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What is Article Marketing?

In its simplest form, article marketing is a type of advertising through which a business writes short articles related to its respective industry. Once written, the business makes these articles freely available for distribution and publication in the marketplace. Each article contains a 'bio box' and 'by-line' which include references and contact information for the author's business. Well written content articles released for free distribution have the potential of gaining the author business credibility within his or her market, as well as new clients.*

It is easy to see the value of article marketing, if you understand that each time the article is published, you get free backlinks from your author box. The articles are not likely to get published on PR 9 sites, but a hundred links from PR 0-5 sites can build your PageRank. The more articles you publish, the more links you get.

How to Publish Your Articles?

There are some, who think you should only submit your articles to a few of the best article directories. They usually argue that 1. doing otherwise is only a waste of time, or 2. submitting the same article to more directories increases the amount of duplicate content, and makes your article rank even worse in search engines.

Now, on 1. I agree: you should not waste your time with low traffic article indexes, but submit to any that you think will benefit you. I have compiled a list of the most important ones for you below. On 2. however, I must totally disagree. The articles, if successful, will be published identical on a number of sites. Submitting to more directories only helps publishers find them, search engines are not going to ban the content any more than otherwise. Besides, I see backlinks as the most important use of articles, and submitting to directories always gives at least one link. Secondary traffic through articles coming up in search engines is only a bonus.

Where to Submit Them?

1. ArticleMarketer.com

They send your article out to publishers on their list. Submission to the complete publisher list is a paid service, but you can submit to the partial list with a free account. The only problem I have with Article Marketer is that they do not show the exposure information to free publishers.

2. EzineArticles.com

The largest directory with the most authors. You can get a free account with 10 submissions. Submit good articles and you may get a platinum account with unlimited submissions.

3. ArticleCodex.com

A newer and smaller directory, but Article Codex offers Revenue Sharing. You enter your AdSense publisher id, and your ads are shown on 50% of page loads on your articles. Profit while marketing your website. Articles are quickly accepted, unless they fail some formatting test.

4. ArticlesBase.com

Not very different from all the other article directories out there, but submission is easy, and articles get accepted easily. They have accepted all my articles without modification, and in just a couple of days.

*Wikipedia:http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Article_marketing&oldid=150322542

Sutocu is the author of the webmaster resources Your Website Profit and Ad Network Reviews, and brings you the latest tech news