Guest Post by Pat Tate
Google has tried to undo one of the most popular and effective marketing methods known to site owners – article marketing. In the past, when you wanted to market a new aspect of your site or just get new backlinks, you created or purchased articles and submitted the same articles to numerous article directories. These articles were picked up by other sites and republished to give you more exposure.
Overall, it was a great way to market your site. Unless you purchased articles, the process was free or at least extremely cheap. Since other marketing methods often mean paying for ad space or spending time trying to build relationships with other sites for the possibility of a backlink, free and simple is definitely the preferable method.
So why would Google want to take away this power from webmasters? While you may have been benefiting from it, so were the wrong types of sites. Spam or low quality sites take full advantage of any types of free or low cost marketing they can. Your site may be legitimate, but if these other sites are benefiting just as much, it is possible your site may get lost in the middle of all these others.
Since Google can’t control which sites use these directories, the best way to eliminate some of the low quality search results is to banish article directories to the bottom of the search results pile. Where as many directories had high page ranks before the Google Farmer update, most are lucky if they even rank at all now.
The result for site owners was a drop in traffic. Some saw an increase and others saw no difference at all. If everyone who used article marketing saw the same results after the update, then the solution would be obvious. Just use other marketing methods and your site will be fine. Since the update created three different results for sites, the answer isn’t so cut and dry.
The most common question from site owners is whether article marketing can still be used or not. With many sites earning most of their profits through article marketing, the idea of giving up this lucrative avenue is devastating. The good news is you don’t have to give up article marketing at all. You will need to change a few things about how and where you market, however.
Change Is Good
As we discussed earlier, article marketing was used by all sites, both good and bad. Another problem with the marketing tactic was the inability to control where your articles were republished. While the second part is still a small problem, there is a way to keep it from damaging your site’s reputation. The issues caused by bad sites have made Google change its search algorithm. This is for the good of searchers, not necessarily for sites.
Google looks for what people actually want, instead of search engines. While this isn’t a perfect solution, it does take out some of the nonsense you see on many article directories. Bad articles typically equal bad sites. A high quality site spends more time on their articles to ensure visitors want to head back to their website after reading. With all the articles lumped together, the bad ones bring down an article directory’s page rank. If no one can find the directory, no sees your article from a search engine and no one republishes it. As you can see, this presents a major problem.
The solution is finding the directories which have quickly recovered from Google’s little change. Sites like Ezine Articles are still going strong. You may not see quite as many results, but many of the higher quality articles are appearing on the first page of results for many searches. This proves that article directories are still holding their own. As long as they are ranking, article marketing is still possible.
This is where one of the first major changes comes into play. Instead of submitting to hundreds of directories, choose a handful of high quality directories. Submitting to those who no longer rank is not going to help your site. More likely, it will cause your own rank to drop. Low quality backlinks should always be avoided when possible.
The next change is crafting high quality articles. This means you need to work on grammar, content, keyword placement and general structure. Google is looking for well written content. While you want search engines to find you, bad content full of keywords will get you dropped instead of picked up. A few well placed keywords which fit into the context of the article work much better. Take the time to familiarize yourself with Google’s guidelines to ensure your content fits the bill.
The final change is creating unique articles for every directory. Instead of submitting the same article to every directory, rewrite your article for each place. Google will see each directory as having unique content. Since one of Google’s rules deals with duplicate content, the more unique content you create, the less duplication you will have.
While you can’t control who will republish your content, high quality content does counter the duplication rule to an extent. There are no exact percentages or numbers, but if you submit to four directories with the same article, duplication will always be times four. Four unique articles means one fourth the duplication rate as before. Basically, you go from 100% duplication to 25%. A much better percentage to aim for.
What About Bad Sites
If you can change your marketing methods, why can’t bad sites do the same? In the past, these sites wrote extremely poor content, which likely took less than three or four minutes to put together. Use an article spinner and you suddenly have a batch of useless content floating through hundreds of article directories.
A high quality article with relevant content to your site should take roughly thirty minutes to write. Rewrites take far less time, especially if you use the best spinner software available. Bad sites always look for shortcuts. This is simply more work than they are willing to put in. Instead, they’ll hope bombarding the system with more articles will somehow fool Google into ranking them.
If you have ever run across an article which linked to a site unrelated to the content, you know exactly what I’m talking about. For instance, if your site was about golf, ladies clubs may be a great topic, not how to care for your teeth.
While a few will still try, the higher quality sites are the ones who will benefit. Instead of competing against spam, you can actually compete against real competitors. The better your article marketing technique, the easier it will be to advance past your competitors’ altogether.
Make Google Work For You
Google tried to kill article marketing and failed. Instead, they made it easier for legitimate sites to benefit. Many article directories are clearing out junk and have created strict guidelines for new content. By only accepting the best, they are able to rank high. A higher rank means more visitors for you. Since the directory will have a good reputation with Google, having a backlink through them will help your site too.
Some directories are even offering ways to choose which places republish your content. Though people can still bypass the rules and copy and paste, it will deter some. Control is always a great thing. Often times, sites will simply offer a preview and a link to the original article. This prevents duplication while still providing a link to your content, which contains a link to your site.
Regardless of your opinion on Google’s Farmer update, you can take advantage of it. With the trash falling to the bottom of the pile, you have the chance to rise far above it. Many sites are already seeing the results of their new article marketing efforts. The results are surprising to most since their rank is higher than before. If you have numerous low quality backlinks and articles, it may take longer to recover, but it is still possible.
Google will never be able to kill article marketing. It can change how it’s done, but never do away with it. Article marketing is here to stay. The results are just based around how you do it. The learning curve isn’t steep. Your site will benefit, your content looks better and readers are far more likely to click links in great content than poor content. Google can and will work for your site if you are willing to make just a few changes to your marketing technique.
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As a senior Pat Tate started to explore Internet Marketing. She uses her blog as a journal to keep track of the people and programs that she has met along the way. Grandma’s Internet Marketing/blog. She is an avid golfer and invites women to join her to talk golf at Women’s Golf Center. She has always loved toys and as the proud Grandmother of five beautiful Grandchildren she gets to play with new ones at Grandma’s Toy Review.
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