Guidelines before writing and publishing articles
To write a good article for internet publishing you need to keep it short, simple and direct.
There are two ways to get an article: the writing task can be outsourced to professionals or you can write it yourself. If you decide to write by yourself, it make sens to be aware of following tips:
1. The first paragraph should state what you will write about.
The first part of the article should attract and captivate. Some initial keyword research via keyword research tools is very important and beneficial for the optimization of an article title.
Web surfers probably make a quick assessment of the page based on the first paragraph. Or they skim it for key points.
2. It's a good idea to outline the points that your article will cover before writing. This way you will be sure to cover them in the content of the article.
3. Write reader-friendly text, easy to be understand by internet users. Keep in mind that you do not write for a scientific or literary audience. Your peers on the Internet would prefer a simple style. If you introduce new terms, define them for your readers.
Avoid writing broad or superficial in content. When writing about a specific topic try to go in-depth, define and explain it. Place your keywords several times throughout your text.
4. Organize text in short paragraphs. Short paragraphs are easier for the reader to follow. Try to collect three, four or five sentences in a paragraph. A long block of solid text is hard to be followed and depressing for your readers.
It is recommend a word length between 400 and 500 words. If you want to write more than this, break it up into smaller articles. For topics that require thousands of words, produce several articles and then a summary page that links all the other pages together. The number of people who spend time reading long articles is very low.
You can improve your readability scores by:
- breaking long sentences into shorter sentences
- replacing long sentences with bullet points
- rewriting passive sentences
- using shorter words
- using headings to organise the text
5. Give concrete examples and personal experiences to back up your points.
6. Underline the benefits of your product or service. Keep in mind that you advertise your business and the theme of your article is about your products or services.
Tell the truth about your products or services. Avoid fluff, embellishments and exaggerations. Readers are smart and will see right through your "hype-veil."
7. For more detailed studying provide your readers with resources. It may be your own site or other websites where your readers can get more information. Don't you worry about losing customers as good outbound links from your website are also helpful to your site's PageRank and positioning in search engines.
8. Place the most important information close to the beginning of the article and summarize what you want to say at the end.
A good article is entertaining and informative on the same time to get readers interested in the product. Remember that if a reader gets bored reading an article, they usually will not finish reading it. Editors usually cut things close to the end, so keep your most important points and ideas in the beginning of the article.
9. When the article is finished, check it for grammatical, spelling and punctuation errors. This is surely the main point for any writing!
