For any writer interested in self promotion, article marketing can be an essential tool in your arsenal.

If you don’t know what article marketing is, it’s about knowing how to write and submit articles to get into the top 10 Google Search results and building one way quality back links to your own site.

This is how all the top article marketers make their money hand over fist that they don’t want you to know about.

There is one vital secret about article marketing you should re-read several times over, until it truly sinks in.

Many writers will never attract an audience as they do not understand this secret…

Here is your secret, seems simple and unimportant, but when you finally understand it, it will be like an “AH-HA” moment:

What do you- as a consumer- actually care about?

Your wants, needs and desires will typically fall into one or more of the following categories:

Better health.

More comfort or security.

More money/greater success.

More leisure time.

More popularity/recognition.

Greater charisma/beauty.

Instant gratification.

Attraction to pleasure/avoidance of pain.

When you write about your readers desires, you can be sure of gaining their attention. Then you can follow through with an enumeration of the benefits he or she can gain by reading your work.

In essence, you must reinforce the advantages, comfort, happiness and instant gratification your reader will enjoy - as you have implied in your article headline.

Mentally picture your reader, determine their wants and emotional needs- put yourself in their shoes, and ask yourself: If I were reading this article, what are the things that would appeal to me?

Write your article and headlines to appeal to your reader’s wants and emotional needs and ego cravings.

Remember, it’s not the “safety features” that have sold cars for the past 50 years. Nor has it been the need of transportation. It has been, and almost certainly always will be, the advertising writer’s recognition of people’s wants and emotional needs and ego cravings.

Carefully study a BMW commercial, next time you get the opportunity.

Writing good articles and advertising copy is nothing more or less than knowing “who” your buyers are; recognizing what they want; and then telling them how your product will fulfill each of those wants:

Visualize your prospect.

Recognize their wants.

Satisfy them.

Remember this because it’s one of the most important keys to writing that pays.

The “desire” portion of your article is where you present the facts of your product; create and justify your prospect’s conviction, and cause them to demand “a piece of the action” right now.

While these type of articles can be easy to read, they may not be so easy to write. Elegant simplicity takes work!

One guy who has been working and succeeding at article marketing for a few years is Dean Shainin. You can read Deans Article Marketing Manifesto here.