If there is one mistake in article marketing that many would be writers make, it is probably the inclination to write articles which are nothing more than one long advertisement. This can be very costly especially when you are trying to build web traffic. While people are on line for various reasons, the common denominator is they want information. All of the advertising and promotion should be reserved for that little section at the end of your article known as the resource box.

Christopher M. Knight the owner and founder of Ezine Articles.com, writes," the body of your article is where you "give" and the resource box is where you get to "take" for your article marketing gift of information."

Indeed. If people like the article you wrote, then chances are they will want to find out more. Your resource box is the doorway to readers getting additional information and you getting more site traffic.

Naturally your byline should contain your name. Pretty basic but you would be surprised at the number of articles which do not have it. It is also okay to include a brief description about yourself. The key word here is brief. Going on and on about what you did after graduating from Whatsamatter University won't cut it for your readers. Instead focus on the benefits you can provide to them.

Also make sure your link is active and pointing toward the page you want. Then check it and check it again. More website traffic has been lost due to the fact people click on a link and wind up on the wrong page or worse "page not found".

These are the basic components of your resource box. More than anything, it must be interesting and grab the attention of readers. A big part of this is your keyword selection. Keywords go along way in not only helping readers find your article but getting them to also click over to your website. There are a number of tools you can use for this; however you still cannot go wrong with Overture's free keyword selector tool.

A word to the wise here: Stay away from stuffing your articles and resource box with keywords. Search engines and article directories frown on this. Also stay away from using keywords that are not related to the topic of your article. This is a classic deception with some writers and does not do anything but tick people off.

You only get between three to five lines to persuade people to click to your website so give some real thought to your resource box. A good device to assist you with this, are the magazines at your local newsstand. Think about it. You walk by and see something that catches your attention. Chances are it's a sharp headline with a persuasive subtitle that triggers you to read further. It could also be the headline with a list of bullet points. The strategy here is to adapt some of the same attention grabbing techniques to your resource box.

Always keep in mind the main purpose of your article resource box is to get people to travel from the end of reading your article to your website. Make sure your article and resource box work as a team. Provide good article content while showing people the benefits of clicking your link. By doing this you are well on your way to more web site traffic