Article marketing is one of the newer methods of generating more traffic on your website. Articles should not be promotional in nature but rather informative for your customers. The popularity of article writing, however, has given rise to several myths about the practice.  Here’s the real story:

Myth:  Article marketing is not really very helpful.

Reality:  Article marketing can in fact be the biggest vehicle for driving traffic to your website. It can also help in increasing your link popularity.

Myth: Articles that are being reprinted are indexed only as supplementary pages, which are not really worthwhile.

Reality:  The article itself can actually get a top-ten listing in the various search engines, depending largely on where exactly it has been submitted.

Myth:  Submitting your article in many places can lead to duplication of content. Search engines will discount such pages.

Reality:  Duplication of content can be alleged only when approximately 65 to 70 percent (only the search engine companies know for sure) of the page is identical to another on your site.  Follow guidelines published by search engines for article syndication and you will avoid most problems.

Myth:  Article marketing is effective only when you submit your article to a number of websites.

Reality:  Effective article marketing occurs in a number of ways. Submitting your article to several sites is most effective if your link popularity is negligible. In such a case, this method can give you a number of links back to your website whether or not they are related to your product.

You can also submit your article only to those websites that are related to your product. Although this may be more time-consuming, these websites, if they in turn repost your article, generate new links that will also be related to your product, thus leading to more specific links back to your website.

Another alternative is to write an extremely high-quality article. Choose a website with high traffic and good PR and offer them an exclusive for posting your article along with the included links. If you choose the website carefully, this method can be very effective in creating the targeted customer base.

You can also have an exclusive posting of your article on your own website. This method is only effective if you already have good traffic coming to your site.

Myth:  Your article should always be posted first on your website and only then elsewhere.

Reality:  The whole concept of article marketing actually means that you submit articles to other websites. Posting on your own website is merely adding content. In article marketing, your article should not be indexed initially on your own website.