Writing articles to improve website traffic is one of the most profitable things you can do to improve your internet business. No internet business will thrive without traffic: it is the lifeblood of your business. There are many ways to improve website traffic, but writing articles and using them to market your site is probably one of the best.

Articles can provide both content for your site and advertise it, and may people use them to get traffic to their sites or to improve their listings in the search engines. Many people also use articles the wrong way, and wonder why they are not getting the results that they were promised. In fact, most people do not use articles to their full potential. Before rushing off and writing yet another article that will fail to do what it is meant to have done, stop and think what you are trying to do.

There are two main objectives in writing an article. Think on both, and then work on each together. One is to get one-way links back to your website. You will probably have read of the value of back-links and how reciprocal links are a marvelous way of getting the search engines to notice you. So you want lots of reciprocal links, right? Wrong! The value of reciprocal links is now coming into question, especially if they are not directly related to the content of your site.

Let me tell you a story.

I designed a website that was as search engine optimized as it could be then I published it on the internet at the same time as I published several articles relating to the content of the site. Within three days it was at number three for the keyword article services out of 55 million other Google results for that keyword, plus one or two first and second page listings for other keywords.

Three days! Thats unbelievable and perhaps had something to do with my rigid silo structure and the way I handle Google webmaster tools. However, thats another topic. I know it had a hell of a lot to do with me publishing articles with my new URL in the resource box at the aame time as I published the website.

I signed up with a reciprocal linking service and within a few weeks had about 500 reciprocal links. Recently I found that my site had disappeared from Googles index: at least from the first five pages for the same keyword. I removed all the reciprocal links from Googles view using robots.txt and within a week was back at number three. I removed the block and my site disappeared again. I am now in the process of informing all my links that I am closing down the links page.

Now I am not suggesting that will happen with everybody, but I firmly believe that good SEO design and one way links back to your site from articles are the best way to secure high listings. I no longer believe in reciprocal links.

Writing articles with a properly designed resource box will provide you with good back links. The link comes from the article directory and the URL provided by you in your resource box, and from other websites that copy your article as content. So make sure that your article is well written so that others will be impressed enough to use it on their website. It is mostly informational sites that articles are used on, rather than private marketing sites, and some of these have good page rank themselves, thus making the link more valuable.

However, even better, if you write well enough about your topic, your reader might want to read more. If they do, your resource box should provide them with a URL that will lead them to a page on your website that provides further information on the topic of your article. Lead them to any other page and they will click away. You dont write about diamonds then lead the visitor to your opal page. You lead them to your diamond page.

Sometimes, however, this is not possible, and you decide where your visitors should be led. For example, this article has touched on the topics of article writing, how to design your resource box and SEO. I will lead my visitors to my home page where they will have the option of clicking to visit any of these topics on my website. I have also now informed these visitors where they will be led, and that they can get to the page of their choice with just one more click. If they feel that my advice might help them then they will do that. What will not happen is that they will be lost if they click on my link.

Thats another use you can put your article to: provide information to your potential visitors. It is visitors to your site that ultimately provide that mutual interaction between you and the visitor. The person clicking to your website is provided with what they need in the way of advice, information or product, and you have the opportunity to let them know what you have to offer.

Nether you, nor they, can be expected to do more. That is how writing articles to improve website traffic can be of value not only to you, but to those that your website depends on: your visitors.

Peter Nisbet
http://www.article-services.com