Tips For Writing Your First Article

July 17, 2008

Writing your first article may seem daunting at first but you would be surprised how quickly you can write once you start. An article should be at least 300 words in length although 400-500 words is ideal. Anything longer than 500 words may be broken up into multiple articles as it is a well known fact that most people simply do not read large portions of text online.

There are several tips to keep in mind when writing your first article, including:

Research First

You should have some idea of what you are writing about before you start. It helps if you do some background research on the topic or keyword so that you’ll be able to write off the top of your head. You may use other articles as reference, but never copy directly.

Don’t Ramble

Fluffing up an article with useless text is a big mistake; make every sentence count in your article so people don’t become bored.

Break It Up

Breaking up your article text into bullet points, lists and sub-headings makes it easier to read. Many people just skim read articles so they are more likely to get to the end of your article if it is broken into sections.

Enticing Title

Your title can make or break your article. If the title is interesting then people will click the search engine result to read it. Article titles such starting with “10 tips” or “Discover how to” are great attention grabbers.

Write For People, Not Search Engines

One very common mistake is to take a set of keywords and write the article with the sole purpose of using those keywords even if they don’t make sense to the reader. In the long run you will have more success if your articles are written for the visitors and not for search engines.

Posted in Article Marketing