So now we have established that you are not article marketing for traffic. You are article marketing for the relationship. The relationship is what you are building.

I would far rather have 100 lifelong customers than 10,000 one time sales.

Think about this.

Your sales funnel:

1) $10 ebook

2) $47 ebook

3) $97 ebook

4) $497 course

5) $5000 event

6) $5000 per year in coaching for life (say $50,000 – 10 years)

If 100 people get into that sales funnel, and go all the way – you make $55,561 per customer – which is $5,556,100 as the lifetime value of just 100 customers.

If you sold 10,000 people your $97 product up front – you only make $970,000. Do you see the difference?

And that is what you do with most traffic, with most systems. But with article marketing, you are building a relationship – and that is the important part.

So the article marketing funnel looks like this (even before they buy anything – remember, I do not even want a sale right away, I want the relationship).

1) The read your articles

2) They like your articles

3) They become hooked on your articles, and stop reading anyone else’s articles.

4) They click through to your link

5) Instead of more articles – they find a free offer to download a free book from you

6) That is irresistible to them – so they ‘buy’ the free gift (they are exchanging their name and email for the gift).

7) Now they are a customer, and not a visitor. This is the important part. The average person who visits a sales page cold buys at the rate of less than 1%, right (don’t believe me, check your visitors for last month and your sales). The average buyer on your list buys at between 10% and 20%.

Now you have to deliver the best sales funnel on earth – and get them to demand that you give them lifetime coaching for $5000 per month.

Do you want to learn more about how I do it? I have just completed my brand new guide to article marketing success, ‘Your Article Writing and Promotion Guide‘

Download it free here: Secrets of Article Promotion

Do you want to learn how to build a massive list fast? Click here: Email List Building

Sean Mize is a full time internet marketer who has written over 900 articles in print and 9 published ebooks.