And so what do you do now?

Submit your article!

The most logical place to start is to post articles on your own website, blog or hub pages.  This establishes that this is your original article.

The next place to go is Ezine Articles. This is one of the top article directories for article submission.  The staff at ezine articles are very particular about  their article submissions.  The articles must be original and the only other place they can occur at time of submission is your own website , blog or hub pages.  As a new author, it will take 3 to 7 days for the article to be reviewed and approved.

Simply go the website at ezinearticles and submit your articles.

Ezine Articles Sign up

Click on the Green Button, fill out a few short fields and you are the newest member.

It’s a very simple signup process.  Ezine Articles gives new members10 Initial Article Submissions.  If all their rules are followed members can earn a platinum status.  Before you submit your first article, make sure to read the article guidelines located under the Author Resources.

So maybe you aren’t ready to submit articles yet.  Go ahead and sign up.  Look around in the members area.  The Ezine Article Staff provides  a wide variety of resources for you to get started.  They will teach you how to submit an article.  The training includes:

• Article Writing and Marketing
• Article Title
• Article Writing – Paragraph and Grammar Structure
• Article Writing-Content Sources and Article Templates

The member’s area also provides tools for promoting your articles:

• Banners

• Article Promotion
• Title Suggestions
• Article Diagnostic Center
• Statistics
• Social Media:  Twitter, Facebook, Linkedin, Myspace, Youtube

Remember, after poking around and getting familiar with the site, read the Ezine Article guidelines. Here are some important highlights:

1. Must be an original article that you wrote.
2. Must have good content and informative
3. Maximum of 2 “self-serving” links confined to your resource box.
4. The article body is your give and your author resource box is your take.
5. Links should be relevant to the content of the article.
6. Affiliate Links are allowed if you own the domain name.
7. Article Body must be a minimum of 400 words.

A lot of rules but the best place for article marketing.  The basis to all their rules is this:

• Write Quality Content
• Respect people and provide links that will give them more.  If you want to promote an affiliate product, link back to your product page on your site.

Here are your three simple steps:

1. Read rules
2. Write Article
3. Submit Article

Now go forth an conquer.

Check out this site when you are ready to submit an article.   This post provides some after submission ideas.

Wishing you happy writing, happy submitting and happy marketing.

Sharon

P.S.  Want to try something else from Google when researching keywords for your article?

Google Alerts customer on new locations on chosen keyword.

The pass key to your future.

Here is a brief synopsis.

“The Secret” is about the law of attraction.  This is a universal law.  We can all relate to the law of gravity because we see it in action every day.  Drop your coffee mug and boy do you understand gravity.

The law of attraction has the same certainty.  But, unlike gravity, many times there is the non-immediate response from the law of attraction and this can cause us to forget it is in action.

The law of Attraction is like looking at yourself in a mirror.  Whatever you put out there, thoughts, feelings, actions, comes back at you.  This is a guarantee.

How can you put this into action?

The writers of The Secret present this affirmation:   “I am the master of my thoughts.”  Let’s break down this statement, and look at the definition of master.

Master can be a:

NOUN

• Original creation, such as Michelangelo’s Statute of David.

• An overlord or Overseer

• One who’s doctrines and teachings are followed by others
• Passkey, the key to everywhere

VERB

• To overcome

• Deal successfully with

• Dominate

• Have a firm understanding or knowledge

Thoughts:

• Thought is the mental form and process that allows beings to model the world and to represent it according to their objectives, plans, needs, and desires.

If you take the different definitions of Master and the definition of thoughts, you can mold it into a positive statement of your own.

Brian Tracy says this,  “ You are a living magnet.  What you attract in your life is in harmony with your dominant thoughts.”  He understands the Law of Attraction.

If we want good things in our lives, good relationships, good finances, good health, why in the world would we not be the master of our thoughts and only think positive things.

When I first started practicing this, I was overwhelmed with the number of thoughts that go racing through my mind.  Were my thoughts out of control?  Absolutely, yes.  Some days, they still can be like a runaway train.  But I have learned from The Secret, a trick.

We have a built in barometer to monitor our thoughts.  And that is our feelings.  If we are feeling good, happy, joyful, we are thinking good, happy, joyful thoughts.  And if we are feeling sad, anxious, unhappy, depressed, we are thinking sad, anxious, unhappy, depressed thoughts.  There is no way to think positive thoughts and feel bad and the opposite is true as well.

Sometimes, our personal world can fell as if it is out of our control.  We are torn by our boss, or family, or responsibilities.  And we can feel like we have no control.  But that is the delusion.  We do have control.  We can change how we think on a daily basis.

Have you ever had one of those days when everything seems to go wrong, one right after the other?  And then, finally, I have to laugh at that last one and suddenly, it stops.  Why can’t I remember to laugh after the first one happens, and stop the chain right there?

Well, my friends, that is what practicing the Law of Attraction is about.  Taking control.  Being the master of your thoughts.

Sharon Burger

P.S. Like watching movies better?

Change your life today!

This came across my desk today.  I dont’ have much time, but wanted to get this out.  Thought it was an interesting concept.

If you are an entrepreneur looking for funding for a project, check this site out.

On the flip side, if you have some extra cash that you would like to invest and help someone else out, check this site out.

Sharon Burger

Today this quote came up.

“The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continuously fearing you will make one”.  Elbert Hubbard

This one grabbed me as a truth.  I must admit, I had never heard of Elbert Hubbard.  But this quote was enough for me to be curious about the person who said it.  So once again, I resorted to the great and wonderful Google.  Mr. Hubbard was an American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher born in 1856.  Upon doing my Google search, I found that there are many quotes attributed to Elbert Hubbard.  I didn’t read them all, but many of them I agreed with.

Elbert Hubbard - 1856- 1915

Here is a quote from a man, born 150 years ago, that because of its truth, transcends time.  And, if we all stop to think about it, we can see it happen in our lives.

How many times have you been stopped from doing something, because you feared making a mistake?

A 2010 Gallup poll indicated that 40 percent of Adults were afraid of public speaking.  I can speak from experience that at one time this was indeed a fear of mine.  But we all need to do public speaking at some point in time.  Now public speaking can be standing in front of an audience or participating in a group environment.

So what did I do about my fear?

When I was in high school, I decided to sign up for the Competitive Speech team.  I can hear you saying it.  “What, are you nuts?”  And at the time, I kinda thought I was too.  (LOL)  And I will tell you, that I was never the “star” of the team.  But that wasn’t the point, although it would have been nice.

The point was that I took action to overcome my fear.  The first time, I was paralyzed.  My stomach was in knots, I thought “how in the world was I going to do this”.  And I came in last.  But the judges wrote notes on their critique and I studied it and went back to my coach and we worked.  I practiced and practiced and practiced.  Then in the last of the competitions of the year, I made the power round.  And I placed second in that.  Frankly, I think my coach was a little bit amazed.  And so was I.

What was the turning point?

When I looked back on the experience, I realized that what happened was I made a connection with my audience.  And that connection made me more confident and my speech started flowing more easily.  Instead of the dreaded thing creeping out it started to have power.  Instead of people looking down, embarrassed for me, they looked up and were interested and connected.

Do I still fear public speaking?

I don’t fear it, but I do respect it and the power it has.  I still get a little bit “antsy”, but I try to use that to my advantage.  There are things that I do to make it more comfortable for myself.

1.     Be prepared.  I never go into a speech without being prepared.  I know many people who can go up there and ‘wing it”.  But that’s not me.  Once I came to accept that, I moved on.

2.     My speech must flow.  I don’t like to use notes when I get up there.  So I structure my speech so that one point leads to the next and I don’t lose my place.  I will usually carry a note card in my hand with bullet points (but it’s really a security blanket.)

3.     Practice.  I practice and practice and practice.  Sometimes out loud, but mostly to myself.  My brain goes over and over it.

4.     I make it a point to connect with several of the people in the front row.  I make eye contact and use that contact.  If I feel there is at least one connection out there, then I am ok.

I have digressed from my quote.  But I wanted to give you a real life example.

If you don’t try, even though you may fail the first, second, third time, you will never succeed.  And believe me, my friends, once you do succeed, the victory is sweet and leaves you smiling for days.  Don’t forget our circle of success.

So remember to listen to Elbert’s advice.

The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continuously fearing you will make one.

Don’t let your fear keep you from what you want to do.

As always, advocate for your success.

Sharon

P.S.  We would love for you to share with our readers, a story about something you always wanted to do, but fear stood in your way.  Did you overcome it and get it accomplished?

If it is too long for the comments, send it to me at sharon@trumanburger.com and we will include it in the post.

Don’t forget to give us a tweet or facebook.  The RSS feed is at the top or under the post.

Truman and I use Host Gator for our internet hosting.   One of the things we enjoy the most about Host Gator, is the ability to see what countries the visits are coming from.

Host Gator Country Display

Host Gator Country List

Truman and I love to travel and hear about other places.  So we thought it might be fun to set up a page where people can leave a comment, where they are from and what their town or country has to offer to visitors.   But before I do that, I thought it might be wise to put a quick post and get some feedback from our readers.

Would you be willing to play along?

And if anyone knows of a good pin map that I could use that would run with word press, that information would be helpful also.

I am not sure where this will develop.  Maybe I will get some great ideas on where to visit. 

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Truman and Sharon

I was out driving our jeep, a stick shift, and I suddenly realized how much you have to pay attention to your driving.  Now mind you, I learned to drive on a stick shift.  But that was 30 + mumble, mumble years ago.  This is the first stick shift I have had since that very first one.I was having a great time driving.  I pulled up to another jeep at a red light on a very busy highway. And I gave them the “hey fellow jeep person, I’m cool, I gotta jeep too.”  And I could tell by the look on their faces, they were thinking, “why does that little ol’ gray haired lady have a Jeep.  And a stick shift at that.

Well, I would show them….I very coolly pulled away….BUCK….BUCK…SQUEAL….BUCK….so much for cool.   I looked over and they were LAUGHING!   Ha!  I gave them the “What the heck, I’m an old lady” look.

The next day, I was grateful for my “real” car.  The one with XM radio, Power Steering, Sunroof, Directional, phone hookup to the I-Phone, the smell of new leather seats.  I am happily driving down the road.  After awhile, I realized I was driving in the zone.

Now I know, that you know, what I am talking about.

Your mind gets to chattering about things other than your driving.  And before you know it, you are wondering if you stopped for the red lights or if you ran over anything.  And….you just realized you drove past your exit and the next one is 10 miles down the road.

Well, the zone applies to life also.  We get so busy with our lives that we are not paying attention to the moment.  We are worrying about what is going to happen in the future, or fretting over something that happened in the past.   We need to live in the moment.  Pay close attention to what you are doing, working, playing, relaxing.

There are three benefits to living in the moment.

1. No worrying
2. No regrets
3. Produces healthier, happier  living

So if you are having difficulty staying in the moment, enhancE your life try these simple things.

• Practice random acts of kindness This one is really my favorite.  It will uplift your spirits and make you smile for the rest of the day.  Truman will randomly pick someone in the drive through line behind us and pay for their meal.
• Read live in the moment quotes. I accidentally stumbled upon a site with nice quotes.
• Be thankful Even in tough times, find something to be grateful for.
• Smile and Laugh If you don’t have anything to laugh about today, visit my just for fun page and watch Carol Burnett.  Classic.
• Focus on the positive When you find yourself worrying about something that “might” happen in the future, focus on something that brings you happiness, things that make you smile.

Hmmm, I think I am discovering a theme here.  Positive, Gratitude, Laughter.

Wishing you wonderful, stay in the moments.

{sharon}

P.S.  If you like our posts, give us a tweet or a comment.  And remember, stay in the moment.  If you have any other ideas, we sure would love to hear them!

In Use Article Directory Submission for an Effective Marketing Strategy:Part 2 , we discussed how you take that idea and transform it into a title.

You have your title line and what do you do next?

At this point in time, I take my original keyword in my title line, and expand the search to come up with other related keywords that might work in my article.

So let’s say we use Article Submission as our keyword.  If I put this in my google search window, it pulls up 14,900,000 results in (o.22 seconds).  Now I don’t know about you, but to me that fact alone is absolutely mind boggling.  The things Google does is simply awesome.

What we want to do is look at the left hand side of the page.

Click on that little arrow next to more search tools. Wow.  Look at all those cool ways to look at things.  But the one I want you to look at now is the Standard View – Related searches.  Once you click that, you will see a completely new list that you can run through your keyword research tool.

Related Google Searches

Is that too cool or what?   This is what people are searching for RIGHT NOW!  I love this part.

Ok.  Back to work.  You have your list of keywords in hand.  Write them down or have them up on your second monitor.  If you don’t have a second monitor, check out our video on How to use Dual Monitors and see how easy it is to set up.  But, I digress.

Now you have to write.  I know that’s the hard part.

Here is something you can do to get the juices flowing.  Take a couple of your keywords, go to one of the ezines, use those keywords to search articles and get idea.  DO NOT COPY.  Quickly jot down ideas and go back to work.

There are three key points that I want to stress to you when you are writing.

1. Scanability:  Your article must be able to be scanned by today’s internet reader.  They want to be able to breeze over the written word.  Paragraphs should absolutely be no longer that three sentences.
2. Bullets/Numbering:  Internet readers love bullet points.  Once again goes back to being able to scan the article.
3. Emphasis: Place emphasis where you want by using bold, italicized, or Underlined. Once in awhile you can get away with CAPS, but do not use it frequently.  In today’s IM world, that is the equivalent of YELLING.

When you are writing for your own blog you can add images.

One of my readers once told me I needed more images.  And I felt like he had a valid point.  But in the ezines, many times they are not allowed.  So you must remember to paint the picture with your words.  And people love stories.  Can you tell it in story fashion?

A long time ago, I was told to start journaling.  And at that point in time, putting pen to paper was about the equivalent of eating Brussels sprouts.    So I would sit down with my pad of paper and my pen.  Do you know what I wrote?

I always started with my grocery list, which progressed to what I did that day, which progressed into flowing thinking.  Before I knew it, I had all kinds of little ideas and tidbits in the middle of the grocery list.  Kinda dumb, huh?  But it worked and I got past that writer’s brick wall.

HOMEWORK: If you haven’t yet, write your first article.  Remember the three key points, plaster a smile on your face (like you really mean it), and get to work.

Can’t wait to read it.  See you on the flip side.

{sharon}

P.S.  If you like this series on article submission, please help a fellow writer out and give me a tweet or bookmark.

We love to hear your comments.  Do you have any tips to share with our readers?

The trail in Ocala National Forest.

This desire intensified when we went to Sedona, Arizona and rented a jeep for the day.  We got into areas that you could only get there by a 4 wheel drive vehicle or a horse.   She said NO to the horse. 

Many of our pictures at the top of our site are from those excursions during that 24 hour period.

We took our first real break from our business this Saturday and went Jeeping in the Ocala National Forest.  But even as we were driving to our destination, as always our discussion turned to our business which we love.  Internet marketing has so many twists and turns that you need a score card to keep up.

We were deep in the forest and suddenly we came to a crossroads.  Which way to go?  Now, I am going to admit to something that an experienced jeeper should never admit to.

Ocala National Forest crossroads - which way to go?

I came unprepared.  I had no map, nothing to tell me where I was at or where to go to.  We were wandering aimlessly with no sense of direction.  What if I got stuck?  Or we broke down?  Hello, sir, I am in the Ocala National Forest, please come get me.  Duh!

While we did do some trails and managed to get the jeep quite muddy, we did decide to go straight so we could find our way back out.  But I am sure, we probably missed some pretty cool stuff.  So we found the Rangers Visitor center, got maps, came home, looked online for more detailed maps, and planned the next strategy.

Excursions into the forest is much like internet marketing.  Without a road map, or game plan, of where you want to go or what you want to achieve, you can end up using valuable time aimlessly.

There is internet marketing software that includes great training.  Get a road map.  Don’t wander aimlessly.  Have a sense of purpose and direction.

Truman - Experience at the wheel.

Wishing you all the best!   Grab those dreams.

Truman

P.S.  Meet me at the crossroads, I have your map to successfully market your business.

P.S.S.  Join us in the Tattler Forum that is coming soon.  Revealing our tips, tricks, and crossroad experiences and sharing and learning from yours.

P.S.S.S.  What crossroads have you experienced or dreams realized?  Share the good, the bad, and the ugly.

In Part 2, I want to discuss how you take that idea and transform it into a title.

You have your idea.  Now, one of the most important parts of your article is your title line.  Why?

• When you are submitting to the ezines, your title needs to be compelling enough to make that reader click on your title to access the article.   The competition for reader’s time is fierce and it takes a while to build up a following.  So your title must be intriguing without being stupid.

This is an example of a title line that is getting lots or reads: “Do You Know These Seven Elements of Online Success?”

Go to Go Articles and review some articles.  Great place for ideas, by the way.

• Also, you need a keyword phrase in your title line that will display in the search results for Google, Yahoo, etc.  Can you guess what the keyword phrase is in the title above?  My guess would be Online Success.  I took my guess and plopped it into the keyword search tool and this was the result.

So you have located your keyword, but it is important to make the title make sense.  Now this one is not as easy as it sounds.  You might find an awesome long tail keyword phrase that does not have severe competition.  But working it into a dynamic title line sometimes takes some creative license.  And sometimes, there is some give and take.  Do you want more search engine punch or is it going on your own site where direct searches may not be as important?

You have your idea, your keyword phrase and a possible title line.  What do you do next?  This is what I do.  I use this awesome site, Advanced Marketing Institute, where you can put your title in and it analyzes it for emotional marketing value based on Intellectual, Empathetic, and Spiritual criteria.

I am going to use the title of this post and show you the results.

Headline Analyzer

Now for a little homework.  What keyword phrase did I use?  Put this headline in the analyzer and bring the score up.

Or better yet, put in your title and start trying different values to bring up your score.  I usually like to tap into at least two of the criteria, Intellectual, Empathetic or Spiritual.  But this time, I accepted this one and moved on.  This site can get a little bit addicting.

Best of luck on all of your articles.  Get started today.

{sharon}

P.S.  For a great source for copy writing, don’t forget the Ultimate Guide to Google Adwords and also the Copy Writer’s Guild.

P.S.S.  Part 3 in a few days.  See you then!

P.S.S..S.  If you already know all this stuff, check out this great Article Submitter Program.

For part three, go to Use Article Directory Submission for an Effective marketing Stategy:Part 3

Wow!

I have had this problem FOREVER.  Now I haven’t had a chance yet to follow up on the solution, but I will probably head out to Radio Shack today.  So I will have to give you an update.

Anyway, here is a very short video, done by an extremely nice site, demonstrating how to eliminate the static noise that comes out of your speakers when your cell phone rings.