Harriet Hodgson – Author Spotlight
Expert Author Harriet Hodgson, BS, MA, is in today’s Author Spotlight.
Harriet is not your typical article marketer. She started out as a teacher and earned a BS with honors from Wheelock College in Boston, MA. She went on to earn an MA in Art Education from the University of Minnesota and did additional graduate work. After spending a dozen years in the classroom, she changed careers and turned to writing.
She’s now been an Independent Journalist for more than 30 years and is the author of 27 published books and hundreds of print and electronic articles. She’s a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the Association of Health Care Journalists, and the Association for Death Education and Counseling. Amazingly, she is also an active GRG (grandparent raising grandchildren) of teens.
Harriet’s education and life experience give her a unique and wise position from which to write her articles. In many ways she is a model for combining article marketing with passion and expertise to benefit not only herself, but her readers as well.
We asked Harriet to share some of her experience and expertise with the rest of the EzineArticles community.
- Harriet, you do something very few authors manage to do well – you write on an assortment of different topics effectively. What’s your secret?
It is easy for me to find article ideas because virtually everything I write comes from life experience. When I am temporarily stumped, I just take a closer look at my life, and another idea pops up.
- Are all of your articles written with the intention of driving traffic back to your site or are many just written as labors of love?
I can’t say that I write every article with the idea of driving traffic to my website. However, I have written many articles about loss and grief and this is driving traffic to my website, which is designed to support my books.
- You’ve written a steady stream of approximately 100 articles/year for the last 5 years. How do you keep up this level of discipline?
Producing 100 articles a year does not seem like a lot to me. I would write more, but am often pressed for time because I am a GRG — grandparent raising grandchildren. It has been a challenge to raise teenagers and maintain my writing career.
- How does article marketing fit into your overall marketing plan?
Article marketing is the key to promoting my work. I recently received an email from a reader in Australia who had visited my website and found it helpful. When I surf the Internet, I see that my articles have been translated into many languages, including Spanish, French, Japanese, German, and Arabic.
- What’s the one piece of advice you would give newbie article marketers?
I would tell newbie article marketers to strive for quality every time. In other words, try to top yourself. To understand word flow and emphasis, I often read my articles aloud before I submit them.
- What are your favorite EzineArticles tools and why?
Of course, I love spell check. However, another favorite tool (and it surprises me to say this) is the one that flags excessive use of a word. I didn’t realize I was doing this until I received an email about it.
- If you could do one thing differently in regard to article marketing, what would it be?
I wish there was a way to know which publications or individuals are using my articles. So I Google myself. While this sounds egocentric, it always yields new information.
- What kind of results have you gotten from your article marketing efforts?
I am astonished by the effectiveness of article marketing. As soon as I reached 100 articles, the number of hits increased markedly. Thanks to EzineArticles my name is all over the Internet. I have received emails from readers and inquiries from newspapers and magazines.
- Anything else you care to share?
The beautiful thing about EzineArticles is that I can write as much as I want to, about anything I want to, as long as my mind is working. I’m just hitting my stride!
You may not have the benefits of Harriet’s education and expertise (few of us do!), but that doesn’t mean you can’t experience comparable success with your article marketing.
Here are 5 lessons from Harriet that you can put into practice today:
- Write about what you know and are passionate about.
- Just write! Sometimes opportunities come from unexpected directions.
- Don’t make excuses for not writing articles. Everybody has demands on their time, energy and concentration.
- Strive for quality and read your articles aloud before you submit them.
- Enter your author name in search engines and use what you find to gain new information.
Now put these lessons to good use by writing a whole new crop of fresh, high-quality articles. Speaking of crops, don’t forget to make hay while the sun shines! Article review times are still less than 24 business hours, so now’s the time to get that backlog of articles written and submitted.
And leave a comment for Harriet. I’m sure she’d love to hear from you. :)
Hi Lisa,
Thanks for reading the spotlight piece and for your comments. Your comment about the influence of your grandmothers touched my heart. My twin grandchildren will not understand how we have helped them survive crisis until they have teenagers of their own.
January 22, 2010 at 6:14 AMHarriet
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