Learn And Do It

Almost every marketing guru is screaming his head off, "Write those articles!" And then you come over here and I tell you that writing articles is not the way to success! Whom would you believe? Not me, certainly! Not unless I can actually show you why these article directories don't pay off and just how you can actually make them pay off!

What's wrong with Article Directories?

I'm sure you must have heard a lot about duplicate content and how search engines penalize them. Now lay back and think. If an article is posted on a hundred odd sites, isn't it really duplicate content too? Yes, it is. And search engines will determine which site actually originated the content and which sites merely copied it.

I know I promised a new way (and the right way) to benefit from the article directories, but it will have to wait a while. For the moment though, let's look at something else.

You see a lot of advertisements telling you how you can make a couple of thousand dollars a week (or more). Most of these are scams. It also goes for 99% of the ebooks on the internet... they aren't worth 5 bucks a pop and are often marketed for 100s!

The best way to ensure that the product offered isn't a scam is to do a search or post at http://scam.com. I'll also try and set up a section that alerts people of scams.

Before you read this article.. I would like to share a few thoughts with you.

1. The basic advice of this article is right. You need content. However, what this person is doing is marketing his own ebook and his own program. You should not forget that. I have read a ton of such marketing copies and they all tend to tell you either how you can make money by submitting thousands of articles or how to automate content. The basic premise of both is completely wrong.
2. The problem with article directories. Let's say I submit an article to ezinearticles.com where I found this gentleman's article. The PR of ezine articles is 7, that of learnanddoit.com is 0. Ezine Articles has been online for ages. Most of the sites that will use your article are either going to be similar high pr sites (if you write well) or spammers. In either case, before you know, internet is full of duplicate articles that you wrote. And since your own site is new... who do you think google will consider as the original author of the article?
3. Scraping public usage articles. Publishing public usage articles is similarly disadvantageous to a new site. All you are doing is adding duplicate content to your site. Do you really think search engines will take notice of your site this way?

Tommorrow, I'll tell you a better way of going about creating content.

Reviews are probably the reason for over 70% of my income in online business. However, everytime I come across a new review site, whatever the niche may be, I know that their conversions will never beat mine. And no, it is not my ego talking. Most of these review sites usually pay someone to write the reviews for them. Worse, neither the reviewer nor the webmaster have personally tried the product. The result? I guess you know what the result is but let me put it words.

Disadvantages of a fake review and advantages of an honest review.

Back when I was starting out with my first internet venture, I did a crazy thing. I subscribed to a Search Engine Optimization newsletter. These guys send a weekly email with their bundle of latest tips. For the first few months, I actually followed what they said. Now, I just keep my subscription to get a few laughs.

You see, their basic advice hasn’t changed a bit. It is still about keyword laden content, back links to your site, et cetera, et cetera. Of course, every time the search engines change their algorithm a bit, there is a huge new update on how best to beat this algorithm and remain on top. And you know what? Some of the things these guys say actually work! But here I am, telling you to stop writing for the search engines. I must be really crazy, right?