Most article marketing slogans will try to pull you into the bandwagon with slogans like “You can earn money by blogging!” or “Make your blog generate cash!” However, beginners make a lot of mistakes when they try to submit their articles online. Below are the most common misconceptions about the business of writing content for the web.

Avoid the hype text.

Whether you are writing for a website, or writing an online review about a certain product, you should always try not to sound like a hawker with a megaphone. Putting too many exclamation points (!!!) in your text is a big no-no. For one, it makes your readers feel like you think they are stupid, and secondly, it gives you away. When you write in an exclamatory (!!!) tone, you only end up sounding insincere. This is not the way to gain your readers’ trust.

Stick to informative articles.

Whether you are writing for your own affiliate web site or an ezine that pays you depending on your word count, it is always safe to stick to informative topics. How-to articles are big right now. Everyone seems to be looking for self-help tips online, whether it is about carpentry or losing weight. Because how-to articles require a lot of research, it is safer to stick to topics you are familiar with. You would not want to be stuck with a lot of jargon you cannot understand. Writing articles is about translating your understanding of the subject matter onto the screen. If you cannot get anything about what you are reading, chances are, you will give nothing in what you are writing as well.

Do keyword research.

You can do this simply by typing in what you think your prospective readers will search for when they are looking for your topic. This way, you can compare why one page is ranked over the other and what keywords actually reap a lot of results.

Using less common keywords will probably help you rank higher on search engines, although you stand less chance that this keyword will actually be keyed in by any prospective online reader. On the other hand, using common keywords will help you be included in one of the index pages of a search engine, but you will stand very little chance of actually being ranked in the first page.

The best place to start is with the master of search engines, Google. Who better would know what people are searching for than the most used search engine on the web? Google’s Keyword Research Tool can give you a list of related keywords in your niche, as well as the search count, competition, monthly trends, etc. You can find it here:

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Do not overdo the SEO.

Although it is necessary to know how to manipulate keywords in your articles so it can attract search engine spiders, it is not very good to overdo it. For example, repeating “hypertext inclusion” 40 times in a 400 word article will not only make what you have written sound like gibberish, it can get you banned from the most popular search engines online.

You should write for human readers first. Worry about the search engines later once you have come up with web content that is actually worth reading. There is nothing more irritating than looking at 400 words of garbage. If you are going to occupy a domain’s precious bandwidth, anyway, you might as well try to make your text useful.

Try to be original.

Repeating information that has been recycled over and over online will not give you much of an edge as an article marketer. If you cannot get any new information about the topic you are writing about, you might as well try to be creative with your delivery. Again, we do not mean hype when we say creative. Keep your text readable, conversational, and entertaining. You should also never underestimate the power of a well written web article. Proofread your articles before publishing them, and make sure that you do not have any filler text that readers might find useless.

Keep your web content short, sweet, and strong. People who read through their screen do not have the time to filter junk information.

Work At Home

B-u-u-u-T, if you really want to make some great profits, then how about writing up a collection of, say, 10 articles and selling them? That’s a great way to make some quick loot. And, to prove it works, have you seen all those “PLR Article Packages”?

Yeah, they include Private Label Rights so that people who purchase them can add their name as the author and change up the content to fit their needs, but the point here is that they SELL, and sell WELL. Keep that in mind. Now, does that mean that once you sell these articles you can no longer use them for your own web sites or articles? No Way! You can STILL use them. But a bit of advice, change up the articles by adding NEW content to them so they are different from the ones you sold. You’ll have better luck with them as far as selling something through posting the aritcles go.

Even though you can also make money by giving your articles away for others to use in a packaged set, like some other free membership sites do. Which is another fantastic idea that has more than just one benefit, such as, building your own mailing list of perspective buyers, using the “upsell” to get your current members to purchase your other goods from you, and so on. These free types of memberships are great for using Money Making Idea #8 too!

All right, now you know the approximate length the article should be, but what about format? Meaning what should the article look like when it’s finished?

The main thing is for the article to flow in a logical way. In other words, it should make sense to the reader and not jump all over the place. It should have a POINT and lead your readers to take a specific ACTION.

Oh, and of course it should be in the classic: Beginning, Middle, End, format. And ALWAYS remember to include a ‘Resource Box’. Here’s a quick example of a resource box for you to use in your articles:

About The Author

John Doe is an accredited writer and has been associated with several online publications including www.anysite.com, www.anysite.com, and www.anysite.com . He has also begun an extensive free training program for aspiring writers at his own website located at: www.yoursite.com that all writers are encouraged to sign up for as placement into this free program is limited. John can be contacted anytime at his personal email address: johndoe@anyemail.com .

Lastly, what should you write about? Here’s the easy answer, pay attention, because it’s so simple, you just may miss it. . . .

ANYTHING!

Yes. You can effectively write an article on any subject you like, so long as it fits in your scheme of subject matter you are specializing in. Although, you can also ‘break the mold’ and write on an entire different subject matter each and every time you write up your own articles. Nothing about making money online is ever set in stone and you can always go in a different direction. This is what is called ‘carving out niches’. And many people do well by leaving the creative door open, so to speak. But, you should always KNOW what you are writing about if you ever want other people to take you seriously as an “authority” on it.