So you're an expert – so what? In today's world, anyone
with a little money can be an expert too. Websites
everywhere market "life experience PhD.'s" to anyone willing
to pay their fee. And if you're chatting, you really have no
idea who's on the other end of the communication.
There is, however, a simple way to show the Internet
community that you are indeed an expert in your field: by
writing articles and ebooks that show your knowledge in
your niche industry. Anyone can start a website selling
paper dolls, vintage model trains, or used clothing; but only
an expert will be able to talk intelligently about the history
of Victorian paper dolls, how to preserve the paint on the
outside of your model train without destroying the value, or
how you can mix nostalgic clothes with new ones to create
your own fashion look.
Articles for the Non-Writer
But what if you can't write well? This is definitely a
disadvantage. Though you can put together flashy
animations, great catalogs of your merchandise, and an
awesome inventory, if you don't know how to communicate
your expertise correctly, you will lose sales.
Non-writers aren't always just people who can't write,
either. Lots of people who can't write for the Internet have
that problem due to physiological issues like dyslexia, or a
genuine fear of writing instilled by years of public education,
or a focus on numbers or business instead of words. That
doesn't mean you don't know what you're talking about.
But you can identify writing that does know what it's talking
about, and that's where you can fix your problem. All over
the Internet, talented writers who want to write, but who
don't necessarily want to sell things on Ebay, are showing
up. Why not hire one, or contract with an article broker like
YourOwnArticles.com, to get the writing you need done?
Article brokers sell all rights to articles pre-written by
talented writers to people like you who need that content.
These articles are often keyword optimized so that you can
get better placement with search engines. They're wellresearched
and informed. And you can either purchase prepackaged
articles that you can place on your site or in an
emailed newsletter, or you can contract with the broker or
writers to have articles tailored to your specific needs.
It's a new expense, but it can be surprisingly affordable. And
since all rights are sold to you, you have the choice of
recognizing the writer in the byline, placing your own name
in the byline (as many celebrities already do with their
ghostwritten autobiographies), or of just putting it up as
content with no byline at all.
What About Article Directories?
You may have seen other sites online that offer Free Web
Content. I don't know about you, but when I see the word
"free," I always ask what the hitch is.
And article directories do have a hitch. Articles in these
databases are written by people who are often experts in
their field, and often have a website that competes with
yours. You can indeed use their article on your website for
free, but you will have to include a resource box with the
author's name and, if included, website with a clickable link.
This means that you are putting someone else's content on
your site, acknowledging them as an expert, and then giving
them a free link back as well. This allows them to steal
customers from your website, not for you to retain the ones
you have hooked.
Instead of using article directories as sources for free
content, use them as a marketing tool. Purchase batches of
content from a writer or a broker like
YourOwnArticles.com. Use some of the articles you've
purchased to enhance the content on your website or in your
newsletter, but take one or two of them and put them into
the article directories under your own name, with your URL
attached. Then if someone else downloads your article, the
URL from their website will point to you.
What About Ebooks?
Lots of people are looking at ebooks as a great way to selfpublish
books and sell them online. But they really make a
much better marketing tool.
If you compile your ebook into a PDF, it can be downloaded
and read, but it can't be changed. That means anything you
put into it will remain there, including the URL for your
website and all the contact information to you and your
business you like. And there are no printing costs for these
documents. Instead of selling an ebook on your website, put
them out there for free, no strings attached. Your customer
may question it, of course, just like you and I question
freebies, but the answer to that is the truth: it's a marketing
tool. With an ebook, you can show your customer you know
what you're talking about, and you can give them
information that they can subsequently use. But since the
book has your information in it, including the URL, the
customer who uses it will be reminded every time that you
exist.
Just like with articles, you can hire outside writers or
contract with article brokers like YourOwnArticles.com to
acquire ebooks, or you can compile a collection of related
articles into an ebook yourself.
If you don't have the capacity yourself of creating a PDF,
you can use the easy PDF creator in the free download
OpenOffice; it's compatible with MS Office, and easy to use
if you're used to Word.
