With hundreds of article marketing sites on the web, you’re probably wondering which ones are the best for your company.  Article marketing, like free press release distribution, can help to expand the base of your social media and public relations campaign.  Some sites like eZineArticles.com have a higher Page Rank, some are user-friendly in regards to formatting, some take unusually long wait times to gain acceptance to your article, and others are just downright torture.  We also recommend that you do not use article syndication services.  Submitting your articles to hundreds of lesser known distribution sites is less effective then hand-submitting to five or ten high Page Rank sites.  If you use a syndication service you run the risk of your articles being picked picked up as spam, which will hurt your marketing campaign.  Here’s the PR-echnology Article Marketing Breakdown.

The Easiest

If you want to spend the least amount of time submitting articles to websites, here are the two we recommend.  Keep in mind that Scribd.com and Docstoc.com are do-it-yourself publishing platforms, which means no wait times for article acceptance.  You upload your article and voila! it’s ready for the public eye.

Scribd ( PR 8 ) is my personal favorite. The company calls itself the “largest social publishing company in the world — the website where more than 60 million people each month discover and share original writings and documents.”  You will receive exposure to your article on this site if you do two things.  1.) Use precise tags for your documents, a good description, and put the article into the proper category.  2.) Join groups that relate to your industry and post your articles to those groups.  Scribd requires some effort on your part to promote the article to related groups.  Considering how easy it is to upload and distribute articles, however, this additional task is well worth the effort.

Docstoc (PR 6) is more or less the same as Scribd.com, except for professional documents.  You may find that the categories at Docstoc fit your social media objectives better than those at Scribd.  The main categories are:  “Legal, Business, Personal Finance, Education, Jobs and Careers, Tax, Real Estate, Current Events, Politics and History.”  You can showcase multiple documents via your website and blog using the custom “DocShots” code.

The Best Exposure

Ezine articles (PR 6) is one of the original article submissions sites and is considered by many to be the best.  Ezinearticles.com delivered the most traffic to my articles, and also back to my sites; but it took awhile for me to enter the pipeline.  Meaning, the more articles you submit, the quicker they seem to get approved.  That’s usually because you’re still learning what you can and cannot do in your articles.  For example, Ezinearticles is very strict on self-promotion and linking to your own sites within the article.  But building a reputation on this site pays off.  As an “expert author”, visitors can easily browse your collection of previously written articles and check out your profile.

Go articles (PR 6) provides a nice balance of ease-of-use and higher-than-normal exposure.  The articles you submit are usually indexed in the database within one day, and I’ve never had a problem getting an article accepted here.  According to the site, “Posted articles are seen by hundreds of newsletter publishers and site owners looking for free content, providing much greater exposure than an article might normally receive” and “Posted articles are downloaded daily by visitors to GoArticles, exposing your links, services and/or products to a targeted and interested audience.”

Article Alley (PR 5) attracts a good deal of traffic. The most popular articles are placed in their own section, which increases traffic further if you are selected.  In addition, your article may be published to a number of information sites connected with Article Alley.  The editing features on the site are basic, and when I was using the service, I had some trouble retrieving articles that I’d already written.

Article Biz (PR 6) has a huge selection of categories and sub-categories and a significant amount of incoming traffic.  The simple page layout and easy navigation has separate sections for featured articles, most viewed articles, recently added articles, and article comments.  Articles can also be rated.

May not be worth your time

Buzzle (PR 5) boasts “a dynamic network of authors and content contributors who we proudly refer to as our Intelligent Life on the Web.”  This may sound good in theory; the problem is getting your articles accepted.  If you don’t have a lot of time on your hands for registration, and then waiting for acceptance,  you might want to skip this one.

iSnare article (PR 6), like Buzzle, offers a good deal of exposure, but the process of getting your articles accepted is almost not worth the effort.  I received the longest wait times for article acceptance from iSnare.  Keep in mind that you have to register to most of the article sites listed above.  After you register you’ll need to spend at least 15-20 minutes formatting your article to meet the restrictions of the submission site.  If there’s a chance you’ll never hear back from anyone, you’re better off submitting your articles elsewhere.

One final note on linkbacks. There are three possible places on most article sites for you to include linkbacks to your site.  When choosing a submission site, you want to determine if you have one, two, or all three of these options.  The first place is your author profile.  The second place is a bio section at the end of your article.  And lastly, you can usually put linkbacks into the body of the article.  Article sites, however, tend to discourage more than two or three self-promotional links within the body.

Good luck!  And remember you can always consult with PR-echnology on the best article marketing options for your business.