A Quick Guide to Article Writing

Novice article writers tend to make a lot of mistakes when they submit their articles to article directories.

Here is a quick tip sheet of stuff you need to focus on to get your articles approved, read, and working for you.

1. Give Hype The Old Heave-Ho!

Stop talking up a product that you are trying to sell. In fact, stop trying to sell it altogether!

Remember, people do not like being sold to.

Cut out the exclamation marks!!! The first unintended effect you generate in your readers is the impression that you think they are stupid.

The second unintended effect is that you traduce** yourself. Writing in an exclamatory tone sounds insincere.

2. This Is The Information Age, So Stick To Informative Articles.

How-to articles, self-help tips, detailed product reviews - having first TESTED the product, stuff like that, done well, is going to earn you the respect of your readers where selling to them never will.

Because you need to do some research before writing how-to articles, it is best to stick to topics you understand. Writing articles is about communicating your understanding of the subject matter in such a way as to make it clear to the reader. Give the reader the sense that something of value has been conveyed.

Conduct Keyword Research Before You Start Writing.

Keywords are simply the words that people enter into the search engines to find information about a certain topic. You want to think about what words people would enter to search for an article like the one you are about to write.

Include those keywords in the title of your article if possible, and once in the opening and closing paragraph and just once or twice in the main body. Stuffing articles with the same keyword phrase is not a good policy and it certainly makes the article sound strange when it is read.

Using longer keyword phrases will probably help your article to rank higher on search engines, although the keyword phrase will be less frequently keyed in by prospective online readers.

The best place to start researching keywords is with Google. Google's Keyword Research Tool will give you a list of related keywords in your niche, plus the search count, competition, monthly trends and so on. You can find it here:

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

Write For Humans, Not For Spiders

Always address your article to real readers, not the search engines. Remember, keywords are best when they occur naturally in the text. Anything else will be counter-productive.

Try, For Goodness Sake, To Be Original.

If you can't say anything new about a topic, at least try to present it in an original way.

You could adopt a contrarian approach for example, or see something from a different angle or perspective.

Whatever you do, keep your text readable, conversational, and entertaining.

Never underestimate the power of a well written web article.

Spellcheck AND Proofread...

How many people slap out an article and hit the publish button without even putting it through a spell checker?

After you have spell-checked it, proofread your article - spell-checkers are not grammar checkers!

K-I-S-Stupid!

Keep It and Short and Strong. Cut out the junk. If you don't know what junk is, just cut out the first paragraph, that is where a lot of inexperienced article writers stash the biggest proportion of hogwash.

Enjoy!

Learn to love writing articles and life will be a lot sweeter all round. If you have a ball writing your article it might just show through and make the article much more enjoyable to read.

Cheers!

David Hurley
P. S. If article writing is simply "one step beyond" for you at the moment, try my article writing service for work from home Internet marketers.