How Article Marketing is Significantly Increasing My Income (Part 4 of 5)

Following is Part 4 of my case study on article marketing. Specifically, I’m studying the following topic – in detail: Article Marketing – Does It Work, Or Not?

My desire is to create more passive income. An overworked freelancer, I decided to give article marketing a REAL try, as I’d read so much about it. Following are more of the sites I’m consistently submitting articles to. I chose them because they had good PR and Alexa rankings.

For explanations of these, as well as details on the beginning of the experiment, see the 10/26/06 post on InkwellEditorial.blogspot.com.

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16. ContentTycoon.com: This directory has a PR rank of 4 and an Alexa rank of 201,965.

You must create an author account to submit. According to the announcement on their site, they recently underwent an overhaul and the wait time to approve an article is less than 24 hours.

This is not the case with my articles. To date, they’ve approved 2 of the 8 I’ve submitted. Considering that some sites can take up to 4 weeks to approve an article though – I’m not complaining.

No article stats are provided here. So again, get out your article tracking log sheet.*

17. AfroArticles.com: This directory has a PR rank of 4 and an Alexa rank of 38,666.

This site has extensive category listings.

I had to smile when I read their submission guidelines because I wrote a couple of articles explaining why I believe that longer articles sell better. On article length, they state: An article length between 700 to 2500 words is desirable. Finally, somebody gets it!

This site is easy to navigate and once you create an author account, you can start submitting multiple articles immediately. Article stats and a tracking feature are also provided.

As an aside, being African American, I like that they have categories which focus on "Afro Issues" among the other categories you'd find at any article submission site. When I ran my ethnic online crafts business, I had a hard time finding enough outlets to submit articles to, so it's nice to see someone has recognized this void.

18. ImpactArticles: This directory has a PR rank of 4 and an Alexa rank of 189,006.

You don’t need to create an author account to submit here. I tried to use their form to submit, but it didn’t work. So, I sent them the article via email, as advised on their site (eg, when the form doesn’t work).

This is a no-frills site (no tracking features, feeds or article stats provided). The only reason I chose this site is that it is updated daily and I recognized a couple of names of authors who have done well in Internet marketing (ie, Charlie Cook and Willie Crawford).

Google either of these names and you’ll see what I mean. I figured if their articles are there, then it’s a good place for mine to be.

19. Free-Articles-Zone.com: This directory has a PR rank of 4 and an Alexa rank of 56,670.

You need to create an author account to submit. I’m a bit perplexed at this directory because I’ve submitted 8 articles here and according to my account, only one is showing up.

The others seem to have disappeared. Usually a site will tell you if an article is pending, or if there are problems that need to be addressed before it is published – nothing here. Just one article that was published on 10/19, which means it’s probably the first one I submitted.

HTML Note: This site uses what I call "alternative code" for common elements (bold, ital, underline, etc.). Eg, instead of *b*BOLD*/b* for bold, it uses *strong*BOLD*/strong*. This is the only site I encountered to use this type of coding.

I’m bummed that I’m going to have to go back and submit to this site. I really like their setup and the overall feel of the site – not to mention their very good rankings.

20. MainStreetMom.com: This directory has a PR rank of 5 and an Alexa rank of 200,721.

This is not a directory site. It describes itself as “The online magazine for modern mothers with traditional values.... See explanation below as to why I submitted articles here.

By the way, no need to create an account to submit here – they have an article submission form that you use.

When It’s a Good Idea to Use Lower-Rated Directories and Websites

Targeted Marketing: As I explained at the beginning of this experiment, I chose directories/sites based on their PR and Alexa rankings.

But, as you may have noticed, some of these sites are not exactly “top-rated.” So, why did I submit to them? Because they spoke directly to the audience I’m trying to reach.

This may sound a little elementary, but in the interest of educating, it is always more important to reach 100 people who fit your target market than 1,000 who do not.

Eg, MainStreetMom.com. While its Alexa ranking is below the much desired 100,000 or lower range, it speaks directly to an audience who show a great interest in my product (e-books on freelance writing – again, if I can ever find time to get them on Clickbank!).

So, as you prepare to market, write down the who, what, where, when and why as it pertains to your target market. Eg, who and/or what are they, where are they, when are they there and why are they there?

Answers to these questions will give you a pretty clear picture of where and how to market your product/service.

Article Marketing Tips Learned from This On-Going Case Study

a. Submit to the head of the directory: What do I mean by this? Many directories have sub-categories. Eg, a main heading might be “Writing & Speaking.” Under this you may find article marketing, e-book publishing, copywriting, etc.

From my article stats (where provided), I’ve noticed that the articles submitted under the main heading (eg, Writing & Speaking) get read more than those under the sub-headings.

I can only guess that many people don’t know exactly what they’re looking for, so will search under a main category heading first. As most surfers flit from article to article, they may never get around to clicking through to sub-categories.

Article directory owners may disagree with this, or move your article to a sub-category, but unless/until they say otherwise, I would submit under main category headings first.

b. Submit a series of articles: Over the last month and a half, including this series on article marketing, I’ve written two more series (eg, Part 1 of 2).

I don’t know if it was the topic or not (my topics focused on ways for freelancers to make more money), but articles as part of a series are getting more reads in a shorter period of time than single articles. They are also picked up by more e-zine publishers.

Mind you, this is a very limited study and a very narrow topic. Much more analysis over a longer period of time would need to be done to make definitive conclusions.

I’m just tossing out info as I notice it. If you can lend any insight into any of these observations, please do so. I’m as anxious to know as anyone.

c. Go minute! What do I mean? Give as much detail as possible. With online marketing being so competitive, implementing even the smallest change can mean a big return.

Readers pick up on and dissect the smallest details. In my opinion, this is extremely helpful because something that you might not think of as important could be the “clue that breaks the case wide open.”

Shake, Shake, Shake My Moneymaker!

My earnings are up a bit to almost 3 times overall what I was making (per day) before I started this experiment.

*Article Tracking Log Sheet: After this experiment ends, I will be doing a final, in-depth case study analysis. Along with this, I will provide an article tracking log sheet I fashioned to keep track of where I submitted articles.

Stay tuned for Part V tomorrow.
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P.S.: Send in your questions. So we all benefit, I'm trying to wring every bit of useable data out of this experiment. As with any study, it's input from many sources that yield the best results.
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