Bum marketing and Article marketing.

The first steps in creating any successful article marketing campaign is:

• Choose your niche market.
  
• Find a product to offer your targetted market.
  
• Choose your keywords.
  

Your niche, your product, and your keywords all go hand in hand when starting your article marketing project.

Some people start with a specific niche and then choose a product and then the keywords. Some may start with the product and find niches that have potential buyers for the product. On rare occasions you may discover an extremely easy to dominate keyword that has a very high search volume and will look for a product to market to this audience.

Now i don't want to confuse you too much and as I read back I am confusing myself. So in the next modules I will be breaking these steps down into to much easier to understand concepts. As you get more of a grasp on these subjects you will see how they relate and can decide upon your own method for beginning your own article marketing campaign.

Many of you may already know what a niche is and how to choose one. If so then good for you, but I want this page to cover all aspects of article marketing. So I'm going to dig into this subject and your more than welcome to skip this part if your so inclined.

So, what is a niche? Actually a niche is a specific and more targeted subset of a much broader term.

Basically by targeting a niche market you are homing in on buyers who are looking to buy a specific product or are looking to solve a specific problem. The best niche markets are targeting people who have their credit cards in hand and are ready to buy.

Lets look at a niche market. Take for example golf. When someone types the term "golf" into their search engine they are not really looking to buy anything because golf is just too broad of a term. If they search for a term like "golf clubs" then this is a more targeted phrase, but even that term does not mean that they are actually ready to buy. They may only be browsing for information or drooling over the coolest set of clubs that are beyond their budget.

Ok now suppose this person enters "Odyssey White Hot XG Blade Putter". Now this my friend is a niche market. This person has narrowed down their choices and are searching for a very specific product. This in turn means that they are probably ready to make a purchase.
In article marketing choosing a niche that has a hungry market that is ready to buy is a very important.

A keyword is a phrase that someone types into their browsers search box when searching online. Choosing the right keywords is very important as you will see later on in the other modules.

The keywords you choose will be the subject of the articles you publish and when someone searches for these terms they will find your page.

After choosing your niche and doing your keyword research you may have one or several keywords to target in your campaign. Proper keyword research is a must to avoid wasting time with unprofitable terms or keywords with little or no search volume.

Keyword research in your article marketing campaign is as, if not more important than niche research. Lets break it down like this.

1. You have a niche market but no product = 0 sales
   
2. You have a great product but no market = 0 sales
   
3. You have a market + You have a product, but you target the wrong keywords = 0 visitors to your sales page = 0 sales

Okay, in the niche market module I broke it down about what a targeted niche was. So Likewise your keywords need to be targeted as well. You have to put yourself in the place of the searcher and ask yourself if by searching for this phrase am I ready to buy.

Keyword research can be the most intensive and time consuming part of any online campaign and article marketing is no exception. Actually when it comes to article marketing, keyword research should be your prime directive.

Your main goal should be to find buying keywords that have a decent amount of monthly searches but not so much competition that you cannot rank on page one for the keywords.

As we move on with keyword research 3 things to always consider are:

• Intention of the searcher (is it a buying keyword)
• Search volume (number of monthly searches)
• Competition (number of competing pages in Google)

I said in the last module that keyword research was as important as niche research. Well I was wrong. Keyword research is the most important part of your campaign. Why?...Because the keywords you choose will drive traffic to your articles and thus on to your affiliate pages.

A buying keyword is one in which someone is looking for a specific product and has their credit card in hand. So how do you know if it is a buying keyword? Well a good indication is a very specific search including brand names and model numbers.

In the niche module I used "Odyssey White Hot XG Blade Putter" as an example as a very targeted key phrase. This person knows the exact model of putter that they are searching for. They may not have their credit card in hand but with a well written article you could easily turn this browser into a buyer. Hopefully he will buy through your link instead of the local sporting goods store.

There are certain keyword modifiers that definitely show the intent of the searcher is to make a purchase. I will use xbox 360 as an example.

• buy xbox 360
• xbox 360 free shipping
• buy xbox 360 online
• cheap xbox 360

Physical products like golf clubs and game consoles are not the only way to make money with article marketing. In fact information products in the form of ebooks are a billion dollar business.

There are millions of people out there that are desperate to solve certain problems and are willing to pay for the information. For most of these problems there is an ebook that you as an affiliate can provide for these desperate buyers.

With the proper keyword research you can target these desperate buyers and help solve their problems while gaining a nice commission for yourself. In fact I prefer digital products because the commissions are much higher compared to physical products.

The greatest buying keyword in the world ain't squat if noone is searching that term. Therefore having a decent search volume is a must when choosing keywords for your campaign.

So what is a good search volume? Well the higher the better of course. But with article marketing you have to compromise search volume based on competition. There is no point in targeting a term that gets millions of searches if noone will ever find your page.

This is highly debated among marketers. But when first starting out in article marketing a search volume of at least 3000 exact searches per month and 30,000 or less competing pages is a good rule of thumb. Of course with more experience you can begin targeting and dominating more competitive keywords.

Finding a product to sell is really the easiest part of article marketing. Once you find your market all you really have to do is search online for products and check to see if they have an affiliate program. Sign up and boom, there you are.
As I said before some people tend to choose the product and then search for a hungry market so hopefully you already belong to a few of the more popular affiliate networks.