Article marketing makes one great form of business promotion: it is cost-effective and exposes your business to a very wide audience. People search for information online, and only a small percentage of the overall amount of web surfers actually perform commercial transactions. Nevertheless, over the last years, the amount of online transactions has reached incredible levels, and there is no sign that this trend will come to an end in the near future. When you write articles for article marketing, you target all sorts of readers that have an interest in your domain of activity.

The content you provide has to meet the reader’s requirements, which means that it has to be useful, reader-friendly, short but comprehensive and stimulating. Start writing based on one particular keyword: that is your topic! A keyword like ‘pet grooming’ would be relevant for a site about cats, and this is just a singular example. In order for the  article marketing strategies to have an impact on readers you also need to take into consideration other aspects when you submit articles.

The keyword density should range between 1.5% and 4%. Just one keyword is enough, otherwise there is a risk to confuse the reader. The title should be catchy, and the information high quality. On the average, a 450-500 article should have between four and six paragraphs. While you make the articles reader-friendly, you also have to follow the guidelines or the rules of the article directories where you submit them.

One major free article marketing issue here is that of links and the way you are allowed to use them within the content or the author box. There are article directories that allow for the inclusion of anchor text links in the paragraphs, as well as in the resource box at the end of the article. You can use around three such links per article. The reader will land on your home website when clicking on any such link. Yet, most article directories require simple links or URLs instead of anchor text links, which is why you should have a look on their policy first.

An article directory like www.myarticlenetwork.com accepts anchor text links, but other directories like www.enzinearticle.com rely exclusively on simple URLs in the author resource box. One or two links in the info box are enough. Then, do notoverlook the relevance of content originality. Directories go through all the materials to prevent duplication. Thus, if you submit an article to a directory, you cannot use it on your website or with other submission services.