Positioning Yourself as an Expert Author--Even if You're Not a Writer!

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If you don't know how to write articles, you don't know what to write about or you think you can't write, keep reading anyway! Article marketing is too important to your business to ignore its traffic-pulling potential. And don't worry. You don't have to be a top-notch writer to write great articles. You simply have to have knowledge about your subject matter and be able to talk about it.

Your subject matter obviously needs to relate to your target audience to ensure you're attracting the right kind of traffic. If you sell information about do-it-yourself home projects, your articles need to include tips about do-it-yourself home projects.

Rather than trying to write the article to the entire ezine publishing community in your niche, pretend that you are writing to a friend. By imagining yourself writing to a friend, you'll end up writing in a personable, conversational style. And that's exactly what you want. But if you find yourself completely stuck as to what to write, ask yourself five questions: who, what, when, where and how?

Let's, for example, apply the five-question formula to an article called: "The 5 Secrets the Pros Don't Want You to Know About Installing Ceramic Tile."

--Who: "Do you love the look of ceramic tile but think you have to be a professional to install it?"

--What: "Read on to discover how even a novice can perfectly install tile by following five simple steps."

--When: "In the ten minutes it takes you to read this article, you'll learn what professionals learn after years of practice."

--Where: "You can use these secrets to install tile in your kitchen, bathroom or anywhere else you choose."

--How: "Step 1. Step 2. Step 3. Step 4. Step 5."

Now you have an outline for your article. All you have to do is add to it while pretending to explain the steps to a friend in 400-700 words. Just make sure you include keywords throughout the body of the article. The more keywords you include, the higher you'll be ranked on the major search engines.

You also have the option of hiring a ghostwriter to write articles for you. Using a ghostwriter allows you to keep the copyright and put your name on the article.

Whether you choose to write your article or hire a ghostwriter, it must contain good information and be well-written. Although it doesn't have to be perfect, you don't want it to have any glaring grammatical or spelling errors. Such errors detract from the expert information you're sharing with your audience.

But having a well-written, informative, keyword-rich article only generates traffic if you have a resource box at the end of it. Your resource box basically says, "If you want to publish or reprint this article, you may do so with my permission provided you include my resource box."

In your resource box, you need to include your name, a sentence or two about yourself and a link that directs readers back to your site. Keep the reader in mind as you write this, though. You want to persuade him to click your link, not brag about how great you are.

Because anyone who clicks your link is a highly-targeted prospect, you want to send him directly to your squeeze page so you can capture his information. He may not be quite ready to buy anything from you yet, but you've started to build a relationship with him by giving him free information in your article. To keep that relationship alive, you need to be able to follow-up with him on a regular basis through email.

About the Author

Glen Hopkins is a Best-Selling Author, Information Marketer, Speaker and Consultant. Glen specializes in teaching struggling entrepreneurs how to turn their small Online businesses into thriving money machines using specific systems that will allow you to work less and earn more. Get his List Building Report and Web Traffic CD (valued at $97) for FREE at: http://glenhopkins.name/>http://GlenHopkins.name  

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