There’s no doubt that writing articles can help in building your online profile, back links and traffic. It seems to me though as an Article Directory site owner that many authors are being very short sighted when it comes to the resource box at the foot of the article, and for a couple of very solid reasons.
Every day I see Resource Boxes with something like the following:-
NOTE: html code is used with spaces inserted so it is fully visible but inoperative.
Fred Bloggs is a top internet marketer and can show you how to make a fortune with his methods. Visit his web site at Make Your Million Here
Now what’s wrong with this you might ask. Well, it may well get into Article Directories, but the author is ignoring a very valuable second opportunity for publication – and one that is exponential.
That second source is the publication market. Part of the Terms of Service of most Article Directories permits the publication of your articles in ezines and on other web sites providing that they are published in full. Now “in full” means adding that very important Resource Box. I would suggest to you that an article with a resource box like that is going to have little chance of being picked up for further publication.
The example above has an embedded URL link which will not appear in an ezine or text based email because the html will not be picked up. Remember, the deal for publishers is to publish the article intact but that doesn’t mean adding the html code to keep the link working. In fact to do so would technically breach the Terms of Service because they would be altering the article.
I would suggest that a better way of doing your resource box is along these lines:-
Fred Bloggs is a proud contributing author and writes articles on several subjects including internet marketing. You can see more of Fred’s articles on his web site at Use High Quality Descriptive Keywords Here Site located at http://www.somesite.com
Or perhaps:-
Fred Bloggs is a proud contributing author and writes articles on several subjects including internet marketing. You can obtain Fred’s free comprehensive Ebook on Internet Marketing at Use High Quality Descriptive Keywords Here Site located at http://www.somesite.com
The first example at the beginning of this article does the “hard sell” on the reader. An article is all about “soft sell”. Going the “hard sell” in the Resource Box simply undoes all the good you have done in the body of the article itself. You may just have destroyed all the credibility and trust you have built up with the article. You need to “balance” your article and your Resource Box.
In the examples I have suggested for a Resource Box, they don’t try and “sell” anything. They are simply “inviting” people to visit a link and this is exactly the action you want.
Write an article a day the easy wayWhen you insert your URL using html, make sure you use high quality descriptive keywords because that is what is picked up by the search engines to describe your link. The full separate URL address, including the prefix of http:// in addition to the embedded link, keeps the URL intact in the event of publication in an email or ezine.
Not the last, but probably the most important thing. When you have completed your article and Resource Box, email it to yourself in html format. That way you can be sure that all your hard work will pay off when you can see that the links are all working properly in the Resource Box area. You wouldn’t believe the number of Resource Boxes I see where people have forgotten the ending inverted commas on an embedded link. Send it in text format too so that you can ensure that the links are still displaying in this format. Remember, once it is published online, you can’t get it back that easily.
Make your Resource Box work for you. In can bring you thousands of visitors if done properly, but you can be losing thousands if you write it poorly.
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