Article writing is a fantastic way to create new links to websites from many areas. When writing an article, it should be written about an area that you have a great deal of knowledge about, and that would interest other people who may stumble across it and read it. Once one of our clients has written an article, we will submit it to a number of websites to get this published in numerous locations with links back to the site.

Others will publish these articles because it adds more content to their websites, which we all know is one of the key areas of search engine marketing, and continually updated content will increase the number of returning visitors to a site, as they will want to stay up to date with the latest opinions.

There are a number of good reasons to write articles for other websites, rather than only writing content for your own site (which obviously needs to be done in conjunction with this article activity). If these articles are constantly providing good consistent advice, then it is entirely plausible that you can become an expert and important figure in your industry field. Building up a reputation like this means that more people will respect the opinions that you place on your site and in your articles, and may feel drawn to trying your offering.

These articles often will appear in more places than you submit it to, so it is vital to ensure that a link is placed on your article, so all places that syndicate your content will increase the number of valid and relevant links to your site. If this article is being written by a Vertical Leap client for us to use then this can be done by us, it allows us to link from specific keywords within the text, and it also allows for deep linking to pages that cannot always be linked to using other off page optimisation strategies.

So what exactly should you write this article about? Well, it can be about anything that is related to your business and is of use to others to make it worthwhile for them to publish it, as many of the sites that are used to promote these articles will have human editors checking these before they agree to publish them. Write something new, take a new angle on an existing subject, or comment on a recent news story affecting your industry – if you know something that no-one else has discussed in great depth on the internet then that could be a perfect topic. Unique content is absolutely essential, just as it would be for content that appears on your site!

So… onto some more specific tips on how to approach writing this content (this can also apply to writing content for your website):

• Know what words to target – If you are working with me, or another CDM from Vertical Leap, then we will supply you with a likely list of targeted words to include within the article. These keywords should be related to the website that is being promoted, so if you are not working with us, make sure you are writing about a relevant topic to your site, else the article may bring traffic to your site that has no relevance to what you are trying to promote.

• Write the article naturally – Ok, well this may seem like a contradiction from the last point, but don’t stuff keywords into the article just because it makes it look “better optimised”. When someone comes to read the article it will be obvious what you are trying to do, and it is possible that some sites will reject our submission. If a keyword fits, use it, if a keyword chain wont fit properly use it naturally, there will still be benefits for that phrase.

If you are writing an article, you should be writing about something that you know about, so make sure it reads well. I would normally advise that an article is between 500-1000 words long, and certainly should not be more than 1500 words! If it gets too long, then we can split it up and make it a series of articles. This can allow for more specific targeting for keywords within each section – but of course, only when they fit naturally!

• Proof Reading – Well, you can’t be considered an expert in your field if you can’t spell properly or use horrific grammar (my spelling is usually good but I have never fully grasped the nuances of grammar – I’m sure there is an error or two thrown in here for good measure, even though I would like to think of myself as an expert these days!). If you need a fresh pair of eyes on it, ask a colleague to check that it all makes sense and reads well.

While proof reading, why not look at the list of phrases being targeted, and see if any can be used suitably within the text – again make sure it reads naturally, but if it fits in appropriately then use it!

• Article Title – This is really important, and if at all relevant is a good place to have a keyword, as this article title is likely to be ranking if its not too competitive. It is also usually the page name of the article when it is hosted on one of the article sites. On the article sites, a good title is likely to draw people to click on it, and possibly draw traffic to the site.

• Keyword Anchor Text – Many article sites allow HTML links in the body text, so if a keyword chain appears in your article, we should link that back to the most relevant page on your website. You will not normally be allowed more than 3 of these. If I am going to be submitting this article for you, then I can put this anchor text in for you. As I mentioned previously, this is a great opportunity to get some deep links to your site!

• Submission – There are hundreds, possibly thousands of sites that these articles can be submitted to. Vertical Leap will normally target 20-30 sites for submissions, but in my experience, if an article is good the content will be scraped and used in multiple other locations, thus giving you more links in the long term.

So that’s my top tips for article writing! Don't forget to check out my blog article on why you should implement a corporate blog too!