What Is Article Marketing? (Part 1)

Article Marketing is basically writing and circulating short
articles to a variety of outlets, including article repositories,
which are also called article directories and article banks,
forums, and ezine publishers. Article marketing is one
of the best types of marketing that one can do – it
is likewise one of the least expensive methods of marketing
a business. As a matter of fact, it can be free, costing you
little more than your time.

There are several benefits to article marketing. Because
articles become viral, your content virtually travels far and
wide, increasing hits to your website and increasing ezine
signups. Article marketing is also employed to make sales
and to build credibility. Anybody who wants to make themselves
an expert in their niche should make use of all that article
marketing provides.

Here is how it works. Let’s suppose that you are in the weight
loss niche, and you sell assorted weight loss products, whether
they are your own products or products to which you are an
affiliate. You compose a weight loss article, preferably one
closely related to one of your products – but you don’t want to
advertise the product in the article.

Rather, you want to address a problem that the product can
help to solve in your article – without adverting the product.
For example, if you sell a cellulite cream, you can compose
an article about what cellulite is, what causes it, and the various
ways to eliminate it. The article should be no more than 750
words, and have a compelling title.

At the bottom of your article, you include a resource box. This
is essentially a block of text, anywhere from five to seven lines
long. In this paragraph, you could say something like this:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
John Doe is a weight loss expert who's assisted hundreds
of people to lose weight. You can find more useful weight loss
facts and help at his website, John Doe’s Weight Loss Secrets,
located at http://www.johndoe.com. You can discover specific
information at http://www.johndoe.com/cellulite.html .
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When you have written your article, and are sure that you have
made all of the points that you wanted to make, and checked the
article for spelling and grammar mistakes, you are ready to
circulate it.

I'll be back shortly with Part 2.

All the best,
Laurie

How To Cut Your Learning Curve By At Least 50%

(The Secret, Hidden Power of OMG Marketing That Saves You
Enormous Amounts Of Time, Money and Energy And Gets You
To Paydays 50% Faster -- And It Doesn't Even Cost You A
Dime)

Save this article for reference and use it as a reminder

By Marlon Sanders


I hate learning curves.

Because they take time and cost money. Plus, they're a pain.

What do you have to create?

* Banner ads

* Sales letters

* Graphic design

* Affiliate site

* Web site

* Ebook cover

* Upsells

* Downsells

* Ezine ads

* Google ads

* Blogs

* Facebook sites

Would you rather find the success you're seeking in 6 months or 1
year?

Which do you prefer?

If you want to do it in 1/2 the time, if you want to be on the 6
month program and not the 1 year program, then I'm going to share
with you three simple rules to cut your learning curve by 50% or
more, speed your progress enormously and get you the results you
want many times faster.


Rule one: You Can't Create From A Vacuum

I'm a writer by trade.

And the hardest thing to do is to write from a vacuum. If you start
and have no input but expect to crank out output, you're in a
pickle.

That's why when you write or create, you build yourself a fodder
package.

This can be samples of other writings, quotes, materials, articles,
web sites you print, books, pages ripped out of books -- anything
that will prime your brain when you begin the creation process.

Push Button Sales Letters


Rule Two: Always Have A Model

When I do consultations or the rare event where I critique items
for mmy customers, I notice a trend: Almost no one follows a proven
model.

They omit obvious factors used in almost every successful sales
letter, blog, banner ad, upsell, Google ad or creative you see
online.

This goes hand-in-hand with rule one. You can't create in a vacuum.
So build up a collection of sales letters and web sites you KNOW
work.

Then, when you go to create YOURS, make sure you incorporate all the
successful elements you see in the model or models.

I'm always taking screen caps of guarantees, headlines, page designs,
bullet points and order forms that I can use as examples on our next
project.

What you do is COMPARE what you're creating against your models,
your benchmarks, your examples in order to make sure that what you
create is up to speed.

I don't see a lot of people doing this.

What I see the vast majority of people doing is putting a small
amount of effort into the end result and not doing their homework.

Plain and simple: The people who succeed in this business do their
homework. Those who don't, don't.

But this isn't some arduous task.

You do it while sitting on the sofa watching TV and during
commercial breaks. You surf web sites and save good ones to your
hard drive. Or take a screen cap of the best elements.

Then you take your MODEL or MODELS and you print them out. Hang
out on a lawn chair or go down to your fav coffee shop and read over
them. Study them. Sink your teeth into the copy, the headline,
the psychology.

This is EASY work. It's actually fun. But it's extremely important.

Push Button Sales Letters


Rule Three: Make A Side-By-Side Comparison

After you create whatever you have to create, whether it's a banner
ad, sales letter, graphic design, web site, ebook cover or anything
else, do a side-by-side comparison.

Literally print out your web site, sales letter, banner ads, ebook
covers or whatever else it is.

Compare YOURS to your model or models side-by-side.

Look at the length, the size, the colors, the balance.

Ask others to compare the two and tell you which they feel is most
effective.

I see people creating sales letters, web sites, designs, ebooks
and sales processes without doing their homework.

It's no huge secret which sales letters do really well online.

Grab yourself one of those and compare it to YOURS.

"But Marlon, my widget is different."

This is why I have my Ateam calls. You can do your best then show
it to me on an Ateam call and I'll give you quick feedback.

But short of that, do your searches on Google. Find other web sites
you know to be successful and compare YOUR creation with what you
see.

My message today is simple:

* Model success

* Do your homework

* Make side-by-side comparisons

Typically, when someone asks me to critique their sales letter, blog
or web site, I can tell in 10 seconds -- they didn't do their
homework.

They worked without a successful model in front of their face.

WRONG!

You get your models. You stick them in front of your face. You use
them as fodder for your creativity. You don't blatantly rip off.
But you make darned sure you include the successful elements and
components. And that there's a modicum of resemblance in a side-by-
side comparison.

If you don't do your research, you're totally ignoring the immense
amount of money and time others have spent getting a model that
works.

Real world is this: 9 out of 10 things you try don't work.

That's real world.

Anyone who tells you otherwise is blowing smoke up your ying yang.

So do YOU want to be the one who goes out and tries the 9 things
that don't work?

Why not find the 1 that DOES work then use it as a model.

Now, blatantly ripping people off can be illegal, is in bad taste
and is NOT what I'm referring to.

But modelling and emulating is good. Finding all the successful
components or elements in something and making sure you use them is
GOOD!

People ask me to critique sales letters that are about one tenth the
length of any successful sales letter you can find at a similar
price point.

And they wonder what I think.

It's simple: I think the person didn't do their homework.

Do your homework.

Model success.

You have something that is NOT working, NOT selling, NOT converting,
NOT putting bacon on the table?

Start out by comparing it to what you KNOW as a fact works.

That's a very good starting point.

Compare.

Find the differences.

Make changes.

Test again.

"Oh look! There are testimonials here! Oh look! The bonuses have
more than one sentence of illustration. Oh look! The bonuses have
illustrations.

Oh look! There's a certificate for the guarantee. Oh look! They
have 10X the raw number of bullet points I have!"

Oh look!

See, that's the power of comparison.

It's called "Oh look" marketing.

And it doesn't cost you a dime.

"OMG (Oh My Gosh) their headline has numbers an specifics in it and
mine doesn't! OMG, their banner has a numerical benefit and mine
doesn't. OMG, this super power web site has a sales letter that
prints out to 25 pages and mine prints out to TWO!"

OMG!

If you do this, you will at LEAST cut your learning curve by 50%.
That means you can hit pay dirt in 6 months instead of 1 year.

OMG, their sales letter has subheads and mine doesn't!

OMG, their sales letter has a deadline for acting today and mine
doesn't!

OMG!

See, all those OMG's save you an enormous amount of time learning
them on your own by trial and error.

You don't need to reinvent marketing.

Marketing has already been invented.

What you need to do is to have the smarts to learn from others who
have gone before you.

I'll also add that the best investment you make is in your own
education, learning from those who have gone before you, tried tons
of things, cut out the 90% that don't work and share the 10% that do
work.

Marlon Sanders

P.S. "OMG, this sales letter has a PS! OMG!"

-----------------------------------------------------------
Marlon Sanders is the author of "The Amazing Formula That
Sells Products Like Crazy."

NEED A SALES LETTER? Fill in the blanks and click a button:
Push Button Letters Software

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I'm Back! A series on Article Marketing Starts Soon!

Hi,

Yes, I'm back!

Within the next few days, I'll begin making a
series of posts about Article Marketing.

So, stay tuned! If you don't know much about
marketing with articles, this series of posts
will be especially valuable.

Until then, my best wishes to all of you.

Laurie