The resource box at the very end of your article is the holy grail, when it comes to using articles to get traffic to your website. The obvious objective is to make sure that as many readers as possible click through to your site. This is not new news to most of you, I am sure. And yet a lot of resource boxes don’t show that the author realizes the importance of the message that goes out in this last paragraph.
There is a lot of hard labor that goes into writing an article for publication in the article directories. You must make sure that it lives up to the quality standards of the directories and that you abide by their terms of service. You don’t get paid for your submission either. The reason that all this is still worth it, is the fact that you get to include a resource box at the very end of your article.
If it is such hard work, with the resource box as the only reward, why then is it that so many authors don’t know how to structure a high converting paragraph to conclude their article. I don’t know the answer for sure, but the fact that the resource box is seen as separate from the article may be partially to blame.
By looking at it as an after the fact addition to the article you automatically create the wrong setting. Reason I am saying this is the fact that the single most important fact of a resource box is that it should be perceived by the reader as the last paragraph of the article, rather than the article is over and now I am entering the sales pitch part for the author.
After all, as soon as the reader realizes that the article has ended, they move on. Chances are that they never even read your resource box. Your only reward for writing that article was just dismissed by your reader. A slap in the face, had you been there to witness it. Take it from me, if your reader can not figure out where the article ended and your resource box started you will be in the best shape to get visitors from this article to your site.
There are a few other factors that do affect the click through from your resource box. They all have to do with your keyword phrase. Make sure that you use hypertext rather than the URL for your links. The most important keyword in your resource box is the long tail keyword phrase of your article. Most directories allow 3 links though, so you can use a main keyword another related long tail keyword as well. But only if they fit in naturally. Don’t force them in for the sake of having them there. You would do yourself a disservice if you did this.
The hyperlinked long tail keyword phrase your article centered around, should be the first words (or almost the first words) in your resource box. This is very important. The reader may not finish this last paragraph, knowing that he has reached the resource box. Even though he decides that he is done reading, he still is presented with your link.
I hope that you realize from the above that it is a mistake to start off your resource box with your name and description of who you are and what you do. This is a major red flag for your reader that he is done reading the content he was looking for and can move on with his day.
To summarize the important parts of a resource box, in order of importance:
- Your resource box needs to be an integral part of your article
- Your keyword needs to be hyperlinked, rather than using the URL itself
- Your long tail keyword needs to be a the very beginning of the first sentence of your resource box
- You can use a main keyword and a related long tail keyword phrase besides the long tail keyword phrase of your article if you can naturally fit it all into that one paragraph at the end.
