Should you pay to promote articles

That for me was never an option till lately, and I thought why I shouldn’t try it out. In the past, I had seen many popular websites promote articles and posts by paying for it. However, there’s a trick here, you should never pay for allowing others click the link that opens your article page. Promotion is perfectly valid till the moment you subject your site to follow the mentioned guidelines of search engines. 

 Image credit: studiom1 / 123RF Stock Photo

Now, to give you an example, I wanted to take a look at the recently added facebook promotion feature of ‘boost post’. They have two options, one where you can avail a $5 facebook promotion feature, and the other where you are entitled to see your post across hundreds and thousands, by paying, from $15- $200.

I was impressed because it essentially allows your post to go through in the news feed. Millions see news feed on Facebook. You have every opportunity to get your post noticed and even make it viral.

But does it work out 

What I found on Facebook was if your post has a terrific title, and if it sounds appealing, then you can be assured that your post will get thousands and millions of views. But it’s never easier. It was then I realized how powerful a title is for an article to get noticed. For a title to work, there are several factors to look into, which includes, the message in the title, the tone of the title, and how it sounds when you run your mouth over it. 

The most important, above all, is whether the title has in it, to make the story popular. If your title has all these, then promoting your post certainly helps, even if you choose to pay to promote articles. Places like Facebook can work out in your favour, because then, it can tempt the onlookers to get inside the post, and the best part of all is you are not breaking any rules. 

However, you should be careful while marketing articles. If your title doesn’t attract viewers then, you can waste hundreds of dollars in a jiffy. Always try with a low budget, to see how your article fares, whether it attracts visitors to your site initially. When you find the response is strong enough, you might think of increasing your budget.

Shall I promote each and every post?

Every article that you choose to write may not entice readers. The best way, I guess works out better is to promote your articles with the best topic and engaging titles, and eventually, the other articles of yours have a reasonable chance to get promoted in the network. Paying to promote each and every article can be a waste of money. 

If you have a considerably reasonable budget, or in case you own a site, and have good commercial revenues flowing in, you can create a fixed capital separately for each article you publish. For instance, if you choose facebook promotion feature, you have a fair chance that you will receive Facebook likes for your article, which in itself is a proof that your site has been generating readers interest in the market, along with visitors to your site. 

Lastly, promotion should only play a second fiddle, rather than depending solely on it. Promotion should be undertaken only to entice readers to your best articles. Remember if you start promoting your not so excellent articles, then there’s a strong possibility that your site might get negative reviews or comments. Therefore, be careful before you opt for promotion.

 By Rajiv Sighamony