I know. You've already heard it 100 times before. The question is not IF you're writing articles, but WHAT you're actually writing. Simply throwing a bunch of words together isn't going to get you very far.

Here's a blueprint that outlines 7 keys to writing successful articles. Follow 7 keys and you're guaranteed to get more exposure with your articles.

Key #1: Choose a HOT Topic

You'll need to do a little research on this one. If you're already in touch with target market for your article, this should come easy.

Research, spy, observe. Do whatever it takes to understand your target market. What issues are hot? What topics currently appear within top ezines, messageboards, ebooks?

It's also a good idea to frequently visit article directories and content sites. These sites contain current articles on a variety of popular topics. Here's a shortlist:

http://ezinearticles.com http://www.certificate.net/wwio/ http://www.ideamarketers.com http://www.marketing-seek.com http://www.goarticles.com http://www.netterweb.com

Key #2: Choose a "Magnetic" Title

Magnetic title? That's right. Your article title is your headline. If it doesn't pull reader into article, nothing will. Just think ... what if I called this article:

"Writing Articles" "Tips For Article Publishing" "What It Takes To Write An Article"

See what I mean? These don't pack much "punch", do they?

Your title is just like a classified ad. Look at it this way. If your article title is crowded on a webpage with 100 others, what will make it jump off page?

Key #3: Use The AIDA Principle

Attention Interest Desire Action

This universal formula applies to your articles as well. Once you've enticed your reader to read your article (via a great title), you need to keep them reading.

The first paragraph of your article is critical. If it's dull, boring and lifeless, your reader will surely bail out. You must keep their interest right from start.

How do you get started? You must decide up front if you have marketing expertise to develop your "newsletter creative" in-house and how you want to manage distribution of your newsletters. Many companies turn to agencies/marketing services firms to help them develop actual newsletter creative and also outsource part of process to ASP (Application Service Providers), who handle all facets of list distribution, signup and ongoing management.

Content format can be critical to effectiveness of your newsletter - we typically don't recommend HTML (text with images/graphics embedded) format unless our client's product or service is very consumer-focused Plain old text is not as glamorous as HTML but it's a lot more effective in most cases - people want information, not fancy eye candy that's appealing to marketing geeks - keep your message, simple, to point and with customer success stories or references when/where you can to drive credibility.

It's relatively simple to use a Word processor with a mail merge program to integrate addresses (depending on volume) with your message and then send out via your ISP. But, doing it in house can be very time consuming - you have to deal with inbound requests for people who want to be added to your list, "unsubscribes" (people who want to be deleted) and integrate your web site into process, so people can automatically sign up with a back end auto-responder (automatic message) that confirms their sign up.