For Beginners: Article Syndication, Guest Blogging & Article Marketing EXPLAINED!

There's a LOT of misunderstanding, much of it created by discussions
around the topics, about Article Syndication, Guest Blogging &
Article Marketing in general.

Hopefully, this explanation of the BASICS of each will help dispel
some myths and clear up some confusion.


Article Syndication

It is a process where your article is re-published on many different
sites, blogs, newsletters and even offline resources.

Why would anyone re-publish your content?

Because:

a. Your content provides value that'll benefit their audience (or)
b. You are a celebrity or expert or thought-leader and having your
content on their site adds credibility, authority or popularity

Primary Benefit: To get your content in front of other
audiences that you'd find hard to reach on your own.

Secondary Benefit: Traffic back to your website, awareness
of your name and brand, and links back from the sites that
re-publish your content.

You don't 'syndicate' your articles - you permit syndication,
or put up your content for syndication. Your content GETS syndicated
by publishers. To that extent, it's 'passive'... though you can
actively seek out people who may want to syndicate your content,
and make them aware about what you have for them.

Your content (usually) remains unmodified for each outlet you
syndicate to. It is, in a sense, 'duplicate content' (but the
kind that doesn't matter to Google - or to you, because you're
NOT writing for the content to get into search engines)


Guest Blogging

It is a process where you are a guest, posting to someone else's
blog. Your article or post is published on their blog, for their
audience to read.

Why would bloggers want guest posts?

It is hard to constantly keep coming up with quality content, so
getting it from 'outside' is an attractive option for busy bloggers.

Also, many bloggers believe that different perspectives from
other experts or passionate enthusiasts will benefit their
audience.

Primary Benefit: Reaching a targeted audience without
having to build it yourself. Ideal for new bloggers, and
to reach wider groups in your areas of interest.

Secondary Benefit: Relationships with popular influencers
in your niche. Back links from authoritative resources.

Typically, this is a negotiated arrangement. Either you contact
the blogger about writing for them, or bloggers invite you to
contribute your content to their blog.

Some blogs put the process on 'auto-pilot' through a 'write
for us' offer. It's still a negotiated arrangement, except
that the terms of the deal are spelled out in a set of guidelines,
rather than being discussed in person.

Some blogs re-publish any content. This is sometimes called
'guest blogging', but in essence is 'article syndication'
because there is no negotiation involved. When this is done
automatically using scripts, it becomes 'auto-blogging'
or 'content scraping'.


Article Marketing

It is a process where you use articles for marketing.

That's the 'umbrella term' that enfolds all the nuances and
variations, including the two above.

In the past, it meant primarily submitting content to large
repositories called 'article directories', which served
two purposes:

a. automatic syndication to various outlets (publishers
picked up content from directories based on their interests,
when you placed them for syndication on these sites)

b. back links to websites of article writers, which
grew valuable when the article directories gained massive
popularity thanks to millions of article submissions - and
which has now changed recently because those same sites
were 'slapped' for poor quality standards of the content
they accepted

Back in the day, a prolific writer could submit tons of
content to article directories, and through the power of
syndication and the value of the back links from these
articles, boost their personal/business websites in
the search rankings (through having a link in the
'author resource box' of their articles).

Higher rankings led to more traffic, and therefore more 'sales'
- a technique that was referred to as 'Bum Marketing' (presumably
because it could be done by even a bum who had no resources
to fall back on!)

This, in and of itself, constituted the ENTIRE 'article
marketing' strategy for some people - and it was VERY
effective (while it lasted). Now, it is no longer quite
as effective, and indeed many who bemoan the 'death
of article marketing' refer exclusively to this style
of doing it.


Article Directories

Article directories are sites/databases that accept
submissions of articles (usually categorized by theme
or topic) and present them for various purposes, including:

a. to provide value to their own visitors
b. to allow syndication by other publishers
c. to frame around ads for revenue

Why would you submit content to article directories?

Primary Benefit: To make your content available for
syndication by other publishers AND to get back links
to your website (through your signature/author resource box)
from the 'authority' site (article directory)
- Note: the latter has diminished in significance recently

Secondary Benefit: To build up a portfolio of content
that showcases your expertise in a subject, or even your
writing skills to potential clients.


Should You Do Any Of These?

As in all forms of marketing, the governing factor is 'return
on investment'.

What works for someone may not work for you - because your
investment may be too high to justify the return.

Article Syndication is leveraging work once carried
out, to reach wider audiences.

Guest Blogging is relationship building with publishers
(bloggers) and their audiences, often through custom tailored
writing.

Article Directory submission is a path along a journey
to getting extra value from your article writing.

Any (and all) may find a place in YOUR article marketing arsenal.

Now you know ;-)

All success
Dr.Mani