People write articles for a large number of reasons and those that do it well will generally achieve what they set out to achieve. In the world of internet marketing this will normally be to market or advertise a website or product. However, it is the 'doing it well' that is the problem for most people, and no matter how hard you try or how good a writer you believe yourself to be, internet article writing is more than simply putting a few words together in a sensible way.

However, before you think of using articles to promote or try to sell your products, or even attract visitors to your websites, you will have to stand back a bit and consider what it is you are doing, and what the purpose of the article is. Before you start writing you need a clear idea in your head of your objective. If you are writing an article for submission to article directories and ezines, you will not generally be permitted to promote any specific product, or provide a link to your website in the body of the article.

Your success, therefore, depends upon your ability to persuade readers to visit the website for which you provide a link in the 'author's resource' that generally appears at the end of your article. Nobody will click on that link unless they believe that:

a) You really know what you are talking about and can help them with their problems or answer their questions, or

b) They believe that your website is going to give them the extra information they are seeking.

Like any other skill, knowing how to write articles effectively has to be learned - it doesn't 'come naturally', and even the best novelists have no idea what is needed. Writing articles in the world of internet marketing is a totally different skill to writing professionally for public consumption. The use of language is different, and the semantic approach to content is totally divorced from the type of writing of which Tom Clancy or Agatha Christie were masters.

That is what you have to learn: article writing skills, and how to write articles effectively for submission to article directories and for content on your own website. In fact, your article could end up as content on somebody else's website, and how cool is that! If you don't understand what I mean by that, then you still have a lot to learn about writing articles to ensure your online success.

It is well beyond the scope of this article to teach how to write articles to meet Google's needs, and to enable them to act as adverts for your websites, products and services. I mention Google specifically since it is by far the largest search engine on the internet, and most of the others use Google's standards and methods of assessing web pages for publication in its listings.

In fact, Google have taken a very positive attitude to articles that are well written and used both as website content and published on article directories. Even duplicate content between a number of article directories appears to take a long time to be noticed by Google.

Once you have learned how to write articles effectively, and have the article writing skills needed for effective internet and article marketing, then you will have a tool in your hands that you will be able to use again and again to force your websites up the listings, attract masses of traffic and provide you with results that no other form of advertising could approach with the results you will achieve.