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Building your list and adding prospects to your sales funnel with article submissions is the hottest sales lead generation trend on the Web today. However, the article submission process is one of the most boring and tedious tasks around. That’s why many authors, experts and businesses choose to outsource their article marketing efforts.

How can you choose the best company to handle this important process for you? Follow these tips to avoid being ripped off from unscrupulous merchants?

Here Are My Top 10 Questions to Ask Any Article Marketing & Submission Service Provider So You Can Reach Your Goals:

1. Are the sites on your company’s article submission list well known across the Web, or are they dummy sites that you set up? Some unscrupulous article submission service providers promise to post your article to hundreds or thousands of sites for a very low fee – like $15! What they don’t tell you is that these sites are ones they have created for the sole purpose of posting your articles. No one visits these sites. Search engines don’t index these sites. So no one will ever see these articles. Ask for a list of sites they submit to. If they don’t seem credible, run fast!

2. Does Google index the sites you submit to? If Google doesn’t, then you are wasting your time. Ask them for a list of success stories. By going to Google and typing the headline in quotes, you can check whether or not Google indexes the articles they submit.

3. Does Alexa index the sites your company submits articles to? Alexa.com is a website that tracks the traffic of all websites. Go there and type your website URL and you’ll see where your site ranks among the millions of websites. It’s easy and fun to do. Try it! Now, ask the marketing company to provide the names of 10 sites they will submit your article to. See where they rank on Alexa. Do they even rank on Alexa? If not, watch out!

4. Is this a targeted campaign, or a scattershot approach? Ask the company how well targeted the article submission process is going to be. Can they target specific audiences, like health, or marketing or C-level executives? If they can’t, then you are wasting your money reaching audiences that aren’t interested in your message.

5. Does your company submit articles by hand or by software? Most reputable websites that accept articles will not accept articles delivered by software. They want unique content and they know articles submitted by software will be sent to every site imaginable.

6. Does your company edit your article? I’ve written six books on marketing and the Internet that have been translated into six different languages, and I write and submit articles on a weekly basis. Yet, I still hire proofreaders to review my articles. Sure, you think you are a great writer, but there’s not a person alive who won’t benefit from a copy editor giving the article a second look.

7. Will your company use sound search engine optimization strategies to make my articles search engine friendly. If your hire a good article marketing company, they will not only edit your articles but they will make your articles search engine friendly as well. This way, your articles can be found on Google.

8. Will your company handle the day-to-day correspondence with site and ezine editors? You can spend hours answering questions from website and ezine editors. The best firms handle the routine correspondence for you. They bring you in only when you need to answer an important question. You should avoid firms that don’t respond to editors because your articles will never be published by highly targeted websites. They can say they submitted the article, but you won’t have any pickup.

9. Does your company submit articles in a way that Google respects, or do you blast articles out there? Google hates when people try to manipulate their rankings and will ding your article campaign if you send out too many articles too quickly. Make sure your article marketing company understands this. Otherwise, Google could blackball your article marketing efforts.

10. What do you charge? It has been my experience that the article submission process, if performed correctly, can take up to 10 hours or more to submit your article to 100 sites. That doesn’t count the proofing, editing, optimizing, consulting and following up. All this work takes time and effort. If the price seems too low, remember the old saying, “You get what you pay for."

You want an article submission company that cares about your success. Many fly-by-night artists just want to take your money and run. Make sure the service you select takes the time to get to know you, your marketing goals and your audience? Follow these tips to ensure you get what you pay for! If not, you could be headed for disaster.

I hope to see you all over the Web.