Helium Content Types
There are now a variety of content types that you can use to publish on Helium.
First, there was the standard Helium article. Read more about How to publish an article on Helium.
The newer content types are "How-To Guides" and "News Stories." Read on to learn more about those.
How-To Guides
In December, we introduced the new content type called "How-To Guides” (Beta). This special page lets you create step-by-step How-To Guides using the How To Wizard builder.
To get to the How-To page, click on “My Zones” in the Beta navigation bar in the lower area of your My Helium page:
On the My Zones page, you will see a display of tabs including the following:
In order to create How-To Guides, members must first submit an application. If approved, How-To Guide creators must adhere to conventions regarding required blocks and placement in order to promote uniformity throughout the product.
To apply to the How-To community, visit your "My Zones" link found in the left navigation bar called "Beta" on your My Helium page. Then select the "How-To Guide" tab. Select the link "Click Here to request membership in the How-To Guide Community" and you'll be brought to the application. Fill that out and your information will be reviewed by a member of the How-To membership panel. You are also required to have a professional photo and real-sounding name on your About Me page. You will be notified if you are eligible to create a How-To Guide and how to proceed.
How to create a How-To Guide
Once you are accepted to write How-To Guides, you can access the How-To Guides builder from the "How-To Guides" tab on your "My Zones" page. Click on the "Build a How-To Guide" button.
You'll be brought to the How-To Guide rules page. Read the rules, then click "Next." This will take you to a page with top-level channels where you can find How-To Guide subjects.
Pick a channel by clicking on it and you'll be brought to a page listing sub-channels with the number of titles available.
Pick a subchannel by clicking on it. The next page will list suggested titles to pick from based on Search Engine Optimization (SEO). Click on a title that interests you. If you don't find what you are looking for, you can use the "Click Here" option to suggest a title. You may need to use the "Change Channel" feature, which will open a new window for this purpose.
The How-To builder will walk you through suggesting a topic for a How-To page and when finished, click "Done."
You will then have to wait for the title to be approved. A notice will be sent to you in your Inbox, which you can access from the top horizontal navigation on any Helium page.
In the email you receive, you have two options. The email text will say: "Please click here to preview the How-To or click here to begin editing the How-To."
The edit functionality at this point will be familiar if you have built Zones in the past. One new feature is the ability to write various steps necessary in the How-To Guide display. Also keep in mind that the conventions for the layout and applicable content blocks are stricter than with Zones. How-To Guides should have a uniform format throughout Helium.
What to see some examples of great "How-To Guide" pages? Check these out?
News Stories
In December, Helium introduced the content type "News Stories." This enables you to publish multimedia news stories or packages onto Helium, which will show up in the Google News service. Using Helium's unique News Builder, you can create a living news page that can be updated as the story evolves.
To write a News Story using the News Builder, you must first apply. To apply to the News community and write News Stories, select the "My News" link in the left-hand "My Helium" navigation bar on your My Helium page. Then click on "Click Here to request membership in the News Community." and you'll be brought to the application. Fill that out, and your detailed information and clips will be reviewed by a member of the Helium News community. You are also required to have a professional photo and real-sounding name on your About Me page. You will be notified if you are eligible to write News Stories and how to proceed. Approved news writers will also get a badge called News Writer.
How to build a News Story
Once approved as a News Writer, click on "My News" in the navigation bar on your "My Helium" page or on the "News Stories" tab from your "My Zones" page. You will be brought to a page called My News Stories.
Once you're on your "My News" page, click on the bright green "Write A News Story" button.
You'll be brought to the How-To rules page. Read the rules, then click "Next".
You'll be asked to enter a news title, keywords and a brief story description. We advise you to check for duplicate titles before continuing. The system will not let you move forward until you've checked for duplicates. Then click "Next."
The next page lets you pick a location for your News Story. The news has to happen somewhere, right?
Click "Next" and you'll be brought to a page to choose a news category, such as Sports, Politics, Business, etc. Once you've picked a category, you'll then need to click a channel for your News Story to reside in on Helium. The channel selection page is a basic taxonomy setup where you can drill down the final leaf channel on Helium. The more specific your location is, the better!
After you've selected the channel where your News Story will reside, click "Next" and you'll be brought to the confirmation screen. Here you'll ensure that everything is correct and you can select the "Finish Wizard Phase One" button. Upon finishing the first phase, you'll then be able to edit how the news article will appear and you can give it added content features such as maps, stock quotes, polls and other nifty add-ons.
When you're done selecting all the added features that will enhance your News Story, click "Next."
Now you can write and edit your breaking News Story. Remember, you'll want it to look like a professional news story as seen on the Washington Post, New York Times or Boston Globe. (Or The Times of London for our British members.) When you are finished, click the "End Wizard" button.
The next screen will allow you to preview your news page, which we highly recommend, and to publish your breaking News Story. And once it's approved and published, it's live for the world to see. Give yourself a pat on the back for furthering the cause of Citizen Journalism.
Topics Pages
What are Topics?
Topics are among Helium's new products. They are information-rich content landing pages where readers can find factual and unbiased overviews on a subject. Topics are like Zones : They are created using the same basic technology and layout. But Topics are linked to from articles all over Helium. Topics are built from a mash-up of content found all over the web like related Helium articles, Wikipedia, Yahoo News, and Google Images. Most Topics start out on the site as automatically generated pages, but are then enhanced by Topic community members who collaborate to build optimal pages for visitors of Helium to view.
Where will I see them?
Visitors will see hyperlinked text throughout articles all over Helium. Each time there is a keyword phrase that matches a title of a Topic, it will hyperlink the phrase to the Topic Page. You will see pages for "Britney Spears," "Acai Berry," and most definitely "Swine Flu."
The Value of Topics pages
When Topics pages are linked to from an article of yours, it adds to the overall search engine value. That means increased traffic to your article and increased article earnings.
Some Basic Topics page rules
- Helium may at any time determine that a Topic Page is being neglected or not being properly maintained. Helium can remove the manager from the page and can also reassign it to another manager. Helium may at any time determine that a member of the Topic Community is not participating appropriately and can remove him or her from the Topic Community.
- At any given time, a community member can be a Manager of up to 100 Topic pages.
How to become a Topics page manager
At this time, Topics page managers are selected by invitation only. Potential managers are required to have a professional photo and real-sounding name on your About Me page.
If you are a Topics Manager, you’ll be able to access your Topics pages from your “My Zones” page. There will also be a tab located at the top of your Helium About Me page.
Check out these popular Topics Pages
More on Topics Pages
We also have a forum in the Help Group allowing members to post issues they’ve encountered with Topics. Our Topic Community will then confirm the issue and fix them. Acceptable issues to cite are incomplete or wrong keywords (e.g. "blue book" instead of "Kelly Blue Book"), irrelevant content (e.g. a Topic about Donna Summer which pulls summer related articles), and other issues you may feel are important.