This is a guest post by Sylviane
I have been writing online since 2006. Since then, I’ve written over 2000 articles (lost track) and that doesn’t include my blog posts. I have also written a handful of writing tutorials and I answer a lot of writing questions on a regular basis through forums, emails and especially WA tutorial where I am one of the article marketing “experts”.
During the few years that I have been answering questions about article marketing I found myself being able to gather all those questions into five main categories. Among such categories I found five recurring mistakes that people are making and which make them fail with their article marketing campaigns.
Let’s see what are the five major mistakes that make your article marketing campaigns fail, and what you need to do in order to succeed!
1- You’ve picked the wrong niche
The rule of thumb in internet marketing before you start anything else is to pick a hot market or what is called a “niche”. A niche is a targeted market that people are hungry for. If you fail to start here, there isn’t any article you could write that will be able to bring you traffic and generate sales for you.
Article marketing is meant to sell what people are already looking to buy, not to make them buy. I have seen new internet marketers making this mistake so many times. They are starting their article marketing campaign trying to sell a product that either nobody wants or which has so much completion to start with that there is no way they would be able to beat such completion any time soon.
The rule of thumb is this: First, do your diligent research and pick a hot niche; then, and only then, start with your article marketing campaign.
2- You’ve failed to understand what article marketing is all about
The second very common reason why I see people struggle so much with their article marketing is that they have failed to understand what article marketing is really all about.
I am always stunned when people are telling me that they are wondering why their articles are not getting any click while all I see is rambling, non-formatted, compact articles that are not helpful for the reader in any way.
Writing articles for your marketing campaign is not that hard to do, but if you fail to understand what your article marketing campaign is all about, you will fail miserably. If you have no idea what a marketing article should look like there is a very easy way to check it out, and it’s right under your nose. Curiously, I see a lot of newbies not even thinking about it at all.
Where is the answer to your article marketing misunderstanding? In articles that do get a lot of clicks of course.
Research some of the big internet marketing names through Google. Write down four or five of those names and then, check their articles on EzineArticles.com.
In order to do this, just type each name in EZA search box and you will find their author link. Click on that link and a ton of highly effective articles which have generated tons of clicks will pop up before your eyes. Pick 3 or 4 articles and study them very carefully. This is the best method you can use to learn what article marketing is all about.
3- You’ve failed to learn how to write articles that are attractive to the reader
The difference between an attractive article and one that is not will make all the difference between getting a great conversion and no conversion at all with that article.
An attractive article starts with a good title, a good introduction, an appealing formatting, a smart persuasive content and a call to action.
There are many tutorials that will teach you how to write an effective and persuasive article. Download a few free writing tutorials and learn the basics about article writing. Make sure you take note of the most important points and take action by applying them when you write articles.
Your article needs to be both persuasive with it’s content and with its formatting . Failing to learn basic article marketing skills will make it impossible for you to succeed with your article marketing campaigns.
4- You are trying to sell
Some people get very confused when it comes to the content of an article that is supposed to lead to a sale. Because of this, they are thinking that they need to sell in the content of the article. The truth is that they couldn’t be more wrong.
As a matter of fact, you shouldn’t try to sell any more in your online articles ment to sell than your would in a blog post. Your article is NOT a sales copy – your article is a vehicle that you are using to attract your reader by letting him or her know that you have and answer for them, and if they really want to know what it’s all about they need to click on your link.
The way you do this is by agreeing with the reader by trying to put yourself in their shoes, sharing their emotions and feelings, letting them know that you completely understand, and that there is a solution for them. This is called persuasive article marketing.
5- You’ve failed to connect with the reader
As a general rule, people are mostly attracted to articles that reason with them and “speak”. If your article sounds robotic without any human feelings, talking to everyone and anyone at the same time it won’t be attractive to that one reader.
When you write an article it’s very important that you use the word “you” and that you sound like you are talking to that one person in particular; not to anyone.
Show your reader that you are human by relating to your own personal issues that you might have solved using such product or service. Try to sound like a compassionate person, not a cash machine. Make the article more about them and less about you.
If you follow the advice above, you will be able to fix the problem and avoid the five mistakes that made you fail with your article marketing campaigns.
Sylviane Nuccio is a freelance writer, a blogger and a life coach who owns several blogs about topics she is passionate about. She is the owner and writer of Persuasive Article Marketing
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1 Ping on "Five Mistakes That Make Your Article Marketing Campaigns Fail"
25 Comments on "Five Mistakes That Make Your Article Marketing Campaigns Fail"
Thank you for this post Sylviane. It seems that you are all over the places these days. I know that you know your stuff well and those tips are very good for anyone trying to write online.
Thanks
Hi Anthony, I try anyway
(to be all over the place). Thanks for passing by here. Oni has a great blog full of super tips about writing 
Many article marketing posts are either badly formatted/ unedited or sound like a sales copy. I guess these are the two reasons why they fail. And a third important reason is, they don’t offer a new perspective/ new fact about the topic.
Hello Raj,
Yes, I agree with that. The errors you mentioned are very, very common, indeed! If people only knew how formatting alone can make a huge difference for the reader. Maybe they are not readers themselves, if they were they would know. Don’t you think
Hi,
You sharing all these points so well often what happens when some body have much work load then he/she does not conscious on their work and second thing is that when someone understand this thing yes now i don’t need to give extra time to article because i am making good money.
So i think these two factors play big role to curve our business moments.
I totally agree with you Sam.
Hello Sam,
My only question is, how can they make good money with bad article? If I understand you well. If they do, I want to meet them
Connecting with the reader is the most important thing. No matter how hard you try to write in your bid to attract search engines, it is the people that matter the most
Yes, indeed, Tushar! Connecting with the reader is everything.
very nice and cool explanation mate,nice pointing view
Thanks, Sai. Glad you liked it.
You made several good points but #4 makes sense for me. I was trying too hard with my affiliate links the first year. Looking for 2012 to be a great year.
Yes, selling with articles doesn’t work. At least not anymore. It might have at the very beginning of article marekting, but those times are over
Great article! You mentioned about the writing articles that attractive to articles, i guess those that have a writing skills that can do that. Like me,writing is not my talent. I still need to learn more how to write effectively.
Hi David,
We all had to learn at some point, but anyone can become a better writer. It’s all about how much you want it.
I think picking ones niche is the most important part of writing about anything. Great article!
Of course, it’s a very important start.
Hey Sylviane, thanks for giving such a great explanation. To attract the readers, it is very essential to have a quality and informative content on the blog or website. On internet people are seeking for useful information and they only concern with the right information. So to increase the readership it is highly necessary that you provide the best information which will help your website or blog visitors a lot.
Great article specially for me as I am trying to Write quality article
Thanks, I’m glad it helped!
Quite nice and very helpful tips on article marketing. Following such tips can help boost your article marketing effort.
Hello Maninder,
I’m glad you enjoyed it. Thanks for passing by.
i agree with this article, article marketing is not easy as i thought
Yaa I agree with you. As most of the writers even the experienced one make some of the mentioned mistakes many time. Thanks for such a nice article.
Internet marketers often have more than one way that they use when they are doing their article marketing campaigns. One of those is setting up accounts with major article directories and other sites.