How to write good quality articles that really help SEO

Do you engage in article marketing as a method of promoting your business and boosting SEO? We’ve been supporting clients to succeed with their article marketing for a number of years now. Over that time we have developed a range of tactics and tricks to improve article writing and help make them more successful.

First, let’s look at what makes an article successful. The answer is simple – a successful article is one that is read, understood, appreciated, and which results in a visit to your website. Successful articles are not the ones that contain the most keywords or back links!

Here are some simple tips to help you with your article writing.

Don’t rush it. Take your time and write the article using natural English with a friendly but knowledgeable tone. Remember, this is not a story, and it is definitely not an academic paper. Getting the tone and language of your article right, is the most important step towards engaging your reader.

Choose an interesting topic. Whatever you decide to write about, the chances are that someone has already written about it. While you don’t want to write another article that says the same old thing, you have your opinion, your own ideas and your own way of doing things. Share them. Within your field of expertise, you are the expert so don’t be afraid of showing it.

Make sure your articles are immaculately written. No spelling errors, grammatical faux pas or any bad formatting. All it does is make you look bad and make your article much harder to read.

Only use your keywords once. Google algorithms will spot keyword stuffing so don’t do it. Instead, craft your article around the keyword’s subject so you can cleverly incorporate it into the body of the article in a natural way.

Don’t add too many links to your article. Just one simple link to your website or blog for further reading is enough. And as with keywords, make sure it is blended into the content of the article naturally.

Avoid sales pitches! If you want to have articles that are read rather than ignored, don’t write them as sales speeches. The job of an article is not to encourage people to buy from you, they are meant to be pieces of information that you are giving for free. How many times have you clicked on an article link only to realise you are reading a promotional advert made to look like an article? What did you do when you realised? We bet you didn’t keep reading.

Articles are a wonderful ways for you to show your expertise and knowledge in any area. By posting articles on a fairly regular basis, you will also build up activity for keywords and for good back links. And because the activity will come from real readers and followers, the spiders will love it and your rankings will respond positively as a result.

Too many people write articles that are never read. Don’t let yours suffer the same fate.