by Berlin Asong

Created on: July 30, 2011   Last Updated: September 25, 2011

Having studied the contents of 1780 articles on Helium between June 2011 and September 2011, I have identified ten factors that adversely affect the ratings of articles. Avoiding these errors can improve your articles' ratings with the caveat that Helium's rating system is not perfect. Helium relies on the judgment of a community of raters, some of whom may be unfit to rate objectively.

1. Weak Opening Paragraphs

Perhaps, the most important part of an article is the first paragraph used by assessors to identify a writer’s ability to communicate ideas effectively. A weak opening paragraph is anything that distracts the reader's interest from an article. This includes rambling, irrelevant anecdotes, "I would have to say yes or no" statements, ad pitches, and so on. For example, a writer opens an article with the statement: “A quick answer to this question will be that ‘two heads are better than one’. Assessors don’t want quick answers, they want better openings. Should an opening paragraph have any of the errors identified below, it would fit the description of weak opening paragraph.

2. Title – Content Mismatch

Assessors would cast out articles whose contents do not match their titles. For example, an article’s title reads—“Reasons Employers Should Not Hire From Within”. Instead to advance the reasons for external hiring, a writer writes about gardening. However, title-content mismatch may not be caused by ambiguous titles. For instance, “Ways Employees Can Chase Customers Out of the Store”, is potentially confusing, can be interpreted in different ways. The ambiguity stems from the phrase verb “chase out” which can be interpreted as “to get rid” of customers or “going after” customers outside the store. A wrong interpretation produces a wrong content. If you can’t pin down the expectations of an article’s title, stay clear from it.

3. Limited or No Knowledge of the Subject Matter

Only choose to write on subjects you have a reasonable understanding. Sure, it is difficult to calibrate what is “reasonable understanding”. However, an assessor with expert knowledge of a subject can tell if an article lacks substance and veracity. Consider the articles written for this title, “Effective Marketing Strategies to Engage Customers”. More than 90% of the entries showed limited and misleading knowledge of marketing strategies.

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