How To Syndicate Articles (Like A Boss)

Article syndication is HOT. Or at least that’s what info product sellers, certain groups of members from a “certain” Internet marketing forum, and just about every newbie with 6 months’ experience wants you to believe.

So in today’s blog post, I’m going to jump on the bandwagon and show you how to syndicate articles – like a boss.

What is article syndication?

Basically, article syndication is a simple process, which works a little bit like this:

1. You write an article on any niche topic, usually focused around a couple of keywords
2. You submit your article to popular article directories, such as Ezine Articles
3. Fellow webmasters and bloggers in your niche come along and pick up your articles, then repost them on their websites/blogs.
4. You get links and traffic from your embedded resource box
5. Once you’ve got a little bit more experience, you can actually build up a team of “syndication partners” – you simply cut out the middle man and send your articles straight to them.

According to proponents of article syndication, this is pretty much the best thing since sliced bread. All you need to do is sit on your ass and write quality articles, and then the traffic will flow from people republishing them across the web. Here’s an explanation by one of the world’s foremost (and most self-professed) experts on article syndication (scroll down the page a little bit until you see a post by Alexa Smith)

Now it all sounds pretty fantastic, doesn’t it? After all, who would want to learn how to do article syndication if it’s just that easy to manage? And with so many ardent supporters, especially on places like the Warrior Forum, who could ever doubt the effectiveness of article syndication?

I could.

You’re hearing it right from the horse’s mouth that article syndication simply does not work. It never has done, and it never will do (especially now that article directory submission is largely a waste of time)

There are so many structural flaws in the theory of article syndication that I almost don’t know where to begin. In fact, this post is going to be split into a few parts because I just get so fired up about this topic.

I hate seeing hard working people waste their time on methods that don’t work (especially when they are told by various talking heads that the only reason for their failure is because they “aren’t taking MASSIVE action”). Of course you do need to take action to make money online, but the thing is that you need to use a system that works – like Mark Ling’s AffiloBlueprint – rather than just blindly following the advice of people on Internet marketing forums who may not be anywhere near as successful as they actually claim (I’ll get to this shortly).

But that is neither here nor there for the moment, because it’s time to examine the two biggest reasons why article syndication just doesn’t work:

Firstly, no self-respecting web master or blogger of repute is going to republish duplicate content hauled from a crummy article directory onto their valuable web space. Article syndication pundits often claim that the bulk of their success comes from getting their articles republished on popular niche websites or blogs. However, I cannot think of a single info site (news websites excluded, because news is based on syndication) that would willingly take articles republished from another source and slap duplicate content on their site. If you’re looking to build up a reputation as an authority site, this is not how you go about doing it!

People who hark on about the usefulness of article syndication never seem willing to provide solid evidence of the sites that reproduce their articles. Surely if you’re having so much success with article syndication, you would be willing to demonstrate that success with the rest of the world (rather than trying to sell your secrets in over-priced info products or through coaching services)

Basically, I am yet to see one iota of evidence that article syndication – that is to say the republishing of duplicate articles – actually works. Fans of article syndication try to sidestep this attack, by moving on to claiming that they actually syndicate their articles in newsletter lists, often through buying a subscription to the directory of ezines (which, as a former ‘syndicator extraordinaire’ will tell you, is a waste of money). How very convenient – as soon as someone finds a way to score against your methodology, you simply move the goal posts.

Furthermore, article syndication doesn’t work because the people who do actually republish your articles either a) use auto blogging software to create rubbish quality blogs with scraped content, or b) simply republish your articles and remove the resource boxes.

Between my various Ezine Articles accounts (when I used to submit prolifically in the “bum article marketing” heydey of 2007-2010) I’ve had around 1.5 million article views, and over 500,000 resource box clicks – at one point I was making a full-time living just from submitting to Ezinearticles – and I’ve used this money to fund my college education completely.

Here’s a screenshot from one of my most popular Ezine Articles pen-names, James Philipson (I still use this pen name to run my Fix Broken Xbox 360 website):

So from just over 1 million views, I’ve had 1350 people hit my “EzinePublisher” link. Sounds fantastic, right? If you listen to the kind of people who hark on about article syndication until the cows come home, this would be the poster child of syndication success.

But you would be wrong!

Firstly, that number means only 1350 clicks on the EzinePublisher link – not that 1350 people have actually used the article. Conveniently, Ezine Articles (which I think is a big pile of dogs mess btw, ever since they suspended my account for writing too many articles on the same subject [“well duh I’m writing about my niche”] AFTER making them lots of money and being the top writer in the game consoles category) don’t actually include any function for tracking who picks up your articles and syndicates them across the web.

Never mind, because I’m a bit of a detective, and actually entered a string from one of my most active articles of all time, on the subject of the Xbox e74 error (excuse the crap quality of the writing, I was 16 at the time – and I’m still amazed it’s had almost 90,000 views) and took a quick look to see what kind of reputable websites are delivering me MEGA LINKZ AND TRAFFICKZ from “article syndication”:

 

It looks as if we’re off to a fantastic start with article syndication. A nondescript website, called “Experts 123” has literally republished my article with exactly the same title and everything. So let’s see how awesome their publish is:

“No formatting, no worries” (c) 2012 Sam Frost

And the priceless backlink? Oh yeah, it just points straight back to my Ezine Articles page – not to the website that I want people to visit in order to make me money (interesting observation – 99% of the automated reprints Ezine Articles I have seen actually change the backlinks to simply point to the original article location, and not to your website) I don’t know how I could ever have survived without article syndication like this!

What about that Best Buy Berol R Rapiddesign website – which sounds like a right classy establishment – how KILLER is the link juice I’m getting from this particular point of syndication?

So KILLER it’s dead.

And there you have it ladies and gentlemen – how to syndicate articles like a boss.

Just don’t even bother! Only the dregs of the Interwebs will be willing to accept your articles anyway. Instead, you are much better served writing high quality articles or blog posts and putting them on domains that you control. Keep writing, and then build up passive revenue with Adsense, Amazon, and Clickbank links.

If you don’t want to pay for domain names and hosting, then you would still be better off writing and submitting to Web 2.0 sites like Squidoo or Info Barrel, and earn yourself some spare coin there.

Don’t waste your time with article syndication – stick to a PROVEN system like Mark Ling’s AffiloBlueprint and actually make some real money. Your sanity will thank you for it in the long run.

Oh and if you want any more proof about the scam that is article syndication, read this.

Please leave a comment below. And if you’re a secret syndication fan please feel free to spark up a debate, so I can slaughter you mercilessly with my intellectual superiority.