More Search Engine Ranking Tips to Improve Your Article Marketing Efforts

In a recent post, I shared a couple of my favorite search engine ranking tips. Those ideas apply to both on-site and off-site content, so here are some specific ideas to improve your article marketing (or off-site) results.

Use anchor text vs. exposed URLs for links in your author’s resource box when submitting to article directories. Instead of saying “For more information on ___________, visit “http://www.yourdomain.com” - use something like “Improve your search engine rankings today!” Using anchor text links around your targeted keywords will give a boost to the backlink in terms of SEO. (Here are detailed instructions on how to create anchor text links).

Think strategically. When you submit your work to article directories, the keywords you use in your Author’s Resource Box do NOT have to match the ones you target in your article. In fact, consider limiting the main keywords you are targeting for your site to your author resource box vs. in the articles themselves. (If you want to rank for keyword 1, keyword 2 and keyword 3 – don’t write a bunch of articles about those exact keywords because odds are the article directory that gets indexed for those articles will rank higher than your site). You’ll be competing with your own words – and losing! Instead, your articles can drive traffic with secondary keywords, while the anchor text links in the Author Resource Box create valuable SEO backlinks for your primary keywords. A definite win-win.

Speaking of Author Resource Boxes… Most directories will not allow “self-serving” or promotional links in the body of your article itself. However, they do allow 2 – 3 such links in your Author’s Resource Box. Make sure you use ALL of them! Either use them to create anchor text links pointing to more than one page in your site – or diversify and promote two sites with the same articles/resource box.

For example, a good resource box could say: You can increase your search engine rankings immediately by following Jane Doe’s 5 Part Email Marketing series. Two links, one site, but different pages. (Note: those links are just for illustrative purposes – both go to separate pages within WebCopyResults.com, but the content is not related to the anchor text links used in this example).

Or, you could try something like: Start improving your search engine rankings IMMEDIATELY with Jane Doe’s Tip of the Week. Jane also writes extensively about alternative financial solutions to help your business grow. Two links, two sites. If the directory allows 3 links, you could link “Tip of the Week” to redirect to your email opt-in page.

Keep in mind, the main benefit you will get with following this approach isn’t targeted traffic to your site. In fact, your sites may be entirely unrelated to each other. However, you ARE creating two very solid SEO backlinks to different sites with ONE article.

More bang for your buck, don’t ya think??