Article marketing has gained a great deal momentum over the last two years. This is due to the fact that many websites, not to mention website rankings, are driven by quality content. As web site owners have learned more about search engine optimization and the value of quality content, they have gravitated towards article marketing.

Even if you are late to the game, article marketing can work for you. For those who haven’t started, I suggest you jump in. Article marketing is still one of the best ways to promote your website. No one needs to be concerned that many are using article marketing as a way to promote their website or blog. In fact, article marketing works regardless of who uses it or how many people author new content.

The reason that article marketing is effective is because you provide search engines and websites with quality content that references your website. In essence, you are producing keyword focused content that can drive browsers to your site or blog. If the article is created properly, you include links back to your website which serve as a powerful way to boost search engine rankings.

When you distribute your article to article sites, blogs, or partner websites, your content gets additional exposure. As your content ages, and links are included back to your website, you benefit from the Google page rank associated with that page and your in bound link.

One error I see made all too often is when individuals, new to article marketing, is that they forget to include a link back to their website or simply link in the wrong way. The proper way to develop in bound links is with keyword rich link text. What this means is that your link is displayed with your keyword not the traditional http.

If you are unaware of how to produce such a link, do a Google search on create html links. You will find dozens of websites that give you the html code you need to create links in the proper way. If you do not embed your keyword in your link text, you are wasting your precious time and effort in article marketing.

After writing your articles and including links using the proper format, the next step is to distribute them on sites that have a high Google PR and are popular for article aggregation and or distribution. I used to believe that the benefit of these article distribution sites were that they served as a resource for webmasters seeking content. The truth however is that it is the sites Google PR itself that provides the value.

Many online article websites are not that good at distributing content. To distribute your articles you would have to use a software package or an online distribution service. Therefore, you want to focus on article directories that can provide value in terms of the page rank they pass through to your links. Focus your efforts on the top article directories to put your article marketing in overdrive.

Create articles in your niche and structure them correctly. Your links in the author box or included in the article must use your keywords in the anchor text. Test all of your links to make sure they work properly. Once you have validated that everything is working properly, distribute your articles to the top article directories.