for a PG audience, or at least, PG-13. Obscene and profane material will eventually lead to an article's being flagged, either by raters, site stewards or Helium staff.

Profanity is unprofessional, and it violates Helium standards. Besides, what capable writer really wants to put sloppy language into print or cyberspace, where readers and potential publishers can find it forever?

DON'T SELF-PROMOTE.

The Helium rating system is based on anonymity. Raters see two articles at a time, answering the same topic. Authors' names are not included. This is supposed to prevent favoritism or prejudicial rating.

Helium writers do have ABOUT ME pages, however, where personal promotion and even web addresses are encouraged. This is the appropriate spot for listing your great accomplishments, recent publications, blogs and even personal websites, if you wish.

Self-promotion, gone bad, is spamming. This, too, is banned at Helium.com. Articles must focus on the topics to which they are posted.

DON'T WRITE IN ALL CAPS.

In cyberspace, writing in all capital letters is considered SHOUTING. Posting an entire Helium article in ALL CAPS is considered rude and unprofessional.

If you feel strongly about your topic, then you can certainly use emphatic words and showcase your writing skills to stress your key points. But Helium writers simply must avoid writing article in capital letters. Raters will flag such pieces.

On the other hand, because Helium does not currently offer bold or italic typefaces, varying fonts, or type size options, it may be acceptable to write headings and the occasional emphasized word in ALL CAPS. This might be considered Helium's answer to bold type.

DON'T WRITE LESS THAN REQUIRED.

Helium has introduced minimum word counts for most channels, With a few exceptions (songs, poetry and recipes), Helium articles must contain at least 400 words (2,400 characters).

A recent Helium improvement prevents writers from posting brief chat-room answers as articles. And it saves readers from wasting their time clicking on promising looking pieces that prove to be of little informative worth.

DON'T WRITE AN ENTIRE VOLUME.

While the minimum word counts on Helium are a big plus, this does not mean writers must compose weighty tomes on their topics. Online readers generally seek quick results and clear, concise answers to their questions. Direct, well-worded articles are a big plus. If you can say what you need to in 400 to 1,000 words, why drag things on for additional pages?

• << previous page
• 1
• 2
• 3
• next page >>

---

Add your voice

Know something about Helium don'ts: How not to write for Helium.com?
We want to hear your view. Write now!