Gaining Exposure Within Writing.Com

Dear Writing Reader,

One of the most popular questions from Authors on Writing.Com is: How do I gain exposure on Writing.Com?

In this letter, I will provide numerous tips for increasing the amount of exposure you receive on Writing.Com.

Tip #1: Utilize Our Newsletters!

Every week Writing.Com sends out over 140,000 issues of its 13 various newsletters. Each week, Newsletter Editors ask for questions and feedback from their readers. Each week we see many of the newsletters "Ask & Answer" sections go blank! Get easy, quick exposure by emailing Writing.Com Newsletter Editors and asking them questions to be included in their next issue.

Subscribe to newsletters that cover your favorite genres. Email the editors with questions pertaining to the genre, writing style or topic that Editor chose that week. In most cases, you will find your name, your question and a response in that Editor's newsletter the following week. Readers of that newsletter will, more than likely, check out your portfolio!

Tip #2: Review, Review, Review!

Reading and rating are very important for writers, but when it comes to garnering eyeballs for your own work - nothing beats reviewing. When you review another author's item, invite that Author to your own portfolio. Most of our Authors will be more than happy to check out your portfolio, since you were so kind to take a look first!

Review, review and then review some more. Correspond with other Authors on the site and you'll be surprised how many more views your items get!

Tip #3: Plug Yourself In!

There are many In & Outs and Message Forums that are geared toward giving Writing.Com Authors exposure. Most of these are run by Authors themselves and receive heavy traffic. Writing.Com itself provides one that is linked from the "Item Jumps" pulldown menu.

Plug yourself without shame; utilize The Shameless "Plug" Page. Don't be shy; start posting in message forums asking people to visit your portfolio. Tell readers a little about yourself, your portfolio and your writing style; you're sure to gain new readers!

Tip #4: Win Exposure With Contests!

There are many contests run by Writing.Com members, as well! Participating in contests does not only give you the opportunity to win Gift Points, but also provides a free stage for you to flaunt your writing to others who are entering or judging that contest. Contests are easy to enter, give a wide variety of assignment and provide GREAT exposure whether you win or not!
Participate in contests! To start, you will find some by visiting Writing Contests @ Writing.Com!.

You can also visit the "Contest" sub-type link from within the Static Item listing page.

Tip #5: Get BidClicking!

Now take the Gift Points you just won in the contests and Sponsor your items with the Writing.Com BidClick System!

My recommendation is to use the Genre and Item Type sponsorship opportunities. Extremely popular genres like Romance/Love, Action/Adventure, and Fantasy can be sponsored for under 25 Gift Points (or 1/4 of a penny)!

Placing items within applicable genres will generate highly targeted readers who are more likely to read, rate AND review your item; and it costs FAR FEWER Gift Points than the main Sponsored Items column!

If you want instant exposure to all of our visitors, you can bid a higher Gift Point price for the Sponsored Items listing. This listing is shown on the right-hand side of every page and is seen by every visitor to Writing.Com. We've seen items gain over 100 ratings in less than 24 hours when sponsored there!

Sponsor items within the Genre or Item Type listing pages. For even more exposure, try out the Sponsored Items area. For even more information on this, read The Writing.Com BidClick System!

I hope you found useful information within my letter; good luck and have fun!

~~ The StoryMaster (19)

The StoryMaster is WebMaster of Writing.Com ( http://www.Writing.Com/ ). Established in 2000, Writing.Com is the online community for readers and writers of all ages and interests.
Whether you're a casual reader searching for a good story or a creative writer looking for the perfect place to improve your skills, Writing.Com is the site for you! Over 293,848 members have joined and posted over 819,680 literary items.

Beating Perfection Syndrome so you can write

It's Saturday afternoon. Your partner has taken the kids to the
park. You have a whole hour to write. Instead of which, you sit,
staring out the window like Rodin's Thinker in jeans and a yellow
sweatshirt. Why aren't you writing? A tiny item called Perfection
Syndrome. You want whatever you write in this precious hour to be
perfect.

During the week, you had a stream of plausible ideas. You wrote
three ideas in your notebook: an article about children's first
words (your six month old said 'truck'), an essay about male
vanity, and a short story about a blonde with tattooed arms and a
poodle.

Just now, none of those ideas seems right. You've only got an
hour, so you want the perfect idea, the one that will justify the
sixty minutes you're about to spend on it. Instead, you do
nothing.

Perfection Syndrome can destroy your writing career. It's a
killer, because if you don't recognise it for what it is, it
leads to apathy. The gap between what's in your head and what
manifests on the page is so wide that you may give up writing for
days or weeks.

I understand Perfection Syndrome, because it's something I battle
every day. The words on the screen or the page never measure up
to the words in my head. I start typing, and after a sentence or
two, stop. The words "this is garbage" light up like neon in my
skull, my stomach clenches, and I feel as if a ten ton weight had
dropped onto my body. It's not as if I'm a new writer. I've been
writing for over 20 years. Intellectually, I understand that it's
important to get words onto the screen --- any words. You can fix
whatever you write. Emotionally, I want the first draft to be
perfect. I've accepted that perfectionism is part of my
personality, and without a personality transplant, I'm never
going to get rid of it, so all I can do is out-write it.

Yes, out-write it. A practice that's helped is Julia Cameron's
Morning Pages method, which is detailed in her books: The
Artist's Way, and Vein of Gold. The first thing I do each morning
is write three pages in longhand. This primes the pump, and if I
accomplish the Morning Pages, I know that I can count on a
productive writing day, and Perfection Syndrome is beaten for
this 24 hours at least.

Updating my inner "writer" image also helped. Images are the
language of the right brain and the subconscious mind. Your
subconscious mind is the engine which drives you. My initial
image of my writing self was of a mountain climber, clinging to
vertical rock and ice, unable to see the mountain peak, but
terrorized by a crevasse below. No wonder I needed every word to
be perfect, if the alternative was death. A more nourishing image
popped into my mind. I saw my writing self as a seed-sower, the
old-time kind, with a deep hessian bag of seeds, walking along
the furrows of a field of fertile soil, scattering seeds with
both hands. Now, whenever I feel panicked about my writing, I
visualize myself as the sower, scattering those seeds. Ask
yourself what image you hold of yourself as a writer.

Strategies to beat Perfection Syndrome

The first step in fighting Perfection Syndrome is to acknowledge
that you've got it, and know that it's beatable. Any of the
strategies below will help.

* Morning Pages: first thing each morning, write three pages in
longhand. The pages don't have to be about anything. You can
write three pages of whining about situations in your life, or
three pages of "This is stupid, I don't know what to write". Yes,
but--- you're thinking: I'm supposed to write three pages no one
will ever see, much less publish? YES. Just try the process.

* Check in with your subconscious mind. Just wonder quietly about
the image you hold of your writing self. Either awake, while
daydreaming, or in a dream, and image will float into your mind.
If it's negative, change it to a life-affirming, encouraging and
hopeful one.

* Set a target number of words for each writing session. However,
set the word target and quality LOW. Even on your worst migraine
day you can write 200 words of gibberish. Or, promise yourself
that whenever you turn on your computer, you will write 50 words
on your current project.

* Keep a writing log for each writing session for a week. List
what you worked on, how many words you wrote, and how you felt
before you started writing and how you felt when you finished.
Your writing log will convince you that writing can alter your
moods: you'll feel better when you finish your writing session
than you did before you started. It will also convince you that
you can write when you're depressed, tired, or ill.

* Start a story prompts/ ideas file. A fresh idea may tempt you
if you're resisting working on your current projects.

* Where else in your life do you expect perfection? If you're
struck with Perfection Syndrome, it will manifest in other areas.
List five of those areas, and several ways to combat each

* Perfectionism leads to procrastination: do one task each day
that you've been putting off. Be willing to skimp on the task,
and do it badly, but do it.

Copyright © 2002 by Angela Booth

***Resource box: if using, please include*** When your words
sound good, you sound good. Author and copywriter Angela Booth
crafts words for your business --- words to sell, educate or
persuade. Get in touch today for a free quote: ab@digital-e.biz
Free ezine: Creative Small Biz --- subscribe at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Creative_Small_Biz

Australian author and journalist Angela Booth writes about business, technology, health and creativity for print and online publications. She also writes copy for businesses large and small.

A New Way To Self Publish

More and more good authors are turning to the Internet to self publish. There are several reasons for that. All of them are probably well known to every writer by now, so we'll not go into them here. What we'll talk about here is a new way to self publish.

Everyone has, by now, heard of ebooks. This is a wonderful way to publish on the net, but it requires special programs to empliment it. And there are web sites that will do all that for you for a fee. But what if you simply can't afford it or you don't want to pay anyone?

This idea I've come up with may be out there in left field, but out in left field is where you usually find some great ideas. Here is what I found.

Create a credit card account somewhere first. Pick any company you are comfortable with and doesn't cost a great deal. After that is all set, put your novel on your web site, create its own page, and use the ariel font. Use size 10 for the main text. Your title and chapter headings can be larger.

Write an intro page for your novel and create a separate page for it. Here is where you'll put any illustrations you may have. So people will have an example of your writing, copy and paste the first chapter of your novel and put it here, too. Also on this page will be the link to your credit card payment company.

The next step is to set up your credit card account to connect with the novel page after your customers have paid for it and then they can simply print out the novel or copy and paste it to their Word or Works program that is already on their computers.

This is a simple and yet effective way to self publish and it does not cost you anything, either. Out in left field, I know, but hey. Anything to survive, huh?

Anna Kathryn Bir is a published author of many sci fi short stories. One of them was a Star Trek story. You can find her sci fi novels on her web site http://e-sac.com email address is info@e-sac.com

Article Writing Tips from SpongeBob SquarePants

Wisdom can be found in the most unexpected places. Today, wisdom bubbled up from a pineapple under the sea. I suddenly realized that everything you’d want to know about writing articles for your website can be taught by SpongeBob SquarePants and his friends.

When you write for your newsletter, blog, or website, which character are you most like?

Squidward: Squidward is B-O-R-I-N-G. When writing articles, are you a Squidward? Do you just get the words down on paper or are you finding a fun twist to entertain your audience and keep them coming back for more? Take time to make your articles stand out from the thousands of other dull articles out there by including personal stories or just having fun while writing. For instance, this article could be entitled "How to Write a Good Article", but would it stand out from the hundreds of other articles about article writing? Probably not.

Mr. Krabs: This crustacean is focused on one thing and one thing only, making more and more and more money. Only a cartoon could actually have dollar signs drawn in his eyes. He thinks of no one, only how he can benefit. Are your articles focused on you or on the reader? Are you providing information or do you have blinders on, thinking only about how you can make money from the article you are writing? If your article reads like an ad or is self-serving or full of affiliate links, you might write like Mr. Krabs.

Patrick: SpongeBob’s best friend, the starfish, has a good heart, but isn't the brightest creature in the sea. Do your articles make you sound like an expert? Are you providing valuable content or just pushing out sloppy articles as fast as you can? Always double check for typos and grammatical errors. If you're challenged by spelling and grammar, hire a Virtual Assistant or Copywriter to proofread and submit your article for you. Or slow down, set your article aside for a day and then reread it before you click the “submit” button.

Plankton: The smallest creature in the sea is also the sneakiest. He’ll do anything and hurt anyone to steal someone else’s work (the Krabby Pattie secret formula). Write your own material. Don’t be Plankton. Don’t copy and paste someone else’s work, edit it, and try to pass it off as your own. You will be caught, and it just isn’t worth it. Take the same amount of effort and work on your own thoughts and ideas. Plankton never gets away with his schemes, either. He’s on Plan “Z” and is still pathetically failing at his attempts to steal the secret formula.

SpongeBob: This little guy always tries to do the right thing, and is a hard worker. He may not always end up getting the results he hoped for, but he bounces back and tackles his work with a renewed vigor. SpongeBob works very hard, he's a good friend, he always thinks of others, and tries to have fun no matter what he is faced with. Hardworking, friendly SpongeBob is the guy to be when writing articles.

Although this is a silly lesson in article writing, I hope you'll remember the important messages our underwater friends have taught us.

1. Be entertaining. Not boring.

2. Write articles to help others, not with dollar signs in your eyes.

3. Proofread your articles carefully, and provide valuable information.

4. Write your own material. Don’t copy others.

5. Be a SpongeBob! Hard work and persistence pay off.

Before you know it, you'll develop a following for having informative and entertaining articles and you’ll be King or Queen of the sea.

Nicole Dean, owner of http://ShowMomtheMoney.com uses Article Marketing to get free advertising on websites and in newsletters worldwide. She welcomes you to visit http://www.EasyArticleMarketing.com to find out how.

Article Writing & Marketing: The Single Most Powerful Tool I Have Ever Found

Have you discovered the power of article writing and marketing?

By far, this is the single most powerful tool I have ever found for creating prospects, publicity and profits.

An incredible 70/30 split

Here is a great example of the power of this article writing and marketing.

I have been writing a syndicated relationship column for 11 years now. My column runs weekly in newspapers all over the world. Since they are kind enough to include my contact information, I've gotten a steady stream of prospects, publicity and profits from doing this for 11 years.

I have been posting my articles online at EzineArticles.com since late April of this year, 2005, or said another way, for the last 7 months as of this writing. From the first month I started I've gotten a flood of prospects, publicity and profits from writing and posting articles.

Now, let's look at some simple numbers.

From my newspaper column that I have written for 11 years, I get 30% of my new prospects and subscribers.

From writing and posting articles online for the last 7 months, I get 70% of my new prospects and subscribers.

Simply stated:

11 years equals 30% of my new prospects and subscribers

7 months equals 70% of my new prospects and subscribers.

11 years = 30%

7 months = 70%

Are you getting the power of this?

Visit The Article Guy for more leading edge tips and tools for writing articles that bring you prospects, publicity and profits. You can also subscribe to our monthly Article Writing & Marketing Tips Newsletter. You are also invited to visit my Express-Start Article Writing Program for more information on the next article writing tele-seminar.

Using Articles to Market Your Business by Answering Questions

Using articles in your marketing can make you into the EXPERT (think - you're they're superhero), answer customer questions, and ultimately, help you sell stuff!

There is no better way to advertise and promote information than to use articles. Article can answer questions that people have regarding your product or service. Who better to answer those questions than you, the expert on your product of service?

Many businesses are now marketing their products and services via the internet. This is a great way to communicate information to people all around the world. In the absence of articles there are plenty of websites that would fail to have any purpose. All of the articles that support various products on the web have a real marketing spin. Using articles as part of a marketing program is how many items get sold, because those articles are written to answer questions people have to problems they face. Usually the solution presented in the article shows that the answer to the question is the product or service you market. Brochures, newsletters, direct mail letters and magazines columns are all perfect examples of article marketing.

To write your article, the first thing you need to do is determine your aims for writing the article. Ask yourself three simple questions

What is it I am trying to sell?

What am I trying to achieve?

Who is my target market?

In order for you to sell a product, write your article so that it meets the needs and desires of your potential customers and potential target markets. In other words, what question or problem that the customer is having can you solve by the time they finish reading the article?

Write the article so that it gets to the heart and soul of the buyer in a way that helps them to see how truly beneficial the item is to them. Emotions play an important role in a customer's decision to purchase something.

If your aim is to market a service that you offer, then you might want to include testimonials in your articles. Phrases such as "They go above and beyond every time." These sorts of phrases help to ensure you customers feel confident above using your services. Make sure your testimonials are from real people. You want to run an ethical business.

In a world that consists of an ever-growing market in the technology field and expanding information age, it is important to have a precise plan when marketing with articles. You want your customers to be reassured that you have the information that will simplify their work, life, etc...

In other words, ANSWER the questions that they didn't know they had.

Basically, the plan is to design your ideas for marketing with articles so that the articles focus on filling the need of your client in a way that they want your product or service above your competitors.

Jonathan Kraft has been specializing in Internet affiliate marketing for nearly 4 years. He works with a team on www.affiliateadvice.us, which has been designed to help people of all design and ability levels to find and set up money generating sites through affiliate programs.

SOME HELPFUL HINTS IN WRITING ARTICLES FOR THE WEB - TWENTY FIVE TIPS

Writing articles can provide you with enormous amount of exposure on the Web. You are branding yourself on a shoestring budget - it hasn't cost you a cent, but a little time and effort Writing a free content article is simple and follows a similar professional approach as an article for a standard, paying market.

People want quality content : for their ezines and their web sites .; however, the competition for content is fierce. Every Web site owner wants content and hundreds of writers want their content visible on the Web It's FREE promotion through your signature file at the end of your article* Articles that give good information or explain how to accomplish something are usually best, and will be read most often.

Here are some pointers in writing articles for the www:

1. Accept that writing for the web is different to writing for the off-line world. People tend to skim and scan (note alliteration) when reading online. They read quickly scrolling down the page.

2. Identify your target audience.

3. Give your article a catchy title that will grab attention and make people want to read.

4. Keep your title reasonably short. Put some thought and effort into your heading - again to get your reader's immediate attention.

5. Be professional and take your article writing seriously. Write about something you know professionally. Don't be overly casual in your writing (ie. don't write exactly as you speak)

6. Keep your paragraphs short.

7. Get to the point quickly (enough waffle with maple syrup, Craig!).

8. Target your article to your audience with "focussed information".

9. Be brief, if you are a "waffler", like this writer. People want immediate information online and have limitedtime usually - it's the "instant coffee, sorry generation.

10. Write briefly and concisely (redundant words, meaning the same thing, Craig!) Try to keep your article under 1,500 words. Most paying markets usually only accept between 500 and 2,000 words...and with a bit of luck they may even "pick up" your great article. Try to be concise in your wording. Brevity is the hall-mark of good writing...or so say many of the teachers of writing!

11. Use the OCCASIONAL exclamation mark (!) to get your readers attention. Forget the ALL CAPITAL LETTERS and exclamation points!!!

12. Be credible (big word, eh?) at all times. I use my articles to attempt to share, inform and entertain at the same time in a "conversational style with dashes of my funny (peculiar/zany) humour".Happy writing "dem" articles


Craig is a writer, who believes in encouraging and helping others to find their talents and gifts, strive for and achieve their dreams in life, whatever they may be. He truly believespeople can overcome obstacles, rise to any occasion and accomplish their entire dream with enough faith and commitment.Craig's various books* (hard copies, CD's, "talking books" and e-books) are available at: http://www.nzenterprise.com/writer/books.html

I Am Biodegradable. My Writing Is Not.

My dad was wrong. I just discovered that I am good for nuthin' after all. In fact I've been good for nuthin' all along. I am 100% biodegradable and that means I can be recycled into nuthin'. It also means that no matter how much I waste, no matter how much I consume, no matter how much I pollute, in the end I am environment-friendly. Best of all, I now have an end use.
Now that's something to put on my resume!

This comes as particularly good news to somebody who is not sure what his purpose is. Sometimes I write these humor columns, pretending to be funny. Sometimes people even laugh, and I worry that it might be the start of an ominous trend.

Sometimes I am selling my happiness book, pretending to be a successful author. With 2,000 copies of my book keeping the floor from floating upwards, perhaps I AM successful. Levitating floors are generally not considered signs of success in this part of the country.

Sometimes I am optimizing websites for search engine rankings. "What exactly does that mean?" I am often asked.

"Well...it means that I get my clients' site high up in the searches." Blank stare.

I try again. "It means that I help Google show you my clients' web sites. Blank stare.

"Well...I'm not sure how to explain it. But I get paid to do it." People understand that.

"I turn on a machine that defluctuates the turbo-rotating modulator down at the spare parts plant," someone adds.

"What exactly does that mean?" I ask.

"Beats me. But I get paid to do it." We are soulmates.

Sometimes I write for pay, because people seem to want something written. They hope that if they can't say it themselves, I might be able to find just the right words.

"C'mon, David. You have lots of words. Why don't you lend me some? Why, just last week you promised to 'defenestrate' me, whatever that means." They want me to put their thoughts into words, and occasionally they want me to create their thoughts. I worked for a politician years ago. I vaguely remember how to write somebody else's thoughts before he knew he had them.
"So what do you write?"

"Web site copy, mostly."

"Really? Not another book?"

"No, I still have 2,000 copies of the last book piled up in my office."

"I'm sure they'll sell quickly, David."

"Really? Want one?"

"Uh...gotta go. It's time for my pet goldfish's nap."

I also write this humor column faithfully every week. But people actually PAY me to write website copy. Now, dear reader, answer me this question. Would you rather be reading this hilarious column, loaded with frosting and topped with chocolate syrup, or would you rather read plain vanilla website copy.

OK, go ahead and read the website copy, then. See if I care.

One thing my website copy and this column have in common is that they are not biodegradable. Remember how computers would save the environment as they replace the three gazillion tones of paper we trash every few hours in offices around the world and elsewhere?

Now we discover that all that paper at least was biodegradable, recyclable, reusable. It wasn't all that bad for the environment, after all. But the monitor you are reading this on will last forever.

(SFX: evil laughter) Adventure seekers from the planet Zorgoppppt will land here in the year 2304 and discover all these abandoned monitors scattered around.

One Zorgopppptian will say to the other, "prrg, ddyte h hthp oooo djudu" (Translation: "Groovy paper weights!")

But they won't find me, thanks to my lifetime achievement. I'll be long gone, because I am (chest swells with pride) biodegradable.

David Leonhardt is biodegradable and happy at: http://www.thehappyguy.com To write your website copy, newsletter or award winning biodegradable cereal box copy, email him at: info@thehappyguy.com He is author of Inspiration & Motivation To Go: http://www.thehappyguy.com/l/daily-motivation-inspiration.php The Get Happy Workbook: http://www.thehappyguy.com/happiness-work-book.html and Climb Your Stairway to Heaven: the 9 habits of maximum happiness: http://www.thehappyguy.com/happiness-self-help-book.html Info@thehappyguy.com

Why Writers Write

Writing is not just another hobby, it is an emotion. The words are not just fitted together in sentences and paragraphs hoping to pass on a message, but it is form of expression of our greatest fears, hopes and dreams.

As a teenager I had my share of problems just like any other, but I was different… special. My mind was not at ease telling my parents or friends about a situation that had occurred or even might occur. I didn’t feel that a journal was just as my feelings were hard to explain in ordinary English. I had to find a way to express my love and hate about certain subjects, no matter how large or small.

I grabbed a pencil and paper and started writing. Using images, sounds and smells was easier than I had thought. My mind then became at ease with myself and I could live another day without wondering who or what I was going to tell my thoughts to. As the weeks and months ran on I became even more comfortable with writing my thoughts and feelings on paper, I didn’t feel discomfort any longer.

Ever since I have written. It doesn’t matter what others say or think about my writings, because I know what these poems meant and the history behind each one. Knowing that every single poem has a story and emotion greater than the comprehension of others give me satisfaction when receiving flame mails stating that I suck potatoes or bananas are more interesting than my poetry.

Writers write not because of what others think. We write because it makes us feel great about putting something on paper that will stay apart of us forever. No matter how much someone says our writing stinks, there will be ten others who appreciate the time, effort and emotion put into each one, and we will know that our writing was meant for us and only us.

Gary is a writer for Love Poetry

The Myths Of Writing: Have You Bought Into These?

There is an image most people carry of the artist (think Van Gough's self-portrait, the one with his ear bandaged), working in solitude in a barren garret in a dark corner of the city. Everyday is a struggle. He continually walks between moments of brilliance and moments of insanity. It's a romantic image, I suppose. Built around the belief that an artist must suffer for his art.
This applies not only to the painter, mind you, but also to the actor, the dancer, the photographer, the writer. We all must suffer for our art.

But image and reality are often two different things. Writing, for example, does NOT have to be a torturous process of endurance and pain. In fact, it should be exactly the opposite. Liberating. Joyous. Enlightening. Why else would you want to invest so much of yourself in it?
So let's take a closer look at a few common writing myths.

This first one actually applies in all areas of a person's life. Simply stated: Having a big ego is a bad thing. It's unbecoming. It's boastful. It puts you in a negative light.

The truth is … if you want to be a success at anything, you need an ego. It motivates you, keeps you moving, pushes you to do your best. It's not your enemy. It's your ally.

The key to making it work for you is to keep it directed inward. Pump yourself up silently. Let it fill you with pride and a sense of possibilities. That's what the ego does best. Used wisely, it will move you toward your writing goals, not away from them.

Our next common writing myth is one you hear all the time: you have to write something original.

What is originality?

There's only one thing in the world that can make your work original. That's you. Because that's all you have to bring to the table as a writer. Who you are. Your history. Your experiences. Your family. Your beliefs.

When a publisher says he wants something original, he's saying he wants something fresh, something that reflects you the writer. He wants your voice, your honesty. The world already has a Stephen King and a Mary Higgins Clark and a John Grisham. It doesn't need more of them.
Our final common writing myth (though there is no shortage of such myths, we are limited by space): the slower you write, the more time you spend with each and every word, the better your writing will be.

The catch to this one is simple: there's a time and place for writing, and there's a time and place for editing.

When you mix the two activities (which are very different in their requirements and purpose), you rarely do either one justice. If anything will suffer, it will be your writing. Because suddenly you'll be under the constraints of the editor sitting on your shoulder. You'll be fretting over the words while losing perspective on the more important elements of the story. Does the scene work? Are your characters being true to their nature? Does this move the story forward?

The truth is this: your writing will ALWAYS be better when you write in the moment.

Remember when you were a child? When you could spend hours building a sand castle or playing catch or flying a kite? Those were moments when nothing else in the world existed because you were completely absorbed in the activity. Write with that same captivation, as if each scene were unfolding right before your eyes, and you'll find your writing will not only be vivid and powerful, it will flow faster than you ever imagined possible.

Writing does not have to be a torturous, exacting process.

Allow yourself to have fun with it, and you'll be a better writer for the effort.


David B. Silva is a professional writer, editor and publisher. For a FREE mini-course on the best way to make writing that novel faster and easier, Click Here ==> mailto:easyway@thesuccessfulwriter.com?subject=TRAArticle dbsilva@thesuccessfulwriter.com

To Separate Yourself from the Pack, Write and Publish!

For all too many firms and individual professionals, most any kind of marketing/selling or job-seeking strategy works pretty well, especially in good times. But when boom times disappear, so do more automatic forms of business development. Explained research specialist Michael Norris, President, Norris Research, during a recent recession, “The general stumbling of many ‘high fliers’ has been due to marketing, or lack thereof. Until recently, it seemed as if answering the phone was their entire marketing strategy.”

When the going gets rough, however, what’s a company or job seeker to do? One little-used technique for separating oneself from the competition is to write and publish articles and/or books.

Why adopt this approach? For one thing, it’s far less expensive than even a modest snail-mail or advertising strategy, and second, writing/publishing earns one double benefits. At once you are promoting your skills and services while educating target markets about what you know, all in one fell swoop. Thus publishing transforms companies and individuals into “thought leaders,” that is to say, better-known experts in their particular field. This allows core values and unique selling points to be articulated clearly, confidently and persuasively.

How to get started? First, you need a “go-ahead” from an editor, generally a far more effective step then starting off writing a full-blown article or book, then shot-gunning it off to a publication or publisher and hoping it fits. By locating an editor who would be sincerely interested in your work before actually writing it, you stand to gain feedback around angle, length, and deadline which will help you craft the article just the way your new editor would like to see it. Obviously chances of acceptance spike up significantly when criteria for success can be specified and followed beforehand.

To insure that your article will promote you in the way you want, you’ll also want to decide beforehand (a) specific business objectives you wish to advance, and (b) publications read by your target customers (for articles) and target reader audience (for books). A client of mine, a manufacturer of data storage systems, for example, wanted its insurance firm prospects to understand how much more productive its recently-developed data mining system could make them. So its VP Sales wrote an article called “Storage Must be Flexible,” AFTER securing interest from the editor of a major insurance journal.

How does one go about obtaining such interest? The answer is all too business-familiar: cold-call or email an editor or publisher just as you would a prospective customer, pitch your idea briefly, then await the response. You’ll probably end up chatting with the editor about your proposal and hearing her ask, “So when could you get it to me?” If pitching by email, send a nudge reminder a week or so later if you haven’t yet heard, or make a follow-up call.

The truth is that securing a go-ahead from an editor is a pretty straightforward proposition. Most editors are sitting around their desks waiting to hear from you, since they don’t generally know where their next idea meals are coming from. Since they are constantly in need of great new ideas, they welcome calls or emails from strangers who can propose them.

As you get in the game, you will steadily become proficient at this remarkable (and remarkably little-used!) marketing channel. In fact, expect some prospective clients or employers to actually begin recognizing YOUR name when you meet them. They will light up when they realize they have read an article or book authored by you. “I learned a lot from reading your ideas,” they will say, adding (pre-sold to you), “Please tell me what I can do for you. I’m all ears.”

Ken Lizotte CMC is Chief Imaginative Officer (CIO) of emerson consulting group inc. (Concord, MA), which transforms consultants, law firms, executives and companies into “thoughtleaders.”

This article is an excerpt from his newest book "Beyond Reason: Questioning Assumptions of Everyday Life".

Visit ==>www.thoughtleading.com for more info.

Freelance Writers - Five Reasons Why You Need A Website

These days, if you're starting a career as a freelance writer, it's no longer enough to ring up a few editors and distribute a few business cards. Most of the people who want to hire you will ask if you have a website. If the answer is 'no', you could lose out on some valuable sources of income.

Here are five reasons why you should have a web presence.

1. Developing the brand of you

As a writer, your name is your brand. People will like or hate your stuff, trust or distrust your opinions. Either way, they'll have positive or negative feelings every time they see an article with your name on it. So your job is to build editors' and readers' trust in that brand.

2. Writing is your business - you need to treat it like one

Every reputable business has a website that showcases its products and services. You should too. How else are people going to know what you have to offer? A website allows your potential clients the luxury of accessing your information in their own time. You should include a resume, references, services (types of writing), samples of work, links to where you're published on the net.
3. Efficiency

A website is a time saving way of showcasing your past and current work (an online portfolio or selection of clips). You can point editors to it as well - a time saver for you and them. No longer do you have to spend time selecting and printing your best work. Instead, upload examples to your site and link to other places where your work has been published.

4. Make your passion work for you

Some of the writing you do will be for love rather than money, but that's no reason why you can't make it work for you. Upload your short stories, poetry, novel chapters and so on to show how creative you are.

5. Skills development

If you do the web development yourself, you'll also be gaining another valuable skill. The discipline of editing your material for a website will be invaluable when you're trying to get a commission to write 40 web articles for a pittance (we all have to start somewhere).

So what are you waiting for? Get your stuff on the net and start building the brand of you.

Sharon Hurley Hall is a freelance writer, ghostwriter and editor. Sharon worked in publishing for 18 years, writing articles and editing and designing books and magazines. She has also lectured on journalism. For more information or to contact Sharon, visit http://www.doublehdesign.com/. Read more of Sharon's writing at http://www.doublehdesign.com/blog/

Benefits of Submitting Articles – 10 Reasons Why Free May Bring in the Bucks

Websites, Bloggers, Ezine Publishers all need content. All business need exposure and advertising. Writing artilcles to share your expertise with others can benefit in a number of ways even if you offer your articles freely.

1. Brand Yourself. You will brand your website, business and yourself . Make sure you include your name, business name, credentials, web site address and e-mail address in your resource box.

2. Gain credibility. You will become know as an expert on the topics you write about. Get an edge on your competion with a boost in credibilty.

3. Free advertising. This will broaden your advertising efforts in addition to yur normal advertising budget.

4. Get Published All Over The Web. Multiple visiting publishers to need free content for their websites, ezines, blogs and more.

5. Get Published in Offline Content. Some publishers may put your content in ebooks and so your advertising can multiply further.

6. Gain Trust. If when people read your article they like it, they will be more likely to buy your product or service increasing your profits.

7. Highlighted Exposure. A publisher may choose to place your article on their homepage or high traffic blog. Placement can increase credibility as well as exposure.

8. Long Term Advertising. Your article may end up in archives to ezine publications. Some subcribers like to read back issues before subscribing.

9. Multiply Income. You may get extra income from people who want to hire you to write other articles, books or even speak at seminars. This can be a great way to multiply your income.

10. Link Popularity! When publishers begin placing your article along with resource box on their websites you will start to raise your search engine rankings. The more links back to you site the more popular you are with the search engines. Start gaining all sorts of popularity today!

Marie Gervacio is founder and editor of Article Blender.com , ShineYourStar.com , and SimpleBeautyTips.com. Get free content for your website, ezine or blog and/or publish your articles at ArticleBlender.com.

How to be Rejected by the Article Directories

Article writing is one of the best ways to increase your traffic and get more sales. You've heard it a million times so you decide to finally just do it. You write an article and submit it to the article directories, eagerly anticipating the flow of traffic. Instead you receive the dreaded rejection letter.

What did you do wrong?

1. Did you proof-read your article before you submitted it?

Popular article directory sites receive hundreds of submissions each day. It's much easier for the owner to click "decline" than to edit your typo-filled or unformatted article. Before submitting, proof the article and proof it again. If grammar and spelling make you sweat, then hire a Copywriter or ask a friend to help you before you click that submit button.

2. Is it an Advertisement or an Article?

Article directory sites are looking for informative, useful content, not press releases or ads. If your submission reads like an ad, it will not be accepted. And, think about it -- even if was approved on a fluke, do you think that website owners will be clamoring to publish your 500 word advertisement? Not a chance.

If your goal is to write and submit a press release, then check out places like prweb.com.

3. Did you read the Submission Guidelines?

Each article directory has a different culture. Glance through the Submission Guidelines before setting up an account to make sure your article will be welcome before you submit it. If an article directory is based around a niche like gardening, then please resist the urge to submit your Mesothelioma articles. There are plenty of article directories that want your articles. It’s not an effective use of your time to submit unwanted articles to a niche site.

4. Is your article PG-rated?

Don't submit sex-related articles, profanity, or general nastiness. Article directories are businesses and, therefore, exist to make money. This means they generally receive income through affiliate sales or advertising. So, if your article includes sex or contains words stronger than "darn", don't be surprised if your article is rejected. Of course, if your article contains nastiness or anything illegal -- don't even bother.

5. Is your Article original and written by you?

Submit only original articles. Please do not copy someone else's article, edit it, and submit it. That's stealing and you will be caught. And, do not submit articles from shared content sites. Article directories want original, unique content. Public domain is 'public' but think how ineffective article directories would become if there were 500 versions of the same public domain piece. Instead of wasting your time figuring out how to reinvent other people's content, just write your own.

Now that you know what not to do, start writing the kind of articles that article directories dream of -- and watch your business grow.

Nicole Dean, owner of http://www.LadyPens.com – an article directory for women, invites you to visit http://www.EasyArticleMarketing.com to learn how writing simple articles can be the most effective way to bring traffic and sales to your website.

Lost In The World Of Article Submission?

There are hundreds of theories on what makes the internet tick. How will one consumer find you on this big thing called the Web? Any webmaster knows that it is the most important element to finding and keeping traffic flowing to their website. Yet, it is not always all that easy of a problem to solve. Let’s face it, there are hundreds of webmasters out there trying to do the same thing that you are. So, you have competition beyond reason.

Although it is quite difficult for you to get your website traffic up if you don’t know how, if you do, then it’s rather simple. There are many benefits to you from simply writing and submitting articles to article submission websites. This simple process can generate a steady flow of traffic unlike any other. It is quite amazing the results that you can get from this very easy process. Here are some more details for you to consider about article submission.

First, understand how it all works. You write an article, presumably about your product, service or website. Normally, you will want to insure that it is writing without the suggestion of, Come here. I’ve got a great sale for you. This type of article will most likely not be used or it will not even be allowed into publishing. The article should be crafted surrounding whatever is going to pull your customer in. The goal is to have them click and locate you.

At the bottom of your article, you will use a resource box to include your information. Who you are and what you can do for the customer. You will also have the most powerful part of the entire article there. That is of course your website link.

All of this is submitted to an article submission website which will then publish it. Anyone who wants to can pick up your article and place it onto their own website. When they do this, they are required to use the entire article and the resource box on their website. That means that now your website link is on every website out there of every person that picks up your article. This could literally be thousands and thousands of websites.

So, now that you have your articles written and submitted, you can count on receiving some traffic. The more well written the article is, the more attractive it is for other webmasters, the more it will be picked up and used. That means more and more back links to your website. This is of course an excellent way to insure traffic to your website.

When you take this to the next level, article submission really can translate into a lot of traffic. For example, now that you have written one well written article and got some action off of it, you are ready to do this again and again. That’s because you can write any article and get the same results. So, now you don’t just have one article out there generating traffic for you, but you have five, ten, or twenty doing the work for you.

Article submission websites are an excellent way for you to generate traffic to your website. You probably will not find a better location to find such a virtually free way of getting your website out there. It really makes a lot of sense and it’s quite simple.

Part 2 - Do You Know The Value Of Article Submission?

Kim Neal - Author, Webmaster, Entreprenuer. Get the most from your efforts.Submit articles to Articles-Submit.com.

Just One Article and WOW!

Let me share with you a Real Life Case of Content in its most Valuable Form. I have been marketing online for about 1 year or so, maybe a little longer. Anyway, most of what I had been doing was Traffic Exchanges and a Forum here and there, safelists and push-button mailers (which I am now sure were probably mostly spam)...oh, and Banging my head against the wall because nothing was working well. Yeah, I would make a sale here or there, but nothing to be proud of.

After reading about Article Submission, I really put some thought into it and decided that surely I could come up with something. I figured, hey the worst that can happen is that someone reads my article and thinks it is horrible and doesn't visit. No big deal, right?

Well, here is the really cool part...

I wrote that article and submitted it to 3 or 4 free submission sites...that's all, just 3 or 4. Before I knew it, I was getting subscribers left and right. I did a search and found out that not only was my article showing on the submission sites, but it was showing up on several other websites and blogs. Boy was I surprised! People actually wanted something that I wrote on their own sites.
Now, besides the extra subscribers (over 100 in fact), I also got a nice surprise when the Google Dance took place a couple weeks ago. For those of you who don't know what the Google Dance is, it is the time that Google starts updating and changing their algorithms and updating Page Rank on all of the Websites that are indexed in their system.

After that particular dance, I ended up with a Page Rank of 2. Yes, that's right...PR2. Now I know that a PR2 is not a huge achievement, but get this…it was for a website that had only been registered for a few weeks. Now the really funny part of this is that until a couple of days ago, that URL was only a forwarding URL to my Blog hosted on Blogspot. If I went to the real URL for the blog, it was a PR0, but my forwarding was a PR2. Now, of course, I have that URL hosted and a site is up, but for a Forwarded Domain to pull a PR2 off of 1 Article is pretty Amazing.

This just goes to show you the POWER behind good Content! I have since changed most of my marketing methods to incorporate Article Writing as my primary method for Traffic Generation.
It works, folks! It Just WORKS!

About the Author

Scott Raven is an Internet Marketer and Online Entrepreneur. He makes his home in Arkansas, with his Wife and 2 Daughters. You can visit Scott’s Blog at http://www.TheRavenProject.com

Copyright © 2005 TheRavenProject. All Rights Reserved.

5 Reasons Why Submitting Articles Sucks!

I'm not going to lie to you. Submitting articles on the web gets two thumbs down, and here's why.

If you plan on doing it right, you've got a lot of work ahead of you. I mean a LOT!

Whether you're writing your own articles or submitting for a client, your ultimate goal is to be seen in prestigious places. That means high-ranking sites. That means sites where business prospects who are willing to pay for your services frequently lurk.

Here are five things that you MUST do to get your articles out into circulation (and five things that make this one SUCKY job!)

1. Research the best article sites.

Before you start typing into that submission box, DO YOUR HOMEWORK. Sleuth out the best article sites on the web. Tipoffs: Author names that you recognize - and respect! Working links. An attractive design, sensible navigation. Living, breathing human beings ready to email you back with answers to your questions.

2. Update your list frequently.

It feels good to have one of those multi-page article site lists in your hands. But upon closer inspection, you may come to learn that at least a third of the URLs in your article site list don't work. Article sites spring into existence with a finger-snap... and then drop out of sight just as quickly! An outdated list means you wasted your time. Stay ahead of the article game as best you can!

3. Keep track of your submission info.

Every article site is different. Some ask for a "username." Others request an email address. Some require that you type in a password, others generate the password for you. Are you getting a sense of how confusing this can become when doing bulk article submissions? What about a client who asks tons of questions? Take notes: "Site X doesn't accept HTML formats." Record and store your user info for each site.

4. Organize your files.

Article submission varies drastically from one site to the next. You'll need to have two versions of every article - one Plain Text and one HTML-Formatted. If you change one word of one article, both versions must also be edited. Let article maintenance go by the wayside, and you'll be sending some way confused drafts out into circulation!

5. Store your personal information.

Some sites ask for an author photo, others do not. Many accept URLs - sometimes from more than one website! If you're bulk-submitting for a client, this brings a ton of questions to mind. Even the author biographies vary. You'll need to keep several bios on file - one extended bio containing several paragraphs, one brief "generic" bio, and then any bio that's part of an "article marketing campaign" where you might feature a special promotion or link to a sales page/sign-up box.

If you don't have the time to invest in article efficiency, you can always stick to just one, two or three article submission sites. But the truth is, you're short-changing yourself if you do this. The more top-quality sites you submit to, the more top-quality content-seekers will showcase your work on their sites and in their email newsletters.

I believe that if you're going to do something, you should do it right and do it all the way... or don't do it at all. That's why I'm strongly suggesting to you now, to PAY SOMEONE ELSE to organize your article submissions. You will not believe the time, effort and confusion of mass-submitting on the web. This is a FULL-TIME JOB that's best handled by an expert. Think about this: do you want to spend hours, days and weeks trying to keep up with your web articles? Or do you want to focus on offering the best service to your customers? The choice is yours.

Copyright 2005 Dina Giolitto. All rights reserved.

Dina Giolitto is a copywriting consultant and ghostwriter with 10 years of experience writing corporate print materials and web content. Trust her with your next e-book, article series or web project, and make a lasting impression on your audience of information-hungry prospects. Visit http://www.wordfeeder.com for more details.

How a Novice Author Can Write 3000 Articles in Under 9 Months

If you asked the average writer if it were possible to write 3000 articles in under nine months, they would most likely say; “That is impossible!” And you would find few to argue against that point. In fact in looking at such a goal it does appear impossible, yet for those who believe, they will always be the ones to achieve.

Let us break it down, to write 3000 articles in only nine months you would have to write 333 articles per month or 11.1 articles per day. You would not be able to take any days off if you wanted to finish. You would have to write 165,900 words per month or 5550 words per day. So in looking at the break down you can see it is possible, as anything is possible.

Each year authors get together for the National Novel Writers Month or “NaNoWriMo” contest, which is a sprint to the finish 50,000-word novel from scratch each November. They say novel writing is much easier than article writing once you start. The events organizer says that word counts are matter in this race and those words can be crap. Chris Baty is the Founder of the event and although he says that most of the novels are not very good, several of the authors have received book deals and that is common each year. Now there are 42,000 participants and about 6,000 actually complete their works with the 50,000 words. Many or the top writers of the contest write up to 2,000 words per day.

If an online article writer wrote 50,000 words in one month, they would have written 1,000 articles in nine months, which would be a remarkable accomplishment. And 1000 articles would with a by-line under them with a link to a website, would drive incredible amounts of traffic if you were smart enough to post them on the Premier Online Article Submission Site on the Internet; EzineArticles.com. Your traffic from that site alone would be 250,000 articles views. I know this because today I am just shy of 750,000 articles views, which at the current rate will be hit by the end of next week. Additionally your articles would end up in First Class Ezines and on website through RSS Feed all over the Internet.

You will have to take all your worldly knowledge to write 1,000 articles online and work hard to write each day 3-4 articles each day, every day for nine months. I know you can do this, I did it and I am not even a writer, the expert writers are now calling me “The Accidental Writer” which seems to be the case, but if I can do it, anyone can. Currently I am averaging 285,000 words per month and in October I posted 570 articles, this month I hope to better than to 600 articles. My goal was to reach 3000 articles by January 1, 2006 and I am very happy to report this article makes my three thousandth article and I accomplished this goal a month and a half early. I am smiling right now as I write this and indeed, I am very happy.

I wish to thank my mentor Dina Giolitto for helping me get tough and giving me good advice to better my quality, which I am still working on to this day. I would like to thank Jeff Herring, “The Article Guy” for being a tough competitor with good advice for spicing up my articles and helping me hone my skills. Lastly I would like to thank Chris Knight for allowing me the opportunity to share my knowledge with the World and helping me in my mission to wake people up and make them think. Please believe me, I did not start out as a writer and I am still struggling to work on my skills and I guarantee you if I can do this, then anyone can. Think on this.

"Lance Winslow" - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

Article Writing Equals Free Advertising

A little known way to receive ongoing web visitors, a higher Google Page Rank, and inbound links to your site without having to exchange links. All for free...

Article Writing - Pick a category you're interested and/or know a lot about and write an article about it. It doesn't have to be too long, just have some facts about something or even your opinion. At the bottom of the article make a new paragraph 'About the Author'. Here you write a short summary about yourself and your site name and URL. You can even have related links in the article, this is especially good if you write an article pertaining to your site, than have links to your site to show examples.

Here is an example. Go to Google and type in - "Why Paid Inclusion Is Better Than PPC Advertising" be sure to use the quotations, you want to get an exact match. This is an article I wrote last year an already it's listed on over 400 websites. I didn't pay a dime. That over 400 links pointed to my website, because of my 'About the Author' section.

Another example is - "Dear Santa: Christmas Sucks!" also in quotation marks. My sister wrote this one and it is on over 60 sites. Again free advertising for your website because of the 'About the Author' section. Both of these articles are based on opinion and look how many sites listed them. Most people know to get a higher Google Page Rank you need people to link to your website. This is the easiest way, plus it's free.

WebProNews.com - An excellent site to be listed on. They list almost any article that is webmaster related. They also allow you to upload a photo of yourself. Your article will be seen by thousands of people here.

http://www.webpronews.com/submit.html

You also have to be aware of some sites that offer to publish your article to thousands of websites for a fee. As you can see above, this really is not necessary. Just search the web for free article submission sites and you're set.

Here are some more free sites that you can submit your articles to:

http://www.articlesubmission.com

http://ezinearticles.com

http://www.articlesfactory.com

http://www.infonexus.org

http://www.articlehub.com

Kristian Pulz is the owner of http://www.links2see.com/ an online family directory and http://www.web2webgroup.com/ an interactive Yahoo Group for webmasters and website owners. He can be reached at webmaster@links2see.com

Article Writing Equals Free Advertising

A little known way to receive ongoing web visitors, a higher Google Page Rank, and inbound links to your site without having to exchange links. All for free...

Article Writing - Pick a category you're interested and/or know a lot about and write an article about it. It doesn't have to be too long, just have some facts about something or even your opinion. At the bottom of the article make a new paragraph 'About the Author'. Here you write a short summary about yourself and your site name and URL. You can even have related links in the article, this is especially good if you write an article pertaining to your site, than have links to your site to show examples.

Here is an example. Go to Google and type in - "Why Paid Inclusion Is Better Than PPC Advertising" be sure to use the quotations, you want to get an exact match. This is an article I wrote last year an already it's listed on over 400 websites. I didn't pay a dime. That over 400 links pointed to my website, because of my 'About the Author' section.

Another example is - "Dear Santa: Christmas Sucks!" also in quotation marks. My sister wrote this one and it is on over 60 sites. Again free advertising for your website because of the 'About the Author' section. Both of these articles are based on opinion and look how many sites listed them. Most people know to get a higher Google Page Rank you need people to link to your website. This is the easiest way, plus it's free.

WebProNews.com - An excellent site to be listed on. They list almost any article that is webmaster related. They also allow you to upload a photo of yourself. Your article will be seen by thousands of people here.

http://www.webpronews.com/submit.html

You also have to be aware of some sites that offer to publish your article to thousands of websites for a fee. As you can see above, this really is not necessary. Just search the web for free article submission sites and you're set.

Here are some more free sites that you can submit your articles to:

http://www.articlesubmission.com

http://ezinearticles.com

http://www.articlesfactory.com

http://www.infonexus.org

http://www.articlehub.com

Kristian Pulz is the owner of http://www.Links2See.com an online family directory and http://www.web2webgroup.com an interactive Yahoo Group for webmasters and website owners. He can be reached at webmaster@links2see.com

Ten Tips for Effective Internet Article Writing

On the Internet “content is king”, and the real guts of content is the written word. If you are managing a website you need readable text for your onsite articles, for articles in your promotional newsletter or ezine and for promotional articles to be published on other sites or in other ezines. While these writing tasks can be outsourced to professionals, it is also possible for you to do it yourself if you follow a step-by-step process that is outlined in the following ten tips.

1. In the first paragraph clearly state what the article is about. In standard journalism you would tell who, what, why, when and where an event is happening. In web articles you oftentimes state a problem, such as “how to get good written materials for your website”, and then explain how the article is going to solve the problem “by showing a simple step-by-step approach to writing”.

2. Organize your material in a point-wise fashion. Before you begin writing think of the points
that your article is going to cover. You may not necessarily show the points, as I am doing in this article (calling them ten tips), however, for your own outline of the article you should know what you are going to say before you begin writing. Write down these points and then make sure you include them as you begin the writing process.

3. Put the reader at ease. You are not writing for a scientific or literary society, but to your peers on the Internet. Write in a simple style and if you introduce new terms, define them for your readers.

4. Explain your points in short paragraphs. Short paragraphs are easier for the reader to follow.

No one likes to look at a long block of solid text. Three, four or five sentences are usually enough for one paragraph.

5. Don’t be afraid to spill all the beans! Tell your trade secrets! No, I am not crazy, the more you tell, the more the demand you will create for your goods and services. I once hesitated to write an article on “Tips for Writing Metatags” (http://www.a1-optimization.com/optimization-tips-2.htm) thinking, who will need my search engine optimization services if they read the article? I was wrong, the article was widely published and generated several orders for my services. If you give more information, people will understand that you really are an authority on the subject that you are speaking about.

6. Give concrete examples and personal experiences to back up your points. Tell how you faced a problem and how you solved it. Or give hypothetical examples of the California Widget Company and how its website would, for example need a title tag of “Widgets: electronic widgets from the California Widget Company”

7. Emphasize the benefits of your product or service. When it comes to selling, it is the benefits that sell, rather than the features. Sure, you are selling garden supplies, home décor, clothing, gifts and jewelry on your website. These are features. But the benefits are that people can get these items in one place without shopping around, that they can save time and money, etc. The gurus of Internet marketing, such as Ken Evoy (http://myws.sitesell.com/webpromote2.html) all say that you should constantly mention the benefits that you offer to your potential customer.

8. Give resource information to your readers. Give the addresses of websites where your readers can get more information on the subject that you are talking about. These may be your own websites or they can be other resources. In case you are worrying about losing customers, good outgoing links from your website are also helpful to your site’s page ranking and positioning in search engines.

9. Get another opinion on your article. Show it to your friends and colleagues, and don’t worry if they criticize you, it is better that your friends find the mistakes than your clientele. Always remember, a good editor is a writer’s best friend

10. Keep your most important information near the beginning of the article and summarize what you want to say at the end. Editors usually cut things near the end, so keep your most important points and ideas in the beginning of the article. At the very end of the article you can summarize what you set out to accomplish in your opening paragraph.

You may not win a literary prize, but if you follow the steps that I have outlined above you will be able to produce effective written content for your website and for your promotional outreach via your own newsletters and through articles published on other websites. These articles could become the key to success in your Internet endeavors.

PS: If you follow the guidelines outlined in this article you will be able to write great articles, however if you would like to use your time in another way and would like someone else to write your article for you, then contact me, and I will do it at a very reasonable price.

Donald Nelson is a web developer, editor, and social worker. He has been working on the Internet since 1995 and is the proprietor of A1-Optimization, http://www.a1-optimization.com, a firm providing search engine optimization, copywriting, reciprocal linking, and other web promotion services. He publishes a monthly ezine, A1-Web Promotion Tips, available at http://www.a1-optimization.com/newsletter.html

Why You Need a 3-Tiered Strategy For Article Submission

You've heard a lot about how much writing articles can do for your internet marketing strategy. You now understand how writing articles can help position you as an expert in your field, gain valuable targed traffic for your web site, and quickly multiple your site's text links.

Now you have convinced yourself to take the plunge into article marketing and you have a few articles all lined up and ready to submit -- and you are overwhelmed by the sheer volume and variety of article directories available. It is easy to simply go with the big dogs and forget the rest, but that is a big mistake. You really need to have a 3-tiered article submission strategy.

Select a couple of the big dogs, but also had some medium-sized directories and some smaller, newer directories to your list for regular submission as well. There are several reasons why this strategy can be much more effective in the long run than targeting the large directories alone.
The mega-directories carry a big punch in terms of link power and recognition. You can almost watch the reader numbers climb on your articles. But because they are so big they also get a large volume of submissions every day and your articles very quickly move from the top page of the directories new submissions list and even from the top page of the topic listing.

Medium-sized directories don't pack as big a punch as the mega, but their text link value is still strong and they usually have a solid reader base. They have been around long enough to build a loyal audience and clientele. However because they are not as big their submission volume is lower than the mega so your articles retain top billing longer -- and becoming a top article or top author may be an attainable goal for the part-timer.

Small and/or new directories usually don't offer nearly the level of power of their larger brethren, but a quick study will reveal whether or not the directory is regularly maintained and promoted -- and you know that will mean the link power currently exists and will grow in the near future. Also with new and small directories you can easily achieve top author status and your articles will stay at the top of the ranking longer -- they may well pass directly from "new" status to "top" status which rarely if ever happens at a mega directory.

That is my current strategy for article submission and I hope you found it helpful.

Deanna Mascle is the publisher of the writing newsletter Word Craft Online. You can submit your writing to her Article Directory. She is also happy to share tips and advice for Writing On the Internet.

Writing Articles - Advice For The Do-It-Yourself Webmaster

As an SME it is virtually impossible for us to hire the services of a good SEO company that is going to spend time optimising the site, adding new content and gaining good links for the site, simply because of the cost involved. Other SME's are I am sure in a similar position. They would all love to have a web site that ranked highly in google and the other search engines and brought in a constant flow of new business.

However to hire an SEO company to do all those things above is often beyond the reach of many small companies especially those just starting out. However as a company providing services ourselves and 80% of our new business coming via the internet I can thoroughly recommend that you find a company, invest the money because you will soon get the rewards back. If you feel that you still cannot quite afford to go down that path because money in the company is tight then the other course of action I can recommend is to write articles. I kept seeing and reading all this free advice from SEO's out there on the Web about the benefits of writing articles and submitting to article distribution centres and e-zines. I used to think when reading these words of wisdom how wonderful it would be if only I could do that, but I never did it. Until recently that is. About a month ago I decided I would try writing an article. First what would I write about? Big problem, what could I write about that had any relevance to my website or the services we provided and be of interest to anybody else? So I did a search on one of the article distribution sites looking for articles that had relevance to my own sites content and found nothing of real relevance. So nothing for it I would have to write my own. It still took another week before I came up with any ideas. I focused on what services we provided and how I could turn these into articles. Still nothing actually came of these thoughts. Then one night I was talking to one of our cleaners who was telling me about the problems she was having with the toilet brushes on these particular premises she was working at. They were the wrong shape for doing a good job! The following day I spoke to the company and they agreed we could put our own in. Then I realised that this was a problem in many places especially domestic households. So I wrote my first article about toilet brushes and the why's and how's of how people should approach the purchase of these objects. Once started the words flowed. I submitted this to two article distributors and one ezine. To my surprise it was accepted and I have not looked back. I now write on average two articles per week and have reached the grand total of 24 published articles. Each article gives me about five links on average, some provide more, others less, it depends on who picks them up and republishes them. Most importantly it has boosted my visitors and my backlinks and therefore my search engine position. When I did a search on who was linking to my site these articles produced 12 backlinks for google and a staggering 186 on MSN. It was incredibly interesting to see where my articles were ending up, often in very unexpected places, and it is global, so they can be picked up anywhere in the world.

Do not be put of by the thoughts

· I cannot write

· I have nothing to write about

· Nobody would want to read the things I know about

Because you are wrong on all counts. There is a lot of advice freely available on how to write good articles, go search it out. Everybody who is running a business has expert knowledge on some subject, and lastly the whole world is your audience so there will be many people out there who are interested in what you have to say. Surprise yourself, as I did, give it a go. After the first or second article you will find that they just flow and writing becomes much easier. Very importantly however they do wonders for your website.

About the Author

David Andrew Smith is the owner of http://www.wesparkle.co.uk a commercial cleaning company which specialises in the cleaning of natural stone.

12 Point Checklist for Writing Feature Articles

1. Have you selected your intended subject topic and carefully planned out your idea?

2. Have you sent your idea query pitch to magazines or newspapers who may be interested? or will you write "on spec"?

With many magazines and newspapers now accepting material online it is now possible in many instances to email your queries directly to the publication.

Have you read the publishers guidelines carefully to make sure if this method is acceptable?Before sending your query pitch:

- Is it likely to be what the publisher needs: have you studied the publication?

- Is the timing right. Have you checked the magazines editorial calendar?

If it is a seasonal article is now the best time to send your query?

If you have answered yes to these questions then package your idea into an attractive proposal and send it off to the editor of your chosen publication.

3. Have you adequately researched your topic?Read everything you can on the topic from all available sources - bookstores, newspapers, libraries, periodical indexes and internet sources. Never discard anything about your subject topic since you don't know until you write it up what you may actually want to use.

Tip: Saving magazines, newspapers and clippings for the subject matter can save time when researching future writing assignments on the same topic or when working to deadlines. Catalogue all your collected material for easy reference.

4. Have you interviewed the key person/people you need for your proposed feature?Now it is time to organize your material into a feature article.

5. Have you discarded everything in your research except for factual information?

Proper research and liberal use of factual material gives an original perspective to your feature article and also avoids the possibility of plagiarism.

6. Have you checked and cross-referenced your facts amongst your various sources.

7. Have you decided on the length of the article?

Have you checked the length is suitable for the publication you are sending it to?

Tip: Do not waste the editors time by sending a 2000 word article to a publication that requires articles between 500-750 words.


8. Will you use quotes in your article?

Quotes and antcedotes bring a story to life. Are the quotes from a reliable source and have you double checked that quotes used are acurately recorded?

9. Do you have a good lead, middle and ending?

10. Have you proofread and edited your article to achieve the best possible version through re-writing your drafts to arrive at your final version?

Have you made all corrections and necessary changes, have you checked spelling (this includes people and place names) grammar, punctuation etc?

11. If the feature is to be visual - have you provided the appropriate photographs, art work, line drawings, or other graphic illustrations to compliment your feature?

This increases the payment amount you can expect to receive especially if you are a feature photojournalist or travel feature writer who can offer original photographic perspectives of your subject topic.

Finally...12. Have you included everything in your envelope before sending your article to the publisher (including photos properly packaged) or, if the magazine or newspaper excepts online submissions have you given everything a final check before hitting the send button?

For more resources and ideas for home business writers and/or self-publishers visit "Net Writing and e-PublishingSuccess" at http://www.netwrite-publish.com

The UGLY Practice of Sniping - Some Personal Experiences I Have Had

Just a few days ago I wrote a piece entitled: "How to Write an Uncommonly Good Article - Six Key Steps Part 1." I mentioned my credentials to write such an article then went about giving what I believed were the six key steps that would most improve the works of other authors. That is, make them pleasing for other people to read - which is the purpose in the first place.

So, what was my motive to write such an article? To get people to visit my website? Not really. To "big-note" myself? No. To denote myself as an expert on the subject? No, though I do have extensive experience in it. To help people who are struggling to write articles? Yes. That was the main reason.

I wanted to let people know why, when a person starts to read their article they quickly tire, maybe scan to the bottom then click away before finishing. I find myself doing that. I know lots of others do too. So, I wanted to let aspiring authors know why that can happen. I wanted to give them some tips so they can improve their readership levels.

At the time of writing I was conscious that I was setting myself up as a target. I knew that. When I posted the article I wondered how long it would take before somebody would take a shot at me. You see, I know there are snipers on the rooftops. Make yourself a target and they will surely have a ping.

Well, it took just 72 hours for the first bullet to come my way. Some people just cannot help themselves!

Let me explain a little further:

At the time of writing this article I have well over 100 articles circulating around hundreds of sites on the web. For anybody who has written even one article you will know what a significant effort this is.

Many of the articles I have written have received very positive, complimentary comments and ratings. However, as soon as you stand up and say "this is how you do it" and give an example of your own success, out will come some anonymous person whose prime task is to shoot you down.

Well... Mr, Miss or Ms Sharpshooter why don't you have the gumption to identify yourself or go "head to head" with me? Put your long-range sniper rifle down for a while and let's duke it out. One on one. Your best versus my best. There's the challenge. Are you up to it?

Ooh. I can already hear the sound of running footsteps fading into the distance. Probably they will be running to the next target to fire off another volley at somebody else from a concealed position. What an existence!

I remember some years ago posting a self-help article on a very well known self-help site. I was trying to help a young lady overcome a drug addiction by giving her some encouragement. I figured that if she had the courage to make a public posting then I would help her. Several others did too. Except one - a fellow from New Zealand whose main aim was to lecture me on the concepts of "drug of choice" and "harm minimization" and my form of what he termed "mind bending."

I suffered this person's ridicule for weeks. Eventually, frustrated that his comments were largely ignored, he resorted to threats and all sorts of ugly abuse. Never once did he identify himself by anything except some strange pseudonym - another trait of a sniper - that I have long since forgotten. He existed only to ridicule, denigrate and criticize. How sad it is that there are people who do this sort of thing. It's a bit like spraying graffiti in the dead of night on somebody's lovely wall.

Whenever anybody publishes anything on the internet they open themselves up to become the target of all sorts of abuse. I guess it comes with the territory. In fact, I wrote another article about this sort of thing. It was called: "Understand That You Are Always Going to Attract Critics."

In many respects you have to feel some sort of pity for the snipers. To feel the way that they do, to harbor so much anger at their own inadequacy and to try to bring other people down is a truly awful way to eke out an existence.

You can take another shot sniper. Just have the courage to identify yourself. But I guess that would be just too much to ask.

This article comes with reprint rights providing no changes are made and the resource box below accompanies it.

About the author: Gary Simpson is the author of eight books covering a diverse range of subjects such as self esteem, affirmations, self defense, finance and much more. His articles appear all over the web. Gary's email address is budo@iinet.net.au. Click here to go to his Motivation & Self Esteem for Success website where you can receive his "Zenspirational Thoughts" plus an immediate FREE copy of his highly acclaimed, life-changing e-book "The Power of Choice."

Article Writing & Marketing: Tell a Story, Make Some Points

p>Did you know that each person's life tells a story?

You can tell a story that says, here, go this way, or tell a story that says, stop don't go that way.

The really cool thing is we get to pick what kind of story we want our life to tell.

An article about just one story

One method of writing articles is to tell a story from your own life and make some points for life.

Ten years ago I got pulled over at four AM in the morning while driving around trying to get my 1 year old son to sleep. No big deal really, except that all I was wearing was a t-shirt and underwear.

Briefs, by the way.

The one article I wrote about that story has gotten lots of mileage for me. That story has become a keynote speech that I give, and then draw four or five lessons for life from my experience.

All I do is make some common sense points such as the ones below:

1. We are responsible for the choices we make.

2. We are responsible for the outcome of the choices we make.

3. Our individual lives tell a story and leave a trail to either follow or avoid.

4. It's important to leave your house fully clothed.

You get the picture.

What's your story?

So what story could you pull from your life experience and write about? Then make some points for living or lessons for life.

That's an article, a speech and whatever else you wish to make it.

Visit The Article Guy for more leading edge tips and tools for writing articles that bring you prospects, publicity and profits. You can also subscirbe to our monthly Article Empire Tips Newsletter. You are also invited to visit my Express-Start Article Writing Program for more information on the next article writing tele-seminar.

Is Article Marketing an Effective Technique?

Getting traffic to a website can be one of the most challenging issues a webmaster may face. Many people believe by putting a website up people will simply just turn up, by the masses. This just simply is not true. It is the equivalent of opening a water shop in the Sahara desert.

Although Im sure people would love the water if they do not know about it they wont find your shop. Ok this is a slightly silly example as there are not that many people there to be potential customers but I hope you get the message.

So we have identified people don’t just turn up at websites. So how do we get them to visit? You have several options:

Paying for advertising

This can be very expensive and may not deliver the type of traffic you want.

Reciprocal link exchanges

Another technique is to exchange links with other sites. This provides virtual roads into your site, while many will not exactly be freeways they will still deliver you a bit of traffic. Also as you gain more links the search engines will start to increase your rankings so you will start to get free traffic from the search engines

Article marketing

This is a technique that is really starting to be in fashion now. The idea is your submit an article about your sites topic to various article directories. They publish the article with a back link to your site and this article is picked up by lots of sites. This gives you lots of back links and has the benefits of reciprocal linking and more. As you are not linking to the sites that link to you the links are one way. It is thought that one way links are much higher values in the search engines.

Through my tests I have found article marketing to bring me the largest benefits for the least effort and cost. Lets face it time is the one thing we cant get more of so anything that gets us the most gain for minimum effort has to be the winner!

For more information please see http://www.articlesnet.co.uk/

Keyword-Density

It means that as how frequently a keyword is used in the text as a percentage of the total text. While writing content for a site or articles it is very important to check the keyword density. For example, while writing an article on auto, then, it is important to see that how often that keyword is repeated in your text. It is important because when the search engine hits your site, it will get content, then collect mega tag description and sort them in an order. After this search engine calculates the density of every Meta tag keyword in your text or content.

If your site is ranking well for specific keyword phrases at engines like Yahoo!, Teoma, MSN & for the allin sets of searches at Google (allinanchor:, allintitle:, allintext:, etc.) but not listed in the top 50-100 results at Google, the sandbox effect may be at work. However, it is important to keep in mind that this phenomenon is an 'unknown' algorithm piece at Google and standard optimization tactics, even by some of the best and most experienced SEOs have yet to consistently beat this effect.

What is keyword density ?

keyword density is an analysis of the number of times a particular word appears in relation to your web page content. It is reported as a percentage.

keyword advice

keyword traffic

aol keyword

Dynamic Article Marketing: Honor Your Consumer

Dynamic article marketing reap progressive proceeds for small independent corporations. Along with other opportunities to get the company name out there, savvy marketers increasingly use article distribution sites to market their sites and keep their businesses in the forefront.

What's the key?

Purpose and motivation.

Your business is dynamically innovative when you have a distinct purpose in mind and keep that purpose in the forefront of all your marketing options. Literal changes in business design can keep the organization moving forward at a progressive rate, however, change startles clients. Your purpose of business must be obvious, your goals sure, and your motivation pure. Without pure motivation of serving others, your business will fail, just as assuredly as the Titanic sank.

Article Marketing Aspirations

Your business goals must be presented well in your articles. Creating a paradigm that works for promoting your business requires thinking about what you can provide and produce that will be helpful to those who seek your services, and putting it into essay form for marketing purposes. If you find that paradigm, your clients see it, understand it, and seek it. If you miss, your point is lagging, your business sagging, and your financial prospects drag.

Fatal Attraction

You've found a product or service you can produce, and you do it well, but then you get greedy. You over price your product, undercut your service, and rationalize the futility of your marketing options. Your business fails. You got greedy and greed is the end all of business.

Helping People Margin

Astounding as it may be that people want to be recognized, acknowledged, and honored by a new business; the fact is, they do. When you realize that your consumer just wants to know you care, you can find your "helping people margin" and move into a profitable phase of business through a process of meeting their needs, acknowledging them, recognizing them as individuals, and honoring their insight for finding a great deal. Your business is a great deal.

Market your business direct through dynamic article marketing that reaches out to your client and serves them in the way they need to be served. Promote your business by acknowledging the needs of your consumer and honoring them.

Meet your consumer on their level of need. Recognize them for who they are and set out to honor them. Seek our services at http://makemoneyhereon.tripod.com

Stimulate Your Writing With Some Creative Exercises

Abandon your frustrations and get a fresh start by trying some writing activities to spark your creativity.

Exercises in creativity can improve your aptitude as a writer and inspire ideas for new writing projects.

The benefit of attempting any of the following activities is that you can complete the exercises from the comfort of your home, at your own pace, in solitude (hopefully) without outside distractions or the pressures of working with a group.

I've compiled the list of exercises suggested below over the years - from college professors, editors and fellow writers. Some of them have helped me to grow as a writer. Hopefully they will help you in some way too!

1 - Write your own obituary.(I know it sounds somewhat morbid - but it will require you to think about what you've accomplished thus far - and what you wish to achieve in the future.)

2 - Write a 400 word description of your favorite place.

3 - Write a brief biography of someone you know and love. Or write about someone famous you admire.

4 - Write a list of questions you would like to know the answers to. Then try to list the people or resources you could contact to get your answers.

5 - Read a newspaper or magazine article about something you're interested in. Re-write the article in your own words to make it better.

6 - Listen to the conversations of others in a crowded mall or restaurant. Write 200 words about your reaction to their conversation.

7 - Write 500 words describing a special time in your life. Write it so that other people could understand and appreciate it.

8 - Take a 15 minute walk around your neighborhood. As soon as you get home, write 300 words about what you saw on your walk.

9 - Think about your closest friends, your relatives, your boss, or your co-workers. Choose the person you like the most and the least; the person who has had the most positive and most negative influence on you; the person who has changed the most and the least since you've known them; and then write a write a brief paragraph on each explaining why you feel this way.
10 - Write the first ten words that come to mind. Then write brief definitions and/or explanations of why you thought of these words.

Resource Box - © Danielle Hollister (2004) is the Publisher of BellaOnline Quotations Zine - A free newsletter for quote lovers featuring more than 10,000 quotations in dozens of categories like - love, friendship, children, inspiration, success, wisdom, family, life, and many more. Read it online at - http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art8364.asp

Should You Use Ghostwriters that are "A Dime a Dozen?"

Lately there's been a lot of talk about articles,articles for your web site content, articles for your ezine, articles with your bio info posted to article directories.

So what's the big deal anyway? Why is it suddenly being touted as so vitally important!

Actually, there is absolutely nothing more important than having good content on your web site and in your newsletter. Information is what people or looking for, and if you want to attract them to your place of business (your web site), then you had better supply it. And lots of it!

The important keyword here is "good" content. The information you provide must be useful and relevant to the theme of your web site. If your site is about Online Marketing then you need to show me articles about it. Don't tell me how to cook chicken or how to lose money gambling, because I'm not interested. Show me what I need, or goodbye forever...

Why it's being re-discovered as urgent, is because Google and Yahoo rate the calibre of your web site through the information you provide. The higher your ranking is, the higher up in the search results will your web pages appear. As you probably know by now, if you show up higher than #30, you're most likely invisible to surfers, as they will click on one of the first 10 search results, and occasionally from 11 to 30.

The big question then, is where do you find this information to post to your web pages. Actually, if you can write it yourself, that is the best solution.

Otherwise, you can find free articles from the Submission directories and use those. The only condition is that you must keep the author's name and web site info at the bottom of the piece.

That is standard.

However, you should know that the Search engines prefer original work, as opposed to an article that appears 50 or more times on other web sites.

The ultimate solution is to use ghostwriters. Ghostwriters are copywriting experts who you hire to write for you. The work will have your name on it, as you bought the copyright when you hired the copywriter.

Here is the most critical dilemma you face in finding the right ghostwriter: finding a copywriter that knows how to write in English, and one who understands well the subject you want written about.

It's a real challenge. There are many writers today working for $6 to $10 per article of 500 to 700 words. These are the ones you find at places like elance or rent-a-coder.

At the other end of the spectrum are writers who charge $500 to $2,000 per article, and $1,000 to $5,000 for a top quality sales page. Needless to say, I have never used one of these as they are a tiny bit out of my league (for now anyway).

For mid range pricing, expect to pay from $150 and up for a top notch article. And $500 and up for a sales page.

So your choice then is between the 'cheapie' ghostwriters at $10 and top quality work at $150.
I do have some experience with both. My first 4 web pages on Best Affiliate Products were written for $150 each.

Lately, I have been experimenting with the 'cheapies'. But I have been very frustrated with the shoddy quality of work. Firstly, in many cases the authors do NOT know their subject and quess at what they write. Yuk!

The different writing styles leaves much to be desired. Why? It's extremely important that the articles have a writing style similar to your own. Not identical, but not so different that you lose your credibility. Your readers get to know you on Article directories, for example, and if they find an article with your name that is not up to your standard... let's just say they may not read you again.

If the ghostwriters don't know your subject well enough to suit your taste, can they afford to research it? Of course not. After all, can you really expect 2 hours for $10 to be so great, and then ask to do more research. I wouldn't do it, would you?

I often spend 2 hours or more just editing an article (only if the subject is good) so it is more compatible with me. This does get tiresome, but needs to be done.

You really do get what you pay for. With a lot of research, along with trial and error, you may find an author worth keeping, and that can write dozens of articles for you. But it's a long shot for the average guys like us.

Should you try to find one? Why not. It's practical to have a source for volume articles.
As well I strongly recommend having a really good writer for special work. Especially sales pages, which are really hard to get right. Even as an affiliate you occasionally need a good sales page, especially for the resale rights packages you will sell for yourself.

At my web site you will learn more about copywriting, ghostwriters and find recommendations there.

Ghostwriters are a necessary fact of life in today's online business world, so budget accordingly. Get the full benefit that good web content and article submissions will give you.

Fred Farahcopyright 2005

Best Affiliate Products for Maximum ProfitsAll you need to know about affiliate marketing and your copywriting needs, starts right here at the: Best Affiliate Products copywriting

Article Writing and Marketing: Little Known Ways to Use Articles

If you have been writing articles for any length of time, you are familiar with the basic ways in which to use them. You can use articles on your website, on someone else's website, in your newsletter and in someone else's newsletter.

These are all great ways to use and market your articles. But they are not the only way.

Less common ways to use articles

1. Include them in your promotional packet

If you are in a business such as speaking or counseling or coaching, you may be familiar with having a promotional packet or a welcome packet for new clients.

When you include your articles in your promotional materials, your clients think more highly of you, plain and simple. It quickly up your expert-ability.

2. Use them in a radio interview

Just about every radio interview I have ever done, and the number is in the hundreds, have been based on an article.

Using your articles for a radio interview makes the process so much smoother because you know the material so well. You wrote it.

3. Mini-posters

Print your article or a list of suggestions on designer stationary, and ta da, you have a mini-poster suitable for framing.

The number of ways you can use your articles is limited only by your own imagination.

Visit The Article Guy for more leading edge tips and tools for writing articles that bring you prospects, publicity and profits. You can also subscirbe to our monthly Article Empire Tips Newsletter. You are also invited to visit my Express-Start Article Writing Program for more information on the next article writing tele-seminar.

What Makes An Article Directory A Great Place To Submit?

Seems like every where you turn, someone is creating yet another article directory begging you to submit your articles to them. The only person you are helping by submitting your content to newbie article directories are the article directory owners themselves - because they are too new to have any traffic yet to give back to you in exchange for your valuable time.

Here's a checklist to help you determine if an article directory is worth your time to submit to or not:

[ ] Have they been in business for more than a year? Bonus points for those that have been in business for 5 or more years. Directories that are less than 6 months old are often still in the sandbox yet, meaning they don't have any traffic traction.

[ ] Can you figure out in 10 seconds of surfing their site or less who actually owns or is in charge of the site? Article directory owners that hide themselves from the public should be a sign that they don't want to be found.

[ ] Do they respond within 24-48 hours of your email requests? Did your email to them bounce back undeliverable?

[ ] Does the article directory have more than 1,000-5,000 authors listed? Sites with less than 1,000 authors are still cutting their teeth on being a directory owner.

[ ] Does it appear that the article directory was built with article bot scraped content? You can easily tell by looking for the unconverted MS word smartquotes within articles that are listed on the site. There is no honor in having your articles side by side of scraped content.

[ ] Is the article directory human powered vs. fully automated? Any article directory that is fully automated is usually a sign that the owner doesn't intend to police the quality of the content.

[ ] Do they provide RSS feeds, email alerts, forward to a friend function and other strategies to increase the distribution of your articles? Do they have thousands of members of their own double opt-in mailing lists to promote your articles?

[ ] Are they responsible with the advertising clients they have on their site? ie: No popups, no exit pops, no ‘punch the monkey' ads?

[ ] Do they provide article reports to help you see which articles are getting traction or not?

[ ] Service based mentality: Do they have it or not?

[ ] Bottom line: After you've submitted to the article directory, does it generate traffic back to your site or not? Do you find your article distributed to other niche websites or do your articles get picked up by email newsletter publishers?

The reason you make your articles available for syndication is because you want to improve your targeted web traffic, enhance your credibility, drive leads to your products, grow your email list and more!

Unfortunately, you don't have unlimited time in your day to submit your articles to every newbie article directory that begs for your attention. Prioritize the best article sites that meet or exceed the above criteria to help determine which ones should get your valuable attention. It is better to submit 100 articles a top quality article directory or niche site than it is to submit (1) article to 100 directories.

About The Author:

Christopher M. Knight invites you to submit your best articles for massive exposure to the high-traffic http://EzineArticles.com/ directory. When you submit your articles to EzineArticles.com, your articles will be picked up by ezine publishers who will reprint your articles with your content and links in tact giving you traffic surges to help you increase your sales. To submit your article, setup a membership account today: http://EzineArticles.com/submit/

IN YOUR SHADOW

There is an old saying: You can choose your friends but not your family. Everyone has certain choices to make in their lives, except for that one initial launch into this world. We are born and we are who we are - no decision on our part - not even the chance at some suggestions.

Your entire being - the color of your skin, your grandparents’ homeland, your entire genetic make-up is right there - and now you have a choice - you can do what you believe you can, or you can carry your sense of pride or shame with you your entire life and never reach the goals and reap the benefits you could have.

Writing is a career where the choices from the very beginning are yours. In a sense, you create your character, give him all his genetic qualities, and then even write the history for his ancestry. You are in control of who, what, where, and when. However, as with any choice, there are drawbacks as well as advantages. If your character is not a member of your particular ethnic, religious, or race group, your ability to relate and to transmit ideas run into a brick wall, so to speak. Sure, you can put yourself in their place, but it would be according to your standards, and your beliefs. This ingrained system of standards and beliefs were taught to you by your parents, relatives, environment. and the world itself. Now that you have decided to write, how do you overcome this stumbling block?

The literary piece you give birth to should be as factual as possible, even though it is a fictional piece. If you feel you can, just in your own mind, place yourself in someone else’s soul, forget it. You can’t because the only person you can reach intoand enter their very being is yourself. Now what do you do? The answer is reach out, network, and include everything in your research work. Listen to both sides of the coin, and if you don’t agree, the notion to state your carved in stone moral or otherwise statements are irrelevant. Your reader needs to place themselves in your character’s heart and see the world through his/her eyes. A slight remark made to one person may be a monumental insult to an individual of another genre. Don’t judge, or build up or belittle the circumstances. State them exactly, as best you can, from that literary person’s inherited background and make-up.

Don’t ever feel that you will be able to disseminate exactly what it feels like to be someone else. We all have trouble just trying to be ourselves. However, with your character, you will have to step back and let what is the truth come forward. Then you can create the situations, the plots, and the reactions.

Every group of human beings have their particular quirks, beliefs, and moral systems. Try not to place one group’s issues and relate them through your own eyes.

Every great literary masterpiece gave credibility to their characters through writing about them as they are. Write about their individuality, their values, and their history. Give them the opportunity to voice their contradictions and their acknowledgements. Let them be themselves and you will be on your way to a masterpiece that the entire world will cherish.

Trace historical aspects for your character and take into account the evolving changes to his/her particular heritage. Check items such as foods, livelihoods, and statistics. Once you have a volume of information, you will have the grounds for a great novel or article. As writers, we are so tempted to always give our opinions, our views. You are creating this character and your story’s success will be on who he/she is. Readers will agree or disagree with your character but they will learn to respect and value his/her reactions, and choices. They will, in turn, take into account the circumstances that brought your character to this particular point in life. The most enduring characters are those that are real, life-like, and not clones of the writer. Give your characters room to breathe, and be themselves.

I believe God does not need help in creating people. He gives writers the fertile ground of diversity and the ability to relate to readers. Give your readers reliability, authenticity, and an opportunity to decide for themselves, and you are on your way to successful writing.

©Arleen M. Kaptur

Author of numerous articles, e-cookbooks,on-line workshops. Novel: SEARCHING FOR AUSTIN JAMES Website: http://www.rusticliving.info http://www.webspawner.com/users/rusticliving.index.html

Quality of Online Articles and Search Engine Ranking

Many online article authors work so hard to make their articles perfect in every way. So much so that many of these perfectionists never write very many articles, which is necessary for success. You see the quality of articles has nothing to do with Search Engine Ranking.

Of course once you get the reader there; then your article quality does matter. The number of clicks you get, the number of page views or hits to your article is the first and most important matter, because with online article marketing you have to get the traffic first. Did you know that if you submit articles to online free article submission sites that in fact crappy articles or barely passable it makes people want to click out and click to somewhere else. Yet they still came to read it and may get partially thru it? Did you also know that if someone hates you because of what you wrote that they are liable to click onto your sight just to tell you so?

Did you know that most companies turn complaints into sales or increased business? You see, turning a complaint into a lead or friend is nearly universal in human behavior, as anger triggers action and you can manipulate action to serve your will, thus the martial art of Judo where you use the opponents energy to win. Verbal Judo sparing is taught in classes pertaining to conflict resolution and debate.

What does this mean? It means while quality is important it is not as important as the numbers game, meaning write lots of articles first, work on quality second and third it is okay to create controversy, because it sells and causes emotion, tension and causes click thrus, to your site hopefully. Now I do not want anyone who disagrees with me to argue. I know what I am talking about and you just have no clue. See, you want to click that link don’t you to find out who I am or why I have the balls to argue with you and even call you a stupid human, who just doesn’t get it.

"Lance Winslow" - If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs

You Can Master Article Marketing In 7 Days or Less

Let me clarify my definition of an "article marketer". An article marketer provides helpful information in the form of articles written about the industry they work within. Article marketers focus on writing quality content and publishing techniques to complement their existing marketing channels.

It is a win/win situation. The author gains many benefits for being published, and the reader satisfies a thirst for knowledge of the topic being discussed.

Have you considered article marketing?

Anyone can enjoy the benefits of writing content articles for the Web. I am living proof.
2 years ago I was introduced to the idea of using articles as a marketing strategy. Like so many other ideas we are subjected to, it didn't sink in right away. Excuse after excuse, I let procrastination stand in the way.

I had never written an article before …

As I began to see more and more SEO consultants and successful marketers discussing article marekting, I decided to dig in deeper and see what all the fuss was about. It sounded good, and I wanted in too.

Ironically, I begin to read articles about writing articles. Article after article the concepts begin making sense. I understood why article marketing worked, I understood how article marketing worked … but I still had no clue how to start my first article.

I discovered my first article topic quite by accident one evening. Here's how. (Be on the lookout for conversations like this that may take place between you and your colleagues every day.)
While in a general discussion with another site administrator I realized the KEY to successful articles or any ad copy.

Find a problem and solve it. That is what we all want - we want solutions to our problems!
The scenario went like this. My colleague offered live event webinars and needed a easy way to update specifics of these classes to members. Further more, I wanted a way to tell people about the live training without the burden of updating these live events through HTML on my web site.

Having some background experiences with blogs, and actively testing different blog creation scripts and services, he welcomed my advise on adopting RSS as an option to easily feed us the training class schedules.

It solved his problem of updating the live class schedules to us, and my problem of updating the content for my visitors. Realizing the solution to a problem - the research for the article began.
I started in the search engines, read some forums, and gathered facts.

The facts were then picked apart to determine the benefit of each fact. I used those benefits as the central focal point of my article.

My first article "Got Blog" was written and published soon after. Taking that first step and writing that first article, opened the door for me to be able to write a second article, then press releases, and Ebooks now too.

That article was submitted to only 15 free directories, and then I left it alone and went on to other projects.

By digging through all those articles about articles, I inadvertently learned "top notch" techniques from successful article writers themselves.

I felt that learning by this method was so helpful to me, that I created a free guide called "All About Articles the Marketing Advantage ". This guide incorporates all the great articles and techniques that gave me the confidence to build my first article campaign.

The guide was not created until a year after I had published several of my own articles and seen the successful results for myself.

One year later … there are over 140 sites - many of which I have never heard of, some of which are high traffic and successful sites, proudly telling people some interesting tips on using RSS - each one with a healthy link back to my website for more information.

I found the above information by doing a keyword search on Google using the exact phrase of the byline used on that article.

Article writing and circulation has been the single most rewarding "free" promotion effort I have accomplished in my years of trial and error! Be inspired, if I can do it, you can too!

Dawn Wentworth compiled information that helped her to get started with article marketing into a free 7 day step-by-step e-course with the companion eBook. You can Master Article Marketing In 7 Days or Less by visiting http://articles.masteradvertising.com

Rules for Responsible Article Creation

These rules apply to any advertiser creating media, whether it's articles, blog posts, or video blog entries. But I'll write it to apply to responsible article creation for Adam Schultz, my WebSourced colleague.

For the advertiser seeking to create articles the rules are fairly simple: know your strengths and know your audience. It may help if you think of your current clients, and potential clients, as your audience. I will refer to clients as audience for the rest of this article.

Know Your AudienceIn particular, know what issues plague your clients from day to day. If you sell pizza ovens then consider who's buying your ovens. These are people who run kitchens.
Knowing this you know that they also manage employees and money. They also face market pressures such as low carb. They also have to clean their ovens, which is tough in itself.

All of these issues that the pizza joint manager faces would make great articles. Here's a list of titles that this little brainstorm suggested to me:

How to Motivate Your Employees to Upsell Pizza Sizes

When Success Hinders Growth: Making Time To Expand Your Pizza Joint

Getting Expansion Loans for Your Pizza Business

How One Pizza Joint Rode the Low Carb Craze and Prospered

How to Make Your Pizza Ovens Sparkle Like New

10 Tips for Cleaning Burnt Cheese Off Pizza Pans Faster Than Ever Before

15 Crazy New Gourmet Pizza Recipes

Understanding your audience's buying cycle can also help you in creating content.
Know Your StrengthsAs a pizza oven seller online you might not know much about upselling from a medium pizza to a large. But you do - I promise - have some lodes of information that can apply to the pizza business. Hunting out where your experience and expertise converges with the pizza oven business is a matter of:

a) knowing your personal strengthsb) having conversations with your customers
Conversations with your customers will reveal many many ideas for more articles/blog posts/tools (yes tools - especially web based - are some of the strongest link builders out there... so watch for tools your audience might need.)

Develop a series of questions that will uncover the vacancies in your audience's current media. WHAT?? I mean uncover what questions your audience/potential audience has and create media (write articles/blog posts/video blog entries) that answer these questions.

So What's A Responsible Article?A responsible article is one that focuses soley, completely and entirely on solving a particular problem your audience faces. This article, while intended to influence the audience by suggesting behaviors or strategies that might help them, does not seek to influence the audience in a way that will benefit your company.

An irresponsible article is one that is intended to sway the audience into an action that primarily benefits the advertiser.

So How Does this Benefit My Bottom Line?If you're writing responsible articles (creating responsible media... remember this applies to all advertiser created media) that aren't intended to sway the audience into buying your products then what the hell are you doing writing articles?

You're proving, through your free sharing of valuable information, that:

a) you're trustworthyb) you're an industry thought leader

So how does being found a trustworthy thought leader affect your bottom line? It lays the foundation for a long and successful career, no matter what the industry.

About the Author: Want to build links to your site and enhance your brand? Send custom media questions to GFrench@gmail.com for free media creation brainstorm, including article topic suggestions and key publisher identification for your industry. Visit the Article Marketing blog for article marketing ideas.

Use Textpad Program for Easy Ezine and Web Site Submissions To Bring More Sales

When you create your articles in TextPad format, something like Notepad, but much more versatile, you will have them in 65 characters across wrapped, just the right format. Then, when you are ready to submit your articles to web sites, you simply copy and paste the parts of the article into the web site you want to post on.

Use Textpad to format all of your email promotion, ezines, or articles to high traffic ezines or Web sites. This shareware program at www.textpad.com is free to use for some time, and you can buy it later. It can put all of your articles or other message into 65 characters across wrapped automatically.

Textpad formats my monthly ezine, "The BookCoach Says…" easily to reach over 3500 subscribers. It also keeps track of my list and when someone opts-in or opts-out, we use TextPad to locate the name in the files to add or subtract. I like it because we can send the ezine and articles straight from our office. To submit your own ezines or well-edited articles to opt-in ezines and Web sites, you will want this format unless you want HTML format.

While Textpad has no format like bold, or italics, this one program has helped me to produce and send out over 165 articles and 95 tips to share with more than 100 ePublishers and 980 Web sites (year one) and 21,000 (year four) with hyperlinks back to my sites. This is why I am #1 on www.google.com and 25 other search engines. You can have similar success.

Author’s Note: TextPad allows you to send all of your emails including documents within the email, so your readers can open and see all immediately. When people don’t have to download an attachment, they are more likely to open your emails. Think of the time saved. From using this format, hundreds of thousands of targeted buyers eventually will come your way---to your Web site, ezine, or to your email address.

Judy Cullins ©2005 All Rights Reserved.

Judy Cullins, 20-year Book and Internet Marketing Coach works with small business people who want to make a difference in people's lives, build their credibility and clients, and make a consistent life-long income. Author of 10 eBooks including Write your eBook or Other Short Book Fast, Ten Non-Techie Ways to Market Your Book Online, The Fast and Cheap Way to Explode Your Targeted Web Traffic, and Power Writing for Web Sites That Sell, she offers free help through her 2 monthly ezines, "The BookCoach Says...," "Business Tip of the Month," and blog Q & A at http://www.bookcoaching.com/opt-in.shtml and over 170 free articles. Email her at Judy@bookcoaching.com.

How To Write Powerful Headlines

I want to tell you how I go about writing headlines. I like to keep swap files of headlines around for future use. And how I go about doing it goes something like this...

I'll find a headline I like, wherever it may be, and then I don't copy it word for word, instead I'll use a "fill in the blank" approach. That way I get a generic headline that I can apply to almost any business.

For example, I find a headline I like that goes something like this:

"Give Me 5 Minutes And I'll Show You How To Put An Extra $1000 Into Your Pocket!"

In my swap file I would write it down using a "fill in the blank" approach:
"Give Me _____ And I'll _____!"

I could now take this generic headline and apply it to almost any business...

Car insurance for example:

"Give Me 60 Seconds And I'll Show You How To Slash Your Car Insurance Cost In Half Every Single Month!"

Do you follow me...?

You don't want to steal any headline word for word. That would be a bad thing. But you can recycle headlines by using a "fill in the blank" approach, and then applying that to whatever business you may be are a part of.

I mean gee... why reinvent the wheel? There are a ton of great headlines out there already!

Here's another example:

"Great New Discovery Kills Kitchen Odors Quick... Makes Indoor Air Country Fresh!

In my swap file I would write it down using a fill in the blank approach:

"Great New _____ .... Makes _____!"

I could now take this generic headline and apply it to almost any business...

Weight loss for example:

"Great New Diet Pill Burns Unwanted Fat... Makes Dieting Easy!"

So the moral of the story is... The next time you come across a headline that grabs your attention, don't just stare at it! Write it down in your swap file using a fill in the blank approach.
And over time, the next thing you know, you'll have so many fill in the blank generic headlines to choose from in your swap file....

You'll never be stuck for a headline to write ever again!

Al Martinovic publishes an internet marketing newsletter at http://www.milleniummarketers.com and runs a successful home business at http://www.ineedsmokes.com

Rules for Responsible Article Creation

These rules apply to any advertiser creating media, whether it's articles, blog posts, or video blog entries. But I'll write it to apply to responsible article creation for Adam Schultz, my WebSourced colleague.

For the advertiser seeking to create articles the rules are fairly simple: know your strengths and know your audience. It may help if you think of your current clients, and potential clients, as your audience. I will refer to clients as audience for the rest of this article.

Know Your AudienceIn particular, know what issues plague your clients from day to day. If you sell pizza ovens then consider who's buying your ovens. These are people who run kitchens.
Knowing this you know that they also manage employees and money. They also face market pressures such as low carb. They also have to clean their ovens, which is tough in itself.
All of these issues that the pizza joint manager faces would make great articles. Here's a list of titles that this little brainstorm suggested to me:

How to Motivate Your Employees to Upsell Pizza SizesWhen Success Hinders Growth: Making Time To Expand Your Pizza JointGetting Expansion Loans for Your Pizza BusinessHow One Pizza Joint Rode the Low Carb Craze and ProsperedHow to Make Your Pizza Ovens Sparkle Like New10 Tips for Cleaning Burnt Cheese Off Pizza Pans Faster Than Ever Before15 Crazy New Gourmet Pizza Recipes

Understanding your audience's buying cycle can also help you in creating content.

Know Your StrengthsAs a pizza oven seller online you might not know much about upselling from a medium pizza to a large. But you do - I promise - have some lodes of information that can apply to the pizza business. Hunting out where your experience and expertise converges with the pizza oven business is a matter of:

a) knowing your personal strengthsb) having conversations with your customers
Conversations with your customers will reveal many many ideas for more articles/blog posts/tools (yes tools - especially web based - are some of the strongest link builders out there... so watch for tools your audience might need.)

Develop a series of questions that will uncover the vacancies in your audience's current media. WHAT?? I mean uncover what questions your audience/potential audience has and create media (write articles/blog posts/video blog entries) that answer these questions.

So What's A Responsible Article?A responsible article is one that focuses soley, completely and entirely on solving a particular problem your audience faces. This article, while intended to influence the audience by suggesting behaviors or strategies that might help them, does not seek to influence the audience in a way that will benefit your company.

An irresponsible article is one that is intended to sway the audience into an action that primarily benefits the advertiser.

So How Does this Benefit My Bottom Line?If you're writing responsible articles (creating responsible media... remember this applies to all advertiser created media) that aren't intended to sway the audience into buying your products then what the hell are you doing writing articles?

You're proving, through your free sharing of valuable information, that:

a) you're trustworthyb) you're an industry thought leader

So how does being found a trustworthy thought leader affect your bottom line? It lays the foundation for a long and successful career, no matter what the industry.

About the Author: Want to build links to your site and enhance your brand? Send custom media questions to GFrench@gmail.com for free media creation brainstorm, including article topic suggestions and key publisher identification for your industry. Visit the Article Marketing blog for article marketing ideas.

Seo Article Writers

There is this author David R. who seems to fill his articles with nothing but Seo junk. Last week I read on of his articles and it had the term "free internet advertising" 13 times in the body of the article plus once in the title.

This morning I read another of his article and once I began I realize that it is indeed his style of writing. Nothing but junk. I just hate to see people wasting their doing this stuff when they could have easily taught me something and made me a fan or better yet a customer.

What if You Wrote More Articles to Help Your Small Business?

Often the easiest way to help get new clientele is to write articles. If you are a small business this technique works very well. The more information you give the more inquiries for service you get.

The trick to writing informational articles is not just the information inside, which is important no doubt, but it is just as important to do so in the right medium. That is to say the most bang for your buck. It is most important to be cognizant of where you place these articles. You need to have the largest megaphone.

Indeed these are two of the most important items; good content and a strong medium to get your in formation out there and your company name with it. But there is a very important third component and some people miss this one. It is important for you to get a lot of information out there. In ways that trigger the interests of all people, all your target market segments and anyone who potentially could buy from your small business. So you must not just write articles, but you need to concentrate on writing a lot of articles.

Once you have written 20-30 articles about your industry or market sector next you need to step up and find creative ways to give information on sub-subjects specifically geared towards a larger audience. What if You Wrote More Articles to Help Your Small Business? How much more business would you get then? Are you sure you can handle all that new business coming in?

Think on this.

"Lance Winslow" - If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs

Targeting Your Article Marketing Campaign to Your Site's Key Conversion Pages

For many marketers, article marketing is simply a get-links-quick scheme that they use periodically to generate a few home page links from the article directories. For marketers who know the pages on their sites that convert as well as the keywords these pages target in paid and organic search campaigns, article marketing can be far more.

Especially if they're developing both great content and relationships with site/newsletter editors who publish their content regularly.

This article presupposes that you know what the important pages in your site's sales funnel are as well as the keywords you're targeting for these pages.

Some key pages in your site's sales/conversion funnel could be:

Landing pages for your paid search campaigns

Pages that show in your log files as getting the most views

Pages one step away from the shopping cart for your most popular or profitable items

Naturally high-text pages such as FAQ pages, newsletter sign up pages, free trial down load pages

Non-home-page pages that drive organic search traffic

When you have identified which pages are the most important to your site's sales funnel (try starting with your top 3 most important), begin writing articles that target keywords for these particular pages.

These articles should be quite different from each other, and the links in the author bio should be directly to the important pages you identified and include the top keyword for those pages in the link text.

To illustrate what I'm talking about let's take a look at Frank's Fish Shop, an online retailer of live fish for fresh, salt, and brackish aquariums as well as ponds, who decided to implement a more sophisticated article marketing campaign.

Frank's Fish Shop Gets Smart About Article Marketing

Frank's first 900 word article, on how to select the right fish for your tank, linked back to his home page with his main home page keyword, "Aquarium Fish." He saw some definite link increases, and even a little rank improvement, especially in Yahoo and MSN, for that keyword.

More importantly he got a few questions from new aquarium owners that in turn got them newsletter subscribers and sales.

So now he wants his marketing team to expand the article marketing campaign and they determined that the following pages are most important to their conversions:

Newsletter Sign Up Page

Shrimp-Tail Blue Moobly Fish Page (new, very popular fish, high margins)

Aquarium Lighting Paid Search Landing Page

Now Frank has already employed the services of a professional search marketing company, so he has a list, per page, of the key terms he's targeting.

Here's how he determined his article strategy for these important pages:

The Newsletter Sign Up Page

Frank recognizes that business is all about building relationships. He loves talking about fish with the customers who come in his shop, and he found early on that expanding this informative and helpful dialogue online is crucial to his sales.

And so he publishes a bi-weekly newsletter on the latest tips and advice for people with aquariums, and most importantly he answers his readers' questions.

His newsletter sign up page has text that describes the newsletter, some reader testimonials, and a link to his newsletter archive, which is on his site in its entirety.

His keyword phrases for this page include the word "aquarium" as a base and include variables such as "maintenance," "help," "advice," "how to," "newsletter," "guide," "beginner," and other terms his keyword research revealed.

To develop more targeted links to his newsletter sign up page he simply breaks out the articles he's already written for his newsletter, all based on reader/site visitor questions, and creates an author bio with link text that targets the sign up page.

He then submits to the article directories and begins getting links back to his site that really work to position him both in the search engines and to the readers of his articles.

The Shrimp-Tail Blue Moobly Fish Page

The Blue Moobly is an old brackish aquarium favorite. The newly-bred Shrip-Tail variety has a curious looking tail that drives aquarium enthusiasts nuts.

Because of the high margins and the fish's popularity, Frank wants to promote this particular fish. Competition has sprung up, and is especially fierce in paid search.

Frank's main keyword here is simply "shrimp-tailed blue moobly."

He writes 3 articles to target the blue moobly page.

The first covers the introduction of the blue moobly to brackish aquariums, because they have some problems with razor-faced clams.

The second covers the breeding of the shrimp-tail blue moobly, because many see it as a profitable practice, and heck, breeders have to start with a breeding pair, which Frank is more than happy to sell them.

The third is an interview with the shrimp-tail blue-moobly's breeder, Augustus Clayhorn.

All of these link back to the url http://www.FranksFishShop/Brackish/ShrimpTailBlueMoobly with, you guessed it, the link text "Shrimp-Tail Blue Moobly."

Aquarium Lighting Paid Search Landing Page

Aquarium lighting is big in the aquarium business. Frank's landing page for the paid search term "aquarium lighting" is a major point of entry into his site and a major money maker.

Above the fold on his landing page he focuses on images and navigation so that folks coming in from his paid search ads can find exactly what they need, buy it and get back out again.

Below the fold he has a little text about each of the articles he's written about aquarium lighting, from proper set up, to installation, to "artistic" lighting (to Frank and fish enthusiasts aquariums are lit with the attention and care typically reserved for live theatre and movie sets).

He submitted each of these articles to the article directories with author bio links to his lighting landing page from the text "aquarium lighting."

Article Marketing at its Strongest

Article marketing is at its strongest when you combine knowledge of the keywords people use to find your site, the pages that are most important to your site's conversions, and content that serves your prospects and your industry.

It's the last part though, serving your prospects and your industry, that's the most important. It's the willingness to be helpful, complete, detailed, precise and honest in your articles that will deliver not only conversions, but the kinds of relationships that bring you long term business success.

Further Article Marketing Development: Want to build links to your site and enhance your brand? Send article marketing questions and reviews of this article to GFrench@gmail.com for free article marketing brainstorm, including article topic suggestions and key media identification for your industry. Visit the Article Marketing blog for more article marketing ideas.

New to Article Writing - Start Here

First, go back to basics. The whole idea of article writing is to communicate. You have found good information, news, drama, or opinion on a timely subject and feel you have something to say about it. Perhaps you have no more to say about it than any one else but your way of elucidation may help people to see something a little better or something they may have missed. This is good stuff but then comes the business of writing it.

I have found myself getting too long winded in some of my articles. When I found out that the best article length in general is between 450 to 650 words I started to modify my writing to fit that criteria. I still get cramped up sometimes wanting to write more but knowing I’ve said enough. In time I found a way to keep things both simple and readable without sparing important content.

It is so simple I am almost embarrassed to say it. But if a thing works it should be made known. If you were to pick up a pen and write a letter to a friend what form would it take?

Would it have a summary, seven points and a huge wrap up? No it wouldn’t. What it would have is three major divisions, an introduction, two or three points and a conclusion. This may not be the best form for every article you write but it is an excellent place to start if you’re new to article writing. It is also a good place to fall back to when you have gotten far too complicated and bogged down in form and polish.

I am not suggesting that you cease to get all the advice you possibly can to improve your writing skills. I have a few sites I refer to constantly to learn new things. One of my favorites is “Pointeronline.” Every once in a while I have to re-simplify to make sense of something I’m trying to say, try it yourself. Remember, introduction, two or three points and a conclusion.

Rev Bresciani has written many articles over the past thirty years in such periodicals as Guideposts and Catholic Digest. He is the author of two books available on Amazon.com, Alibris, Barnes and Noble and many other places. Rev Bresciani wrote “Hook Line and Sinker or what has Your Church Been Teaching You,” publisher, PublishAmerica of Baltimore MD. He also wrote a book published by Xulon Press entitled “An American Prophet and His Message, Questions and Answers on the Second Coming of Christ.” His book is now being heralded as the clearest book on the subject of the second coming of Christ since Hal Lindsey's "Late Great Planet Earth" Rev Bresciani’s website is,
http://americanprophet.org

Article Marketing: Danger Signs

Marketing your articles is a fantastic way to gain needed exposure on the internet. Article directories are being introduced at a breakneck pace, but they are not all equal. In fact, listing your articles on some sites can be nothing but a waste of your time and could cause you to lose your valuable reputation. How so? Read on for more information.

One of the nicest compliments I have been paid is when a manager of an article directory approaches me to submit articles to his or her new site. Generally, this happens when they have discovered that I list a large number of articles to a high quality site, such as Ezine Articles, and realize that I have the ability to produce articles in spades.

Truthfully, I am very selective about joining new sites and only do so after examining how the site is set up and whether it is received by members of the article marketing community. The following list contains some of the danger signs of article directories that do not quite measure up:

No contact information. I want the person who manages the article directory to be personality driven. A little self promotion goes a long way! Sure, if they don’t have what they say they have, it will soon become apparent that they are blowing in the wind. If it isn’t possible to uncover the personality behind the directory, chances are they really aren’t that involved with the day to day operations.

No blog, no forum. Talk to me! Literally speaking. A blog and/or a forum are necessary parts of a successful article directory site, in my opinion. I want to get the article directory owner’s input on article marketing, and I want to leave a comment when inspired. Those article directories that encourage active participation are certainly the high achieving sites. Their success means your success…plain and simple!

Feed it to them. Yes, a news feed that includes the articles submitted to the site is a must. RSS is a terrific way to maximize article exposure. I give article directories that have this feature an edge over all others as it tells me that they are serious about article marketing.

Statistically speaking. What, no stats?! If you cannot measure how many people have viewed your articles, downloaded the same, emailed them to someone, or left a comment, I have no use for you. Article marketing = statistics. You cannot possibly measure the success of what you write without some sort of feedback. Stats provide it!

Page rank. I want the article directory to pull down a Google page rank of at least 5. Heck, if my own article site can pull down a PR6, then I would expect an article directory to do at least the same! I give new sites 2 or 3 months to get their page rank up before deciding whether to submit to them or not.

Things I look for that are pluses: press releases; preservation of back links; easy submission of articles; approval within 48 hours; circulation of my articles via Google; a contact form to get a hold of the directory manager; continual growth of the site; and introduction of relevant new features to attract authors, content seekers, and the like.

Any site that fails to measure up is, in my opinion, a bad neighborhood. You wouldn’t want to live in a bad neighborhood, so why would you feature your high quality articles there as well? Your reputation is golden; submit only to those sites that can enhance your reputation not lessen it.

Copyright 2005 -- Matthew Keegan is The Article Writer who writes on a variety of topics including: advocacy, automobiles, aviation, business, Christian themes, family, news, product reviews, travel, writing, and more. Samples from his portfolio are available right online.

15 Questions To Instantly Help You Write A Tips Booklet

1. What is the single most compelling subject from your experience or knowledge that you want the world to know about? If there are several topics, consider which one you are most passionate about.

2. Can you identify the single most outstanding thing you want people to know? Think about whether it is a new skill, perspective, attitude, or expansion of general knowledge.

3. Why do you want to write a booklet? It may be an altruistic gesture to spread the word about something. It might be a marketing tool for a business or book you have or want to have. The booklet can be a profit center for you. Maybe you would you like it to be both a marketing tool and a profit center.

4. How would you divide your subject into segments? Look at the possibility of those segments becoming additional booklets to develop into a series, or as mini-chapters of one booklet.

5. What are you often surprised by that people do not know about your subject area? There could be something that seems so 'common sense' to you, while being highly helpful or enlightening to others.

6. Does your information need to be presented sequentially or can it be random? Notice if specific entries stand-alone or if they need whatever came before to cause the entry to make sense to the reader.

7. What do you want people to do and not to do, be or not be as a result of your booklet? Think about how this information will benefit the reader.

8. Who besides the reader can benefit from this material? There may be manufacturers, suppliers, or distributors whose business activities can profit by distributing your contents. Those will be large-quantity buyers of your booklet.

9. Is there jargon or language that is peculiar to your topic? Consider how you will monitor and treat that in your content.

10. What surprised you most when you learned about your topic? That is probably useful to pass along to your readers in some way.

11. Which resources are needed to implement any of your suggestions? Look for the easiest ways to accomplish what you are recommending to your reader.

12. What is it that people need to know about you? Tell what gives you the credential to write about this topic.

13. What other products and/or services would also make sense to develop to assist the reader in this topic? Decide whether it is important for those to be products and services of your own, of someone else's, or both.

14. How would short anecdotes be useful in supporting your materials? The anecdotes could get in the way or enhance your content.

15. Do your tips need visual support with graphics to allow them to be more fully understood? Clip art could be adequate or you might decide to use original art.

Are you ready to get started? Or were you already making notes as you were reading this article? Take as little or as much time as you’d like in creating your first tips booklets. You’ll be amazed by the results. Everyone has something they want the world to know about. What’s the starting place for you?

Paulette Ensign has personally sold almost a million copies in four languages of a tips booklet called "110 Ideas for Organizing Your Business Life," all without spending a penny on advertising. She has had clients match and surpass her results, worldwide.

She has learned her business by doing it, never having taken a formal business course in her life. Her San Diego, California -based company, Tips Products International, offers a range of products and services to support your success regardless of your budget of time or money. Phone 858-481-0890 or visit http://www.tipsbooklets.com

Will This Be Your First 'How-to' Report?

You've got to start somewhere, but once you've created your very first How-To report and learned to develop your own research tactics - life will never be the same again. You can write a report on almost any topic you like, providing you have knowledge of the subject through personal experience or research.

There are loads of subjects to choose from. How about; solving household problems, hobbies, leisure activities, social activities, science, psychology, computer problems, mon~ey-making/saving, gardening - the list is endless. Simple, basic, informative reports.

These reports are written guidelines that give the reader more information on a subject he/she wants to know more about. You'll find that the better selling reports are well researched, authoritative, factual and helpful to the reader in the achievement of his/her goals. Your report can be 2 or a 20 page document - it doesn't matter, so long as it contains the information they want. Writing your report can be very easy. However, it does take longer for some than it does for others, even if they are equally intelligent and knowledgeable.

Picking a subject to write about, one that has sales appeal, is not as hard as it sounds. Just go to any search engine and type-in your chosen subject and you'll soon see if it's popular or not. You will also find less popular niche subjects as well, to exploit. However, you will need to attract the right customers. Though, choosing the right keywords to attract your targeted prospects is for another report and not this one.


If you don't want to spend months researching your subject, pick something that has a particular interest to you, something you already know a great deal about. Your knowledge and enthusiasm will show through, causing your reader to over look any technical writing weaknesses you may have.

Be factual and clear and don't pad out the report just for fill. Try to outline the report before you start writing the main body. That way, you know exactly what you're going to write about before you get too deep into the subject and end up doing loads of re-writes.

Everything that's written should have a natural beginning, a body and an ending. When writing your report, make it sound as though you are talking to someone on a one-to-one basis. Keep it warm and friendly with a hint of humor, because when analysed, writing is no more than a written conversation.

Ok, now it's time to 'brain storm' - sounds painful doesn't it? Well it's not. Begin by writing down all the subjects you know something about, no matter how small. Start with any we've already mentioned above and include subjects like: horticultural, carpentry, glass cutting, painting, needle patch work, collecting memorabilia, golf, darts, pet training, astrology, astronomy, sleep walking, giving-up bad habits, smoking etc etc. Possible 'How-To' reports can be created from almost any subject.

Once you've made your list, go through the topic's one at a time and keep going through them until you find one subject that you're really comfortable with, even if it's not the one you originally knew most about. You see, that's the one you'll put your heart and soul into, and that's the one you'll be most passionate about.

Now you've decided on the subject, the next step is thorough research. The library, magazines, books, newspapers, search engines - anything that will give you information on your chosen subject. Gather this information based on your outlines we talked about earlier. However, don't get bogged down with a fixed set of outlines, they're just a guide to the way you want to list or discuss each aspect of your subject.

When you've finished with your first draft, be proud of yourself and take a break. Go back to it a few days later, rejuvenated. Scrutinize it with a sharp pencil. Polish each paragraph for clarity, accuracy and flow. Make sure it's easy to read, easy to understand and each sentence follows the one before it. The smoother the writing of the report, the easier it will be to read and the easier it will be to sell.

And finally, place your report in a .PDF file or a .EXE file for easy down-loading by your customers. Now go and make a cup of tea while nimbling-up your research cells and writing fingers.

Ed Bellamy is a webmaster and ezine publisher.For more tips and tricks visit dotBASiCWorld.comhttp://www.dotbasicworld.com Copyright (c) 2004.

3 Tips for Writing Articles

Do you love to write? Do you want to put those writing skills to good use? Perhaps you want to see your name published whether it be in a newspaper, magazine, e-zine or other forms of publication. Here's 3 tips to start off your New Year.

1.BrainstormOnce you've decided what your writing is going to be about, brainstorm. Think of a new angle for your article. For example: If you're writing for your local newspaper about an author, don't necessarily write only the obvious details. Is there something about this author that makes them unique?

What is so great about the book they've written, can you tie it with a current news event and or holiday?

2.Removing the Fluff is a Must!

When writing a first draft, it's expected to have at least some fluff. Fluff is words, sentences, certain aspects of your article that don't necessarily add to your article. An example would be: “I had no energy. My energy had been sucked out of me” Now that's not the great example, but you get the point. A good way to tell if you have fluff is to put your article away for a while. Why? Because wen you leave your article for a bit, the next time you look over you'll see aspects of your article popping out. Certain words, facts and excess information that could easily be removed for a smooth flowing article. 3 fast tips that also apply are:

A. Editing- Proof read your articles and remember to use your spell checker. Grammar and spelling mistakes can easily turn your editor away.

B. Simple Language Structuring- You may be an expert in your field, but for others reading about your topic for the first time, your content should be simple. Make sure your sentences aren't run-ons. Are you teaching something? Break down aspects of your article into steps. This will ensure your reader understands your topic better.

C. Be careful of the word “the”- “The” is a common word that sometimes is repeated too many times in the article, causing your article to become repetitious. Use “the” repeatedly if you're trying to make a point.

3.Passion

No, I'm not talking about romance. Passion and excitement in your article. The topic that you choose to write about should excite you. It should be something you enjoy, something you love. If it's a topic you're not truly interested if, it's going to show in your writing. Especially if it's an article that you put together in 5 or so minute. Use words to “pump” up your article, actions, appeal to one's senses if it's about cooking. Have the reader become excited and motivated if it's a teaching article.

Content Producer and Children's Author of Mysterious Chills and Thrills for Kids.http://www.laurahickey.com

New to Article Writing - Start Here

First, go back to basics. The whole idea of article writing is to communicate. You have found good information, news, drama, or opinion on a timely subject and feel you have something to say about it. Perhaps you have no more to say about it than any one else but your way of elucidation may help people to see something a little better or something they may have missed. This is good stuff but then comes the business of writing it.

I have found myself getting too long winded in some of my articles. When I found out that the best article length in general is between 450 to 650 words I started to modify my writing to fit that criteria. I still get cramped up sometimes wanting to write more but knowing I’ve said enough. In time I found a way to keep things both simple and readable without sparing important content.

It is so simple I am almost embarrassed to say it. But if a thing works it should be made known. If you were to pick up a pen and write a letter to a friend what form would it take?

Would it have a summary, seven points and a huge wrap up? No it wouldn’t. What it would have is three major divisions, an introduction, two or three points and a conclusion. This may not be the best form for every article you write but it is an excellent place to start if you’re new to article writing. It is also a good place to fall back to when you have gotten far too complicated and bogged down in form and polish.

I am not suggesting that you cease to get all the advice you possibly can to improve your writing skills. I have a few sites I refer to constantly to learn new things. One of my favorites is “Pointeronline.” Every once in a while I have to re-simplify to make sense of something I’m trying to say, try it yourself. Remember, introduction, two or three points and a conclusion.

Rev Bresciani has written many articles over the past thirty years in such periodicals as Guideposts and Catholic Digest. He is the author of two books available on Amazon.com, Alibris, Barnes and Noble and many other places. Rev Bresciani wrote “Hook Line and Sinker or what has Your Church Been Teaching You,” publisher, PublishAmerica of Baltimore MD. He also wrote a book published by Xulon Press entitled “An American Prophet and His Message, Questions and Answers on the Second Coming of Christ.” His book is now being heralded as the clearest book on the subject of the second coming of Christ since Hal Lindsey's "Late Great Planet Earth" Rev Bresciani’s website is,
http://americanprophet.org

Article Writing: A Great Way to Promote Your Website

There’s nothing quite so satisfying than seeing your name in print, whether it be in the local newspaper or on a website article. And to be quite honest there is no better way to promote your website than writing articles, out of all methods discussed by the online promotion experts this always makes its way to the top of the list as being the must do to succeed in web promotion.

Its sometimes baffling then why so many people find it difficult to write a short article to promote their website and usually resort to many other ways that usually involve great cost.

With the advent now adays of so many online article directories there has never been a better time to start writing articles and having them published on this vast array of article websites.

I always aim to write an article containing approximately 300 to 500 words regarding my chosen subject, try keeping the general wording in easy to understand paragraphs and if possible a little light humour is always an added bonus.

Always try to provide interesting subject matter for the reader so that they want to know more and continue to read the article to the final word, if you can achieve this goal then you have produced a quality item that all website publishers and ezine owners will be willing to place on their websites and in their publications.

Remember that if you place your website address in the resource box at the end of your article they will be more likely to click onto this if they have enjoyed or found interesting information from your article and in turn this will produce a steady flow of visitors to your website.

Having written your first article you will find that writing your second and subsequent ones becomes easier and easier and before long you will have built up quite an impressive portfolio, each one of which will bear a unique link to your chosen website and will be providing a steady flow of visitors for you in the future.

Copywrite 2005 Terry Till

We invite you to submit your articles to Articlebliss.com
http://www.articlebliss.com

What if Nobody Wrote Top Ten Type Articles?

What if nobody wrote articles that began with “the Secrets of...” and nobody wrote the top 7 or top 10 ways to do something? What if each article was written in a way, which got your mind going and the flow of thought pumping? What if the readers of all the top 10 type and “The Secrets of...” hype were just a little less shallow, were not in such a hurry and actually enjoyed articles of more substance? What if people actually liked to read and enjoyed learning? What if people were fully activated while reading?

What if authors were not forced to write snippets, but could actually attract readers without writing mindless stuff? What if more people read articles and information about things that were above and beyond the shallow subjects of sex, being rich and too thin? What if humans started thinking again and woke up? What if the strategy of writing Top Ten Secrets of “X” were not the articles that people mostly read? What if most people could read over an eighth grade reading level? What if the Internet was a place where more intelligent people could converse rather than allowing it to sink down to the lowest common denominator?

What if no one pointed these things out? What if everyone was afraid to say it? What if all Internet Surfers did not even notice their brains turning to mush? What if no one asked these questions? Worse yet, what if no one ever tried to change it or answer the questions. Think on that.

"Lance Winslow" - If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; http://www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs

Article Banks and Google Alerts Harness Your Publishing Power

Content is the currency fueling the Internet. Yet, article banks, repositories for authors to promote their content, are still the Internet’s best-kept secret.

I learned about article banks through a casual chat at a networking event. A few days later, I posted my first article, Five Secrets to Winning Book Proposals. What happened next made me a true believer in the marketing prowess of free content.

My website stats skyrocketed. In one day, I had 933 new visitors, 40 new newsletter subscribers and six client leads. The days and weeks that followed provided more encouraging results.

Previously, my cat Harvey was my only loyal visitor. His motivation for coming to the website was the heat generated from atop the computer’s monitor that displayed my homepage—cute—but not a business-building strategy. Articles provide a new level of expertise, consistency and ubiquitous Internet coverage for any business.

From my experience, I found that placing an article in an article bank is like dropping a pebble in a pond. The energy expands the rings of influence. Five Secrets, now published in over 20 e-zines, still produces client leads and the occasional fan letter.

If I can do it, you can, too. Here are several tips for getting started with article banks.
With any marketing activity, you want to measure it effectiveness. Web statistics are important. Contact your host provider about receiving regular traffic reports. I suggest reviewing them on a monthly basis.

I also think it is important to track where articles appear. I suggest that your first step is to benchmark where you are today on the Internet by setting a Google Alert for your name or the name of your business. Every time your article is posted to a website by a third-party, Google will send you the link via email. This is a great way to track where you content appears on the web.

Step 1: Go to Google. On the search page, select MORE, this is located directly above the search box in the right-hand corner.

Step 2: Under Google services, the first service listed is ALERTS. It is marked by an alarm bell.
Click ALERTS.

Step 3: You are now on the WELCOME TO GOOGLE ALERTS page. You can create an alert using the form given on this page. Alternatively, you can click the link MANAGE YOUR ACCOUNT that will allow you to create a free account in order to set multiple alerts.

Step 4: Set-up a Google Alert for your name. Be sure to put your name in quotation marks. (“Melissa Rosati”). Quotation marks instruct Google to only pull references where these two words appear together. Without the quotation marks, I would receive every generic MELISSA listed on the Internet.

Step 5: Select NEWS AND WEB. This command specifies that Google will search the eight billion pages on the web and will retrieve for you all of the pages where your name appears. You may choose to have Google report to you every day or once each week. Depending on your current web presence, Google will send you your first alert within one to two weeks. As your articles expand on the web, the alerts will come more frequently.

Step 6: Do a search for “article banks.” You’ll find banks that are free as well as sites that may offer promotion for a fee. Personally, I stick with the free sites and find them to be effective. Once you’ve selected an article bank, you may be able to specify that your article appears in more than one section. For example, Alumbo.com will allow you to choose up to 10 sections.
Every site will have its own submission guidelines. By accepting the submission terms, you agree that e-zines, newsletters or other content sites may reprint your article. Most article banks always state that a third-party must produce the article in its entirety and that your name and copyright notice must appear.

Each article bank expects that your submission will contain five key elements.

Headline: Help the reader solve a problem. People go to article banks to find a quick solution to a problem. Construct your headline as a question or in tip form—Five Secrets to Winning Book Proposals, for example.

Description: Make the article description one compelling sentence that addresses the problem.
Article Body: This is your core message. Remember, net readers need short paragraphs and short sentences. Reading is tough on the screen. Think—short and white space.

Subtitles: Include key words related to your topic. This gives your article more pizzazz with search engines.

Resource Box: By all means, highlight your expertise. Always say something like “To learn more, visit…..” This is how you drive traffic to your website.

Don’t let your cat be your only returning website visitor. When used consistently, article banks give you terrific exposure in short period on time and will keep working for you for months to come.

Melissa A Rosati provides readers with her Top 60 Article Banks on her website. She is a co-active coach. Her clients are writers, artists and business visionaries. In addition to her international publishing experience, she is a professor of publishing at Pace University, New York City. To learn more about her services, please visit her website at http://www.melissarosati.com

Dipping Into the Character Well

I believe that the best fiction is character-driven. Plotlines are of secondary importance, because if we don't care about the characters then the drama that unfolds around them fails to stir our interest. This division is really an artificial one, though, because within a good story the plot is an outgrowth of a writer's understanding of his or her protagonists' true natures. The adventure that beckons them is one that they need, or deserve, so the two are intertwined.

How do we hope to arrive at an understanding of our characters and their destiny whilst faced with the first blank page of a (hopeful) novel or story? The prospect is less daunting if we realize that we don't NEED to thoroughly know our heroes and villains at the onset. We need only a starting point and a glimpse from afar; or a first date, if you will. The rough draft is our "getting acquainted" period. We aren't married to our characters until the second draft, and even then we have recourse to literary divorce.

Allow me to describe two wellsprings where I'm wont to go to fill my buckets with character inspiration.

1. Alter-egos

I'm writing this on halloween, a night when children and adults have license to dress up and assume adopted personas. Many are quite zealous about living out their alternate identities, which oftentimes contrast sharply with their everyday lives. Much of the fun of halloween is derived from the freedom we have to let our alter-egos express themselves for a night.

I am typically a quietly disciplined (albeit ambitious) writer and a doting father. But there's an inner showman in me who aches to be up onstage crooning and gyrating like Jim Morrison. My exhibitionist self loves heavy-metal, grunge, punk and psychadelic rock. He insisted that I make music a core element of my first novel, and even that I include song lyrics. In an opposite corner of my psyche there exists a geek who could easily spend days at the library or on the computer surfing the web. He made some unexpected and fortuitous contributions to my book including such characters as a chemistry hobbyist turned City Father and a diplomat and interpreter living within a tribal culture. Another character, a young woman with a passion for history and literature who also plays Pan-pipes, was the result of "collaboration" between these two secret selves of mine.

If you mine your psyche for alter-egos, you're likely to find that they have surprising stories to tell. Clues to their existence can be gleaned by examining your hobbies, your taste in casual reading and even your daydreams. Isolate these figures and give them a chance to speak their minds. Your pen hand may have trouble keeping up with them before long.

2. Dreams

When we dream we travel through the landscape of our own rich inner world. Our deepest beliefs and feelings are personified and given voices. During the day our inner monologue operates constantly, and our thoughts sway us this way and that. We make myriad large and small decisions, and our motivations can be as varied as our choices themselves. Within our dreams, the collision of our thoughts and belief systems is enacted as an otherworldly drama. This inner play is intended to reflect our spiritual condition. Archetypal psychology has evolved the system of gestalt, wherein patients engage in active dialogue with figures from their dreams.

Writing can be a form of gestalt, with the poem, short-story or novel serving the same function as a dream. So the figures we encounter when we sleep can provide another rich source of inspiration for characters. Dream entities are akin to our literary creations; both represent parts of ourselves, and yet at the same time they are more or other than what we are. They receive the germ of their identity from us, but then they take off and evolve in unexpected direction - just as children will diverge from their parents' footsteps.

For this reason I believe that spontaneity is of utmost importance in any form of creative writing. I begin my novels or stories with only the barest sketches of my characters; and then I give them space to come into their own. You may find that your own characters will inevitably do this too, and your painstakingly-drafted outline becomes redundant by the third chapter of your book. So dip into your inner well for your initial impressions of who will be the main movers in your story. Then let them find their feet as you write.

I'll conclude the parenting analogy with this observation: we want what's best for our characters, but we can't plan their lives.

Seth Mullins is the author of "Song of an Untamed Land", a novel of speculative fantasy in lawless frontier territory. To browse sample chapters, short fiction and related writings, visit Seth at http://authorsden.com/sethtmullins/.

THINGS YOU CAN WRITE ABOUT AND PUBLISH!

The stories and articles you can write about are only limited by your imagination, ingenuity and persistence. And your ability to dig deep into and write well about a potentially good story or article can make you a published writer.

You can write about many things and here are a fewof them:

YOUR LIFE! No two people on earth have had the exact experiences. Each of us goes through life and experience things which are unique only to ourselves. Your life experiences are fodder for good personal experience articles. To start writing this type of article, brainstorm about unusual, unique, scary or even dangerous events you have experienced. From your list, think of an angle or an interesting way you can present your experience.

I'LL TEACH YOU HOW TO! Do you have a special talent, skill or knowledge? Why not write instructional articles based on those? This type of articles are commonly known as how-to articles and are regularly published in magazines because of their popularity to readers. How-to articles are usually written in a step-by-step manner, using bullet or number lists.

PROFILES! Personality profiles or sketches feature subjects who are more or less famous people -- celebrities, sports heroes, politicians, or someone who is recognized in his/her field. For profile articles, look within your community (town, city, state, region) and see if you can find and interview local celebrities. Usually, profiles are in the form of Q&A so you only need to come up with interesting questions for your subject. You can then submit your profile article to your community paper or regional paper.

INSPIRATIONALS! Articles that inspire, motivate and/or move people to tears or laughter fall under this category. Religious or secular articles are also forms of inspirational articles. If you're new to writing, submitting inspirational pieces for church or religious magazines is a good way to break into the writing and publishing field.

JAUNTS! Travel articles appeal to practically everyone, even to those who have never traveled. Have you been someplace where you found the sights, customs, food, habits, or culture different and interesting? If you travel frequently, start taking down notes of where the best places to stay are, where the interesting sights can be found, where to stay, and how to get to those places. Keep a travel notebook and log your travels. Write your impressions of places, people and cultures.

SPECIAL INTERESTS! Some special interest subjects are parenting, child nutrition, home and garden, and health. There are certainly thousands of publications that cater to special interest subjects. If you have been gardening for years, you can write articles for gardening enthusiasts.

Specialize on your area of interest and over time, you will establish yourself as an expert in that area.

Shery Ma Belle Arrietamailto:publisher@ewritersplace.comShery is the creator and author of the exciting new series of ebooks for writers, SEEDS: Ideas for the Everyday (Non-Fiction) Writer. You can download a FREE sampler at http://ewritersplace.com/seeds.html. The July SEEDS ebook contains 82 idea seeds, all based on historical events. Visit http://www.thepublishedwriter.com/report1002.html

Writer Beware! Is Writing.com Becoming a Scam? You Decide

Writers Beware! Is Writing.com Becoming a Scam? You Decide.

I will relate to you my personal experience with Writing.com so that you and other hard-working writers out there could take note and avoid getting cheated and abused by the mentioned online service.

Around late September of 2004, I was browsing online searching for a great website where I could share my writing projects with other writers. One search engine brought up result pages of thousands of writing-related services, software, and such. Finally, I found Writing.com listed and I clicked on its link to visit the site. I liked what I read and decided to sign up for a free account on its home page.

After reading its FAQs and other informative material about the site, the idea truly attracted me of reaching literally hundreds of thousands of authors and readers. I loved its dynamic promotional possibilities, the variety of ways to market my writing pieces, and the different tools that became instantly available to me when I signed up.

During my stay at Writing.com, I created a number of poems and articles, made them available to the general public at Writing.com, and received decent, constructive, and honest reviews from well-meaning reviewers. I learned how to improve my poem or article by making a few changes, cutting the "fat," etc. I also regularly reviewed other writers' poetry, book chapters, and short stories, and received kind compliments on my sincere reviews. Every time I reviewed someone's writing, I received what are called "Gift Point." I thought that was a neat and encouraging way to motivate a writer to keep drafting new pieces.

After a year of being an active participant, buying "Gift Points" from Writing.com with my credit card to promote my articles, I went to the home page to log in into my account one night, and I was absolutely unable to do so! On top of the home page it read "Username has been deleted." I received no prior warning, no notice of any kind, or not even a refund of the unused Gift Points I still had.

This unexpected event reminded me of 7Search.com who has been charged by its former marketers of turning into a scam operation. 7Search.com cancelled their account and did not refund their remaining balance. Writing.com is headed in the same exact direction. It's a shame but that's the sad reality. There are thousands of good authors that run the same risk of losing unused Gift Points, their account, and their writing drafts!

I tried emailing the Writing.com administrator, but my email bounced back to me undelivered! When this action occurred, it really made me doubly suspicious. The next day, October 31, I tried logging in into my account at Writing.com and couldn't do so for the second time. For sure this is not a glitch! A glitch does not last twenty four hours!

Beware: If this happened to me, it certainly can happen to you! Tell everyone you know about Writing.com and its crooked practices so that your friends and family members will not become victims as well.

About the Author

Samuel Faris loves to write on a variety of topics varying from health, controversial issues, to specialty products. He also loves to review other authors' works

Ghostwriting for Fun and Profit

We've all heard of ghostwriters. For some, a ghostwriter is the ghostly assistant to junior detectives on a PBS kids' show. For most, however, a ghostwriter is someone who writes for another, in the name of another.

Many celebrities use a ghostwriter in their forays into writing. Probably the most-noted ghostwriting project would have to be the books by V.C. Andrews, which were taken on by a ghostwriter after the real V.C. Andrews passed away. Surprisingly, there are a lot of writers that would like to break into this type of business, even though friends and family are sure to question them about such a task.

But ghostwriting can be really rewarding. You get the chance to research and write all about topics that you wouldn't normally get the chance to learn about. The old "write what you know" theory for writing doesn't apply here, as your clients will dictate the topic you write about. And you can make a decent living!

If you're new to writing, it might take some time to get clients, but it's possible. It just takes some hard work and perserverance. But there are serveral ways that a new ghostwriter can find clients. First of all, bid on writing jobs on contracted work sites such as getafreelancer.com or rentacoder.com. You sign up as a service provider to begin bidding on posted projects. If you win the bid, typically, you do the writing project as a ghostwriter.

Be sure to place ads for your ghostwriting service on free classified ad sites! It doesn't cost you anything and it's a great way to get your services out there in front of your potential clients.

Surely by now you're a member of at least a few forums. Post responses with a signature that defines your ghostwriting service and an email address or website for people to visit. While in the forums, if you're allowed to introduce your business, you should do it! Definitely seek out writing forums for this. You'll be amazed at how many authors would love to have a ghostwriter!
Have business cards created or create your own! This should showcase your ghostwriting business, and you should definitely pass them out at every opportunity. Write a press release announcing your services. There are plenty of ways to get the message out, even no-cost or low-cost distribution services available online!

Ghostwriting may not be for everyone. If you want credit for your work, it's definitely not the way to go, as you don't get credit, the client does. However, if that doesn't matter to you and you love to write on a wide variety of topics, ghostwriting can be enjoyable and you can make some pretty good money doing it!

About the Author

Amanda Baker writes for All Things Pondered: http://AllThingsPondered.com

Submitting Articles to Ezines

Ok, your article’s ready to go!

Now, you should take out your list of Ezines that you have chosen to submit to.

If you chose to use a mail merge program to submit them, I have a few good ones listed in the resource section.

If you chose to send them out manually, make sure you do not use the BCC field or CC function for this.

Here are the things you need to include in your message to the editor:

Introduce your article and give personal information about yourself. The editor needs to have your contact information and a little background info on you helps as well.

You need to make your email stand out from the crowd. Personalize the first paragraph and speak directly to the editor about how well your article fits with their Ezine’s content.

Give your editor the number of words in your article

Do not send your article as an attachment . Most editors will simply throw it away because it poses a risk of having a virus.

Your headline should tell them what you are sending – Ex- New Article for Your Consideration
To find the addresses of Ezines publishers, you can use databases such as,

Ezines search database

You can also post your article to several websites where Ezines editors go to search for new material. They are:

ideamarketers.com

Ezines articles

Submit marketing articles

Writing articles for Ezines is a wonderful, free way to get your name out there and establish yourself in your field. Don’t underestimate the power of a well-written article in the right, targeted Ezine!

By: Anne AhiraEditor The BEST Affiliate Newsletterhttp://www.thebestaffiliate.com