In fact article marketing techniques can be used as your sole advertising medium, although best results are obtained by combining it with other means of attracting visitors to your website. Nevertheless, many people without websites are even now making money using only articles to advertise affiliate products.

Articles Generate Links

Generally, though, articles are used online to generate links back to your website, although there are some article directories on which your articles will be read if they are good enough. The majority of directories do not get read, but there are those that can provide you with a steady supply of visitors, and that can be used as a major source of advertising, if not the only source. The benefit of these back-links is that it boosts the popularity of your website in the eyes of Google, and if there is one thing that Google likes, it is popularity.

In spite of this, most people write articles hoping that enough readers will click on the URL provided in their resource to enable them to make a decent living. Such results rarely happen, and although articles can be used as the prime method of traffic generation, they should not be regarded as the only method.

Construct Your Article Properly

However prominently article marketing is in your sales drive or product promotion strategy, you cannot just write any old article and expect visitors to flock to your website. Your article has to be readable, and has to make the reader want to learn more from you. That means constructing your article in a specific way that is easier to write about than to achieve on paper (or screen).

First, it should be written in short chunks: small paragraphs of four or five sentences, and bulleted where appropriately. Online readers will not read large tracts of text as they would were they reading a book. They want their information in short chunks. In fact most online readers tend to scan, seeking something that catches their eye. So write that way, and try to catch their eye with something good. If you know how to write articles, then you can make them work.

First the Problem - Then the Solution

Present them with a problem and a potential solution, then offer that solution in your resource. Alternatively, write a two part article. Make the first part compellingly interesting, and then offer the second part to them on your website. Then offer it on a squeeze page in exchange for their email address, and once the have done that send them to your sales page for their first view of your product.

People take on average 7 views of a product before reaching the purchase decision, so make sure they get them. You won't do that without their email address, so write your article with that in mind. You are unlikely to make a sale first time, and if they get away without leaving a contact email address, then you are unlikely to ever see them again.

Write your articles so as to offer a potential benefit. For example a solution to the problem you have just told them that they have, or tell them how to save money or time simply clicking on your link. Offer them a free product in your resource to persuade them to make that all-important click. Making money online often involves giving something away first.

Article Marketing is More than Writing

It's not the article marketing that makes you money, it's whether or not people read your articles, and then whether or not they click on your link. Until they do that they might as well be a million miles away because you are not going to sell to anybody that doesn't click on your article resource link.

That is why article marketing is more than just writing articles: it's designing them properly to keep people reading, and providing a compelling resource to force that click. Then you might have a chance of making money online.