Should We Still Bother With Article Marketing in 2014?
To answer this article's title you really need to change how you look at article marketing. I'll come to that later, but first lets look at some of the problems article marketing has faced:
In the last few years article marketing hit a high and was seen as a blackhat SEOs paradise to 'game' the search engines. They would write a low quality article, spin it until it was barely readable and then submit it to as many article directories as possible. All to gain links back to their site which, at the time, would lead to higher search engine rankings.
As soon as this became common knowledge the flood gates opened. Automated systems were written which would spam the major article directories and those directories which were unmoderated were easy game for spammers and their systems. Quality suffered and as a result the search engines took action, penalizing most directories by dropping their rankings.
This is THE major problem with most SEO techniques: they get overused and abused and then the search engines close off the method. Either rendering it ineffective or less powerful than it once was.
This annoys me a bit because article marketing is still a good, solid way to promote yourself online but a lot of people dismiss it now. That said, it does leave an opportunity open for savvy people like you and me!
This leads me back to my first point of this publication: change how you look at article marketing. As a spammy practice, using low quality, spun articles you'd be right to say it doesn't work. But, if you look at again, through the viewpoint of what it was originally intended for and the prospect becomes wonderful again!
By publishing your content you have the opportunity to show case your expertise, knowledge and experience (and even your own personal stories) - directly with those who want to read them. Its all based on the 'give to receive' principle. By giving your knowledge in the form on an interesting and informative read to your target audience, you receive recognition and traffic to your site. As most directories still receive really good traffic and provide some good links back to your site.
Sure, links play a part of publishing articles as they still pass some kudos to your site in the eyes of the search engines. But think about you and your company before you post again. Do you really want to be perceived as spammy? Or as low quality by spreading garbage content over the net?
I know I don't, so before you publish again put some thought into your work. Make your content compelling, interesting and readable. And, above all, remember: like most things in life nothing comes easy and there are no real long term short cuts to promoting yourself, so invest yourself and your business now and you'll reap the rewards for years to come.
So is article marketing still effective in 2014? Yes, it is, you just have to know how to do it right and focus on quality reads over spam or spun content.
In the last few years article marketing hit a high and was seen as a blackhat SEOs paradise to 'game' the search engines. They would write a low quality article, spin it until it was barely readable and then submit it to as many article directories as possible. All to gain links back to their site which, at the time, would lead to higher search engine rankings.
As soon as this became common knowledge the flood gates opened. Automated systems were written which would spam the major article directories and those directories which were unmoderated were easy game for spammers and their systems. Quality suffered and as a result the search engines took action, penalizing most directories by dropping their rankings.
This is THE major problem with most SEO techniques: they get overused and abused and then the search engines close off the method. Either rendering it ineffective or less powerful than it once was.
This annoys me a bit because article marketing is still a good, solid way to promote yourself online but a lot of people dismiss it now. That said, it does leave an opportunity open for savvy people like you and me!
This leads me back to my first point of this publication: change how you look at article marketing. As a spammy practice, using low quality, spun articles you'd be right to say it doesn't work. But, if you look at again, through the viewpoint of what it was originally intended for and the prospect becomes wonderful again!
By publishing your content you have the opportunity to show case your expertise, knowledge and experience (and even your own personal stories) - directly with those who want to read them. Its all based on the 'give to receive' principle. By giving your knowledge in the form on an interesting and informative read to your target audience, you receive recognition and traffic to your site. As most directories still receive really good traffic and provide some good links back to your site.
Sure, links play a part of publishing articles as they still pass some kudos to your site in the eyes of the search engines. But think about you and your company before you post again. Do you really want to be perceived as spammy? Or as low quality by spreading garbage content over the net?
I know I don't, so before you publish again put some thought into your work. Make your content compelling, interesting and readable. And, above all, remember: like most things in life nothing comes easy and there are no real long term short cuts to promoting yourself, so invest yourself and your business now and you'll reap the rewards for years to come.
So is article marketing still effective in 2014? Yes, it is, you just have to know how to do it right and focus on quality reads over spam or spun content.
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