Back links are typically the key to a web page’s success or failure to get to the top of a search engine’s Search Results.

Search engines consider one-way back links to a webpage when determining its placement in those results. Other factors being equal, the quality and quantity of back links to an internet page may make the difference to it reaching the first or second page of Search Results or farther down.

Why is this important? Due to human search behaviour.

Research has shown that human beings are impatient creatures of regular habit. About 40% of searchers click the first web page displayed in the Search Results and almost 90% click on one of the web pages shown on the first page of those results. Nearly 99% of all clicks go to one of the top 20 search results, leaving only a paltry 1% of traffic for all the other webpages put together.

That being so, it should be obvious how crucial it is for a website builder to get his or her web pages to the first, or at least second, page of Google. After all, that’s where just about all of the free traffic comes from.

Astute web masters have long know that article submission sites help site writers build in-coming links. When quality directories supply in-coming links to a web page, the site or page usually climbs higher in search engine results.

Article directory websites have grown into a very important resource for both contributors and users. The article writer publishes content to an article directory which typically is free. Within that content are two, sometimes three back links to the publisher’s web pages. By posting to free article directories, the writer agrees to permit anyone to copy and use his or her content on their own website or blog, provided that they don’t change anything in the article and keep the links as they appear in the article.

Thousands of people scour article directory websites daily for fresh, free content for their own web site or blog. For them, building an internet page is little more than copy and paste: copy the article from the article site, paste it into their own blogor website along with the links.

Done properly, it is a win-win for everybody. The writers get critical back links and often free traffic; the users get free articles that are efficiently incorporated into their web pages.

The key to optimal article marketing is to follow steps which make it most effective because, truthfully, ineffective article promoting is a waste of time.

Effective article marketing involves these steps:

1. Writing an original, top quality article of at least 300 words (5 paragraphs or even more).

2. Use modern “spinning” technology to make similar but different versions of that single article.

This is critical because the search engines search out duplicate content and devalue all but the original page on which it appears.

3. Creating an author’s resource box at the bottom of the article with links back to two pages of the site being promoted, using good keywords as anchor text.

Many, though not all, free article directories, permit a link within the body of the article itself. For best results, put a link there to a different page on the internet site using keyword anchor text.

4. Subscribe to sites that use automation to “spin” your article and post, at the press of your mouse, different versions of articles to loads of web sites and blogs.

More is better. Use automation to your advantage.

5. Publish articles consistently over time.

Follow the method set out above and you’ll build an enormous number of back links in a few months.

And, you’ll be on the way to the top of Google.

The best online marketers know how to promote website by using completely free article websites, promoting their internet pages regularly using automated tools.