Articles are a driving force in bringing traffic to a website. Not only through articles posted on the site itself, but through guest posting on other people’s sites, as well. Articles are a major factor in giving sites high rankings on search engine result pages. The higher a site ranks the bigger slice of the traffic flow pie it gets. With greater traffic flow, there are more profits and more potential for other income-generating methods, as well. That’s why there are certain things your online articles must have.
But, you can’t just stuff your site with random content. Your written content needs to meet certain requirements too. These requirements must be met in order to obtain the maximum benefits of an article. A well-written article will catch the eyes and interest of your customers and keep them coming back for more, as well as recommend your site to others.
Here are some tips to help you create articles that satisfy their multitude of purposes. These tips are in addition to the “red hot” tips offered in a separate post. Below you will find four things that all articles must have to be successful and help your website earn more traffic.
1. Keywords and Keyword Phrases
An article must always pay attention to keywords and keyword phrases. As each website visitor goes to a site, there are those who are just browsing while looking for a specific something. When this happens, a searcher usually goes to a search engine and types in the keywords they are looking for (e.g. Toyota Camry, Meningitis, Tax Lawyer, etc).
The important thing is that you have an article that has keywords that are related to your site. For example, if your topic is “cat health,” you must have articles about cats and their particular health care issues. There are many tools on the Internet that provide keyword research services. You can use these tools to determine what keywords to use and write about.
Here are a few to get you started:
2. Keyword Density
Now that you have your keywords and keyword phrases, you must use them properly. An article must have good keyword density for a search engine to “feel” its presence. Articles should at least have 10-15% keyword density in their content for search engines to rank a site high in their search results. Getting a high rank is what articles do best for a website.
Keyword density is the number of times a keyword or keyword phrase is used in an article. The number varies depending on the number of words used in an article. An effective article must have a keyword density that is not too high or too low. With a very high density, the essence of the article is lost and may turn off a reader as well as the search engines. It comes off as overeager. A low number may be ignored by search engines.
But above all, the article must flow. In other words, the keyword density should be a natural extension of the article — otherwise what you are doing is called “keyword stuffing” which is bad and can get your website de-indexed.
There are tools to help you with this aspect of SEO, as well. If you are using WordPress, using one of these two plugins can make SEO easy:
3. Good Article Content
As what I stated above, you cannot just riddle an article with keywords. Your articles must also be regarded as good reading and the repetition of keywords or keyword phrases must be natural. Articles must be able to entertain people, as well as provide good information. Articles should be written well with correct spelling and good grammar. If you want people to trust you, make your work good and well thought out.
People respond well to figures, facts, and statistics. Try to get great information and as many facts as you can. A good and well-written article will boost your reputation as an expert in your chosen field or topic. As more people believe in you, they will trust you and your products.
4. Links
And another important thing to remember. If you are going to contribute your articles to newsletters and other sites, DON’T ever forget to include a link to your site. A little resource box with a brief description of your site should always be placed right after the articles that you have submitted. If people like your articles, they will most likely click on the link directing them to your site.
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on CarmaSpence.com in February 2008. I has been updated in January 2023.