There's Value in Writing Articles
by: Kathie Thomas
I periodically get clients (new and existing) ask for assistance in getting exposure for their website and their business. There are a number of things you can do such as Google Adwords or any of the other click through advert programs available, make sure your site is listed with search engines and so on, but one of the best value items you can do, is write articles on your niche topic. How many others know your topic as well as you do? And how many others are writing about it?
If you are having a challenge getting visitors to your site it may be that they are not searching on the very things you are trying to promote. Have you written your site in terminology people understand or is it in new terminology that people aren't yet searching on? Example: when I first began I was promoting myself as a homebased secretary. The term 'virtual assistant' began to be used in my industry but the general public did not know what that was, or what to search for so I stuck with using both the old terminology and the new on my website, in my keywords and my articles. Today the industry is 10 years old and lots more people are searching using the modern day term but for those who are still not yet 'web savvy', they will continue to use the old terms. Typing and Wordprocessing is another example.
It's important that you think about how people might view your services and products and use a mix of old words and new words in your articles and on your website. In other words you are educating the public about your field and encouraging them to search using the new terms but still attract people with the old ones.
Think about how many websites there are out there (millions of them) but only a very small percentage of the website owners are actually writing articles on their topic. What if you were to write several articles and submit them to several article submission sites? Let them do all the promotion for you. Some have people subscribing to their lists so they're advised whenever new articles are submitted on topics of interest to them. Others you just peruse through the sites and can view the latest articles, or the most popular ones, or do a search on particular keywords.
In most of these sites you need to set up a username and password, and then you can submit as many articles as you wish at any time. It is worth building up a bank of articles you can submit to several sites and over a few months, if you search for your name (or business name) on the search engines, you'll find the list is growing as others begin to republish your articles on their sites and in their ezines.
If you've never written an article it might be a bit daunting to think about at first, but write down a list of key things you want people to know. What do your clients or prospective clients ask you when finding out about your services or products? What kinds of things do you find yourself telling people over and over again? Make a list of these points and then build up a series of articles about these things. I did a series on Email Etiquette (see the 2003 list at
http://www.vadirectory.net/newsletters.htm) and have done smaller series on Blogging, the World Wide Web and other things.
Develop a small one para bio about yourself, and include your website address - most important. Links leading back to your website are an important item in getting listed higher up in the search engines. Also develop a list of keywords for your topic and make sure you use some of these in each article.
Make a regular date in your diary to submit these articles, or if it's something you feel is beyond you, then engage a virtual assistant to do this for you - many do provide this as one of their services.
You can further add to your website by also adding these articles and your bio and allowing people to copy them from your site to use for their own - providing they link back to your site.
I've got a list of sites that will help you get started - I've used all of these and many more. If you find any deadlinks please do let me know as periodically URLs do change or owners of sites stop operating, but all of the sites I have listed as of today are live.
http://www.vadirectory.net/newsletters/articlesubmissions.htmHave fun writing! And I'd love to hear about your success.
Kathie M. Thomas
About The Author
Copyright Kathie Thomas, 2006
Nominated for International Virtual Assistant of Distinction Award 2006
1993 Member of the Year (Institute Professional Secretaries & Administrators - now AIOP)
1999 Australian Achiever Award Secretarial & Word-processing Services
2000 Highly Commended Australian Achiever Award Office, Secretarial & Desktop Publishing Services
2001 AIOP Award of Excellence
2002 MBN: Ambassador of the Year, Virtual Business of the Year, Highly Recommended Established Business Division (Vic/Tas/SA)
2003 Highly Commended Australian Achiever Award Office, Office Services & Supplies
2004 Highly Commended Australian Achiever Award Office, Secretarial Services
