When a marketing tactic fails to work, it's easy to blame the people promoting it as the next great way to build your business. Obviously they don't know what they're talking about...

Or do they?

I run an article site, and one of the biggest problems I see is poor quality. Too many articles are pounded out as fast as possible without regard for quality, grammar, punctuation or anything else. Article marketing is the great golden ticket that will solve a website's problems, all without serious effort.

Which is a serious line of hooey.

If you aren't making a serious effort with your articles they won't be picked up by other websites. They may not even be posted on the pickier article websites, no matter how often you submit. I can tell you that I delete more articles than I approve, simply because the quality is so often so very poor.

Another problem is that many articles are nothing more than ads for a website, and no effort is made to disguise the fact. However, most people don't want to read ads. They want quality information. If you do a good job you have a better chance that your articles will be picked up by more websites.

But what if you feel you're writing good quality and avoiding sounding like an ad? Why are you failing then? There can be a variety of reasons for this.

One can be how you're linking within the article. Adding links within your article is very risky, especially to other pages within your own website. Save the links to your site for your resource box. But be careful adding any links within the article text, as webmasters are often picky about who they link to, and are more reluctant to use an article with tons of links. Keep in-article links to high quality sites that are highly relevant.

Your resource box should be kept within reason too. Although many article sites allow up to 3 links in a resource box, I find most webmasters prefer two or fewer links. Keep to that rule to maximize your chances of success.

Submitting to the right directories matters too. Make sure you're hitting the big ones such as Ezinearticles.com when you submit. If you prefer you can use a service to submit your articles.

No matter how you submit your articles, keep the category you submit to relevant. In my directory a submission to an irrelevant category is an instant deletion. Take the time, do it right.

Even if you've struggled with article submission in the past you can have success. Make the effort and take the time to submit articles regularly. Done right your articles will work hard for you.