A link of the author's website is known as the back link is provided below the article, where the Internet user may visit after reading the article. Thus, article marketing is a method of advertising the website.

People who have websites that are conducting some sort of business or the other are always on the lookout to promote their websites in more and more profitable ways. For this reason, there is always a great demand for article marketing among website owners. It is not difficult to market your website through articles; and this is a starting instruction guide for you how to go about it if you need.

(i)Decide the topic and the keyword to write on

A good marketing article is always keyword-rich. That means, it should have the words that Internet users often search for. These words, known as keywords, must occur several times in the article. This is how the article will show up on the search engines like Google.

The choice of the keyword must be made judiciously. Here, tools like Overture can help. Overture can make suggestions on what word combinations people are generally searching for more frequently on the Internet. Make your choice of the most popular word string and use that in your article profusely. Google Suggest is another place where you can find how many people are searching for particular keywords.

Quite obviously, the topic of the article should pertain to your website. At least, there must be some common strand. But remember that whatever the topic, use the keyword which is searched more popularly. That, and only that, can ensure better ranking of your article on the search engine pages.

(ii)Have the article written

If you have writing skills, you can write the article yourself. It is best you write it yourself since you will know your website the best. Otherwise, you could get good ghostwriters from freelance web sites.

Whether you write the article yourself or have it ghostwritten, it must go on the article directory in your name, and you must make sure it is copyrighted to only you. You can check for plagiarism with the copyscape.com.

(iii)Submit your article

When you have the article, you should not waste time in submitting it on the Internet. Article directories are the best place to put up your articles.

You must submit your articles regularly to get good traffic. Initially, two to three articles a week is okay, but that helps nowhere if you want to gain visibility. Some websites may put up as many as hundred articles a week on different directories.

You can also ask online publications if they will be interested in your articles, with a link to your website placed below it. Most chances are they will agree, because they are always on the lookout for content on their websites.

These are some of the steps to help you begin. But there are many hidden tricks of the trade which you can learn only by experience, or by reading other 'article marketing' articles like this one.