4 Key Items Your Articles Should Have.

Having articles on your site is a big key to getting people to visit and regularly. Article writing has been a major traffic generator offline for many years. Long before the advent of online websites, people wrote articles to entice people to visit their business. While online marketing tricks come and go, the good old-fashioned article strategy keeps marching forward. Articles are a big factor in boosting your site's rankings in search engine results. Of course, the higher a site ranks, the more traffic they get.

While gurus claim that new gimmicks are the answer to your traffic problems, they actually rely on articles and NOT the gimmick in question to reel in traffic.

But, it is not just about stuffing your site with articles. There's more to it than that. A hodgepodge of words isn't going to cut it. A well written article will catch the eyes and interest of your customers and keep them coming back for more. They would also be able to recommend your site to others.

Following are four components articles must have to make them successful (where success is pulling in the maximum amount of targeted traffic).

• Keywords and Keyword Phrases.

An article must always be include keywords and keyword phrases related to your site. As each website visitor goes to a site, there are those who are just merely browsing but actually looking for a specific something. When this happens, a searcher usually goes to a search engine and types in the keywords they are looking for (e.g. Ford Focus, flu, accountant, etc.).

There are a number of tools on the web that will help you figure out what keywords and keyword phrases are typed into search engines most often.

• Keyword Density

An article must have good keyword density. This is to entice the search engines to list your site higher in the search engine rankings. Keyword density is the percentage of your total words that are keywords. For example, if you have a 500 word article and you mention your keyword, say "golf clubs", 50 times you have keyword density of 10% (50/500).

What is the correct density? 3% - 10%. You should test it. If you have a few sites you can run experiments. One site would have 3%, another 5%, etc. Track their search engine improvement. I'd rather rely on this than some specific number that some guru spits out. It may be too "exploited" by then. The search engines are always changing to keep ahead of people. They don't want to be "figured out". They can sense when everyone is onto something. But, 3-5% seems appropriate.

Beware: A very high density can turn off the reader as well as the search engines. It looks stilted. You can just have a list of keywords! On the other hand, too low a percentage may cause it to be ignored by the search engines.

• Good Article Content

Articles must be able to entertain people as well as provide good information. Do a spell check using your software program's spell check feature. Then spell check with your own eyes. A word can be spelled right yet be the wrong word! For example, if you wrote, "This article was written by Joe an Jane Stevens..." your software would say you have no errors. However, you meant to write "and" rather than "an".

To gain trust and credibility, make sure your article is factual. A way to do this is to include facts (citing the source) and statistics, so inject those. A well written article will boost your reputation as an expert in your chosen field or topic. As more people believe in you. They will be able to trust you and your products.

• Including Your Link In Your Articles

If you are going to submit articles, be sure to include a link to your site. Stick it in your "resource box". A resource box includes your name, role, site name, a brief description of your site, and a link to that site. If people like your article, they may click on your link.

Visit http://articlesandchecklists.net/ for 100s of articles and tips on writing articles. At this article directory you can download articles or submit articles. You may post this article wherever you wish so long as you do not remove anything.