In addition to developing well-written and compelling articles, your other major concern when it comes to article marketing is how to maximize their usage and obtain the best return on investment for your business. In other words, you need to have the best possible exposure for your articles in order to generate huge amounts of traffic that converts to regular customers and buyers.

If you're not sure where to start, check out the following list:

1. Submit your articles to directories. There are thousands of article directories on the internet that don't require a fee to post content. You'll need to create your own account where you can monitor the performance of your articles based on the number of readers and clicks they're receiving. Article directories will not only help increase traffic going to your website, but can also boost your rankings in the search engines, as they're excellent sources of inbound links. And with countless web publishers around the world, there's no limit to the number of people that can read your articles, click through to your website, and ultimately purchase or take advantage of your services.

2. Place your articles on blogs. Blogs are instant traffic hits these days for two reasons - first, because they're very easy to set up and maintain and second, because they're growing exponentially every day. In fact, there are already a number of business owners who are advertising their businesses in blogs for a very small fee. You can do that too. If you manage a business, you can create your own corporate blog and display all your articles there, or you can contact bloggers and ask them to post your copy on their blog sites.

3. Write in forums. More and more people are joining internet message boards and groups to get more information about the subjects they're interested in. You can take advantage of this trend by creating your own account on a popular forum in your niche, and answering reader questions through your own written articles. Using the forums also makes it easy for you to gauge if you're truly getting their attention through their replies and comments.

4. You can exchange them for another article. Call this reciprocal linking with a twist. Instead of asking another webmaster to link to your site, you can simply swap articles. Not only will this increase both of your website rankings, it can also mark the start of a professional long-term relationship between the two of you.

5. Submit your articles to local newspapers and magazines. If you haven't done much offline promotion, you should definitely look into it. Magazines and newspapers are always looking entries or submissions. If you have articles on a topic they're looking for, you may be able to publish your article with a link to your website, with no extra cost at your end. Publishing offline content is also great for bringing in tons of new traffic that hasn't already been exposed to your business.

If you've put in the time to write good quality articles, don't let them go to waste! There are lots of things you can do with your articles that will help bring loads of traffic to your site. All you need to know is how to use them to your advantage.