Here’s the formula that I learned from Willie Crawford, one of the Godfathers of Internet Marketing, to quickly write informative articles that get results. For many of the articles that are writen, the goal is to get visitors to a website where they take some action related to the topic of the article. Often the action that they take is to buy some product that is recommend.
Here is the formula that I use to write articles almost in an assembly line fashion. The reason that I write so many articles is that in some niches you need dozens, even hundreds of articles, to break through the clutter.
I begin with keyword research. You want to know what keyword phrases your ideal customers are using when searching online. They come online searching for solutions to their problems, and when they come across your articles offering a solution, they become raving fans.
To do keyword research, I often use the “Google External Keyword Tool.” You can find it by googling that term. This tool shows you how many searches are made on a given term in a month, plus how many webpages there are out there already targeting that phrase. The tool also suggests
related terms that you might want to target. You can use this tool to compile a list of suitable keywords and then download your research results in an Excel spreadsheet.
In looking at keywords, what you’re trying to identify, in addition to search volume, is “What problems are these searchers try to solve.” People come online looking for solutions to their problems. You identify those problems and then let them know (via your articles) that you have
the perfect solution.
In crafting my article titles, I use my keywords but also work in a promised benefit. My titles promise to show them the solution to a nagging problem. When they see that title listed in the search engines, this is what entices them to click through to your target site.
In crafting the body of my articles, I use the “problem, agitate, solution” formula. I describe the problem to let the reader know that I understand their problems. I then go into excruciating details explaining the problem, and how it’s not going to get any better unless they do
something about it. Finally, I point out the obvious solution, which is my recommended product.
Sometimes I only point them to a website to read more about the problem. On that website, they’ll also find my recommended solution. This is a less-threatening, soft-sell approach.
When I do my keyword research, I sometimes identify hundreds of related keywords that are being searched on a lot. At the same time, I identify several different painful problems (or variations of the same problem). This is what allows me to write articles in almost an assembly line fashion.
After the articles are written, I use an automated submission service to submit them to the top article directories. I use automated submissions because otherwise I’d spend countless hours submitting each article (not a very good use of our time).
In the resource box of these articles, I point readers to a target site. Where permitted I use anchor text in the links in these resource boxes. That anchor text is generally the keyword that I’m targeting (the same keyword that I used in my title).
I also post these articles to my blogs or maybe to a static page on one of my sites.
Since I like to leverage my time, I also turn many of my articles into videos, and podcasts. I generally create the videos by putting the main points of the articles on PowerPoint slides. Then I read the article as I go through the slides – recording then using Camtasia (screen capture
software).
Alternatively, I sometimes simply turn the text of an article into a PDF. Then I scroll down my computer screen reading the article, and again, recording it using Camtasia.
To create the podcast you can use recording software probably already on your computer, or you can download one many free pieces of software such as Audacity. Simply read the article as you record it. I generally save it as an MP3.
Submit the videos to video sharing sites, and submit the audio to podcast sites. I use an automated submission service for this, submitting to numerous sites!
Here’s one final tactic that I use to get my articles to rank higher for a target keyword and get noticed more readily in the search engines. I look for ways to create external links pointing to my article in one location – generally my main blog. I do this by bookmarking the blog post that contains the article. This is perhaps the easiest way to give the article a search engine boost.
