Small business PR and marketing

 When writing articles to be posted on the internet it is worth taking the time to research key words that will drive a lot of traffic to your site or blog. Fred Schebesta from www.onlinemarketingsydney.com.au suggests these 5 steps

Step 1 – Choose your Keyword
To begin, choose your article’s keyword target. I suggest focusing on getting results for just one keyword for each article. Use a keyword selection tool or check your web stats to figure out which keyword you want to rank highly for.

Step 2 – Research what is out there
Go to Google and research:  type in your keyword and figure out what other people have already written and see what websites they are referencing. The internet is filled with plagiarism so you will usually find common source articles. Once you have the core idea, give it your own spin. I include my own experiences to talk directly to my intended audience.

Step 3 – The idea and the benefit
After researching, I come up with my article’s main theme. It usually comes from extending another article, a wacky idea I have been thinking about applied to the topic, or a question a client has asked me during the day. From this idea I focus on what key benefit a person could get out of this information and make that the title of my article.
 
Step 4 – Title, article, links, pictures and resources My next steps just flow:

Title – Write the title of your article. I might adjust this during this process or at the end, depending on what might work better for the target market and what type of content I write.

Article – The actual body of the article. I try and write like I am writing to one person. I think about that person reading it and also imagine myself reading the article and what I would want to know. I try and use dot points and bolding to communicate key points.

Links – Links to related pages are gold because you don’t have to rewrite supporting information, allowing the focus to remain on your core subject.  I try and keep these to a minimum so as not to distract the reader.

Pictures and Diagrams – I love putting a picture or a diagram in because it brightens up the piece and makes it less boring. I hate big wads of text. I want pictures and diagrams because I know a lot of people are visual people.

Resources and Call to actions – At the end of the article I normally include either related resource links or a relevant call to action. Normally if you write an article a call to action to browse another page of your website is easy to sell because you have built trust and credibility.

Step 5 – Proof read, send it live and promote it I always give my articles to someone else to check. Other people see things you don’t and their final finesse can turn your article from being good to great. Also consider how you might promote the article.

3 quick ways to promote your article:

1. Post it on a free articles site – www.goarticles.com is an example

2. Send it as an enewsletter – Send a mail to your database describing a problem your article will solve.

3. Give it away to a related website