The prime objective to any success online goes way beyond simply getting a site up on the web, requiring instead some level of authority or at least an implied value of importance. It all has to do with content value and how other authority sites view that content. This is where submitting articles can effectively help your site's authority by strategically building you up as an expert, plus add quality back links in a couple very important and valuable ways.

What Constitutes Authority?

Authority depends on how you look at it . . .

From an SEO (Search Engine Optimization) perspective, authority has to do with the value of a site based on the number of high level back links it has as well as the amount of quality content it displays. Search engines such as Google take into consideration the popularity of a site in determining its value and weight in comparison to other sites on the same topic.


When Google sees a large number of sites linking to another, it first considers where those links are coming from, and the relevance of the specific links in relation to the site. It then rates the site being linked to according to the number of relevant links it has, but more importantly, the value of the sites that are linking to it.

In plain English, if your site has 100 back links, and those links are from sites with 0 page rank, Google will rank another site on the same keyword with only 5 back links from sites with 6 or 7 page rank higher than yours.

Now if both your site and the other its competing with has 5 back links from high ranking sites, Google would determine which gets the top spot by which has the most back links and the highest level of quality content.

It's all a little foggy, but basically that's how authority is determined from a search engine perspective. Search engine algorithms change all the time, and none of them are all that forthcoming in divulging exactly how they actually rate sites for value and authority, but this is about as close as anyone can come.

In contrast, authority from a human perspective is a bit easier to explain. It's simply a matter of knowing what you're talking about and convincing your readers that you do by conveying that knowledge in a new and interesting way.

You, the Expert!

Articles, by nature are descriptive. Like a novel about some surreal landscape, or an historical era, they can paint a vivid picture of the "world" you wish your reader to see. If done effectively, even the most unlikely setting can be made to appear reasonable.

Of course you won't have to go quite that far to persuade your readers to your viewpoint, but hold on to the concept of articles being descriptive for a moment while we elaborate.

People love information! They come in droves to the Internet to get as much of it as they can every single day on any given topic. Let's face it, humans like to learn, especially if its something new and exciting. The more exciting, the more they hunger for it and seek it out.

For example, over the past 10 years there's been an enormous market for learning how to make money online. Quite a few marketers have made huge amounts of money selling away their "secrets" on how to do it. Millions of people come online seeking this information, many of whom barely know how to use a computer let alone capitalize on it.

It's all quite the frenzy!

Unfortunately, most of what they learn is how to market "how to market products" and they end up preaching to the choir and make little or nothing in the way of income. Yet more and more people come online and seek out the same information day in and day out, and usually from the same group of marketers. We call these marketers, "gurus."

Now back in the day, when Internet marketing was first hitting the scene, these "gurus" figured out they needed to set themselves up as authority figures. So they set out to explain marketing in a whole new light and applied it to the online arena. As a result, they built up quite the following. Would-be marketers followed them just about everywhere. They took us through multi-level marketing, email marketing, affiliate marketing, sold us hundreds of ebooks and reports, and just about every conceivable membership site you could imagine.

They spoke and the majority followed.

Their success came because the rest of the world perceived them as experts in the field of online marketing. Some have since been exposed as charlatans, but even to this day there are several real marketing teachers from back then who snap their fingers and we all follow.

That's authority!

Today, building that kind of authority in the "how to market" field is nearly impossible unless you get taken under the wing of one of these established "gurus." But that doesn't mean you can't get yourself established as a real "go to person" in any number of other fields and niches.

And unlike those "gurus" of old, who basically had to dazzle with shock and awe to build a following through word of mouth, you have a better chance at carving out some authority thanks to article marketing.

Now you can become an authority on any topic by using articles to teach with. And just like the "gurus" you can build up enthusiasm by bringing anything into a "new light" and teaching a concept not thought of by the majority of people.

In the next article in this Article Marketing eCourse we'll discuss how to delve into this realm of teaching new concepts. Look for this article entitled "Teaching Your Way to the Top With Articles" coming up shortly.

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