword.

Your first task will be to define your Target audience and then research for keywords that are relevant to your topic and your audience.

I. Define Your Target Audience

Defining your target audience a fundamental step in writing effective articles. " How to make Money from Home" is a very broad audience, that needs to be further defined, to be effective. There are many different types of people looking to make money, all for different reasons. The more closely you can define your target market, the more this audience will relate and respond to, your articles.

There are different ways to choose your target audience. You can either choose to target people similar you, or may want to target a different audience. Either way, use the following list of questions to define your audience:

1. What do they do for a living?
2. What struggles do they face?
3. What is important to them?
4. What are their values?
5. What is their current income?
6. What are their income goals?
7. What types of activities do they enjoy?
8. What is their definition of success?

II. Select Your Keyword
Since your articles can show up in the search engines for specific keywords, you'll want to "optimize" each article for a specific keyword.

III. Choose Your Topic
Once you have a specific keyword, choose a topic specifically related to that keyword. Here are 5 ideas for article topics:

1.A how-to article
2.A review article
3.A problem, then solution article (define a problem, provide the solution)
4.A personal experience article (My story)
5.A comparison article (compare your former profession to what is your current profession)

Here is another fantastic way to come up with article topics:

1.Write down the top 5 concerns you had, about starting a new business.
2.Write out the solutions that your current profession provides, to these concerns.
3.You now have 5 article topics!

Here's why this works so well: The people who are reading your articles probably have the exact same concerns that you did. By addressing these concerns in your article, your audience will feel that your article was written just for them and they'll be magneticly attracted to you

Whenever possible, you want to write with a emotional aspect to it. This can be frustration (i.e. "Are you frustrated with Affiliate Products that pay tiny commissions?" Think about the problems that your audience faces and what emotions are tied to those problems.

IV. Write Your Article

Writing articles is easier than you think! Your goal is to complete this step a few minutes. Do not worry about making your article perfect. The most important thing you can do, is just sit down and start writing. Here's how to do it quickly:

1.Make a list of 3 main points you want to get across in your article (one sentence each).
2.Write down 3-5 sentences that backup each of your three points.
3.Your three main points will be the first sentence of three paragraphs.
4.The 5 sentences you wrote will make up the body of each paragraph.

You now have 3 paragraphs, and just need an introduction paragraph.
1.Write 3-4 sentences that sum up your three main paragraphs.
This will be your introduction paragraph. Now you just need to finish it up!

2.Write a 2-3 sentences that sum up your three main points, and gives people the final solution.
Note,if you are writing a problem/solution driven article, you want to reiterate your audience's problem. This is effective, because your audience thinks, "This person really knows what I'm thinking and what problems I have! I want to listen to what they have to say, and take a look at the solution they are offering!"

V. Write The Title
Once you have your article ready, you want to create a compelling title by following these key points:

•Whenever possible, include your entire keyword in the title.
•Move your keyword as close to the beginning of the title as possible.
•If you are doing a review or comparison article, don't reveal "the end of the story" or your final opinion in the title. People will not be inclined to click on your article to read the rest.
•Questions make great article titles. The human brain has a specific chemical reaction when a question is unanswered, it does NOT like it! People will be drawn to do whatever it takes, to get their question answered, which can include reading your article and seeing what you have to say, and clicking through to your website.

Important Notes
•Your article should be assisting the reader. Your article is not the place for a sales pitch, this will turn people off.
•If you are writing a "how-to" article, never be afraid of giving away your "Best Secrets" The better content you give your audience for free, the more inclined they will be to listen to you, and ultimately, buy from you.

Well there are the bare basics as outlined to me in my studies. You want to use article writting to build links to your websites, blogs, etc. Google uses these links to rank your sites and content and if you do this in the proper aspect you'll be ranking on the first page results in Google and the other search engines which will drive free targeted traffic to your sites. There is a lot more to building links and ranking on Google than this, but article writting is one of the most important components in link building.