Q. What should I include in my application?
A. The application is our indication of who you are and what your abilities are, so present your best effort! Spell check and grammar check your sample article. We are looking for enthusiasm and a caring heart.
Q. What support do you provide to your editors?
A. We provide support for all levels of incoming writers. We train and mentor our editors in web writing, community forum building, social networking, web marketing, ebook creation, and much more. Our community of editors actively provides personal and professional guidance and support. We are a friendly group of writers and we love to help each other out!
Q. Who owns my content?
A. You always own your own content. You are free to use it elsewhere, to use it in a book, to use it in magazines, to use it on other sites. You grant BellaOnline permission to show it, but if you choose to leave or to use your content in other manners, it's completely up to you! BellaOnline only shows your content while you grant us permission to do so. Many editors write for BellaOnline for a year or so, then gather those 52 articles up and turn them into a book! They then use their BellaOnline site to promote their book, getting more sales for it. All of the content you write for BellaOnline is never "lost" - it is always yours, to do with what you wish. And unlike writing a book offline, with BellaOnline you are building up a loyal following and getting instant feedback while you put together your content.
Q. Do I need to know any HTML, web design, or programming?
A. You don't need to know about HTML, web design or programming. Our easy to use forms let you add and edit articles, links, and other information through simple interfaces.
Q. Do I have to have my own web site to do this?
A. No. BellaOnline is intended to teach aspiring writers every aspect of writing for the web, including providing training to learn HTML, working with images, creating popular articles, and much more.
Q. Who pays to host the content and site images?
A. BellaOnline pays all site hosting fees, image serving fees, bandwidth fees and software fees. BellaOnline actively works to bring publicity in to your site and to get your name known and respected. A BellaOnline editor pays zero for his or her content being read by millions of visitors, for the free expert training, and for the ability to recommend and sell related products to that market. No other site provides this level of hands-on training and 100% profit retention by the editor.
Q. Do I just edit other peoples' content and submissions?
A. No. Editors write all of their own content. Each editor is the sole writer for their topic. We are the Voice of Women, and the point of BellaOnline is to let a woman (or man) speak his or her mind and be heard. Note that all content must be 100% your own words and not cut-and-pasted from another website, or slightly rewritten from existing content written by another person. We take plagiarism very seriously here.
Q. How seriously do I have to take this and how much responsibility is it?
A. Being an editor requires a serious effort akin to a weekly club membership. It's only a few hours each week, but you need to stay on schedule. A key training focus is to help editors learn the discipline to write weekly. Your visitors build up interest in you, and enjoy seeing fresh content weekly on your topic. It is a fun and enjoyable experience. It's about taking a topic you're passionate about and sharing it with the world.
Q. How much time is required of me?
A. The time necessary to maintain a site depends on your level of expertise, how much research you'll have to do to keep the site new and interesting, and how much time you have available. The goal of BellaOnline is to provide the most useful, efficient, and enjoyable experience on the Internet. We estimate that an average of 3-4 hours per week is plenty to develop and maintain a quality web site.
Q. I write for another website. Can I be a BellaOnline editor?
A. BellaOnline is focussed at the brand new editor who wants to learn how to write for the web from the ground up. If you are already an expert writer, being paid to write on other sites, you might not benefit from what we are providing as far as training and support. Also, most content sites will not allow you to write on the same topic elsewhere. If you are writing for another site on the topic of "dogs", you are probably not a viable candidate for the "dogs" site at BellaOnline. Finally, if you are accepted, our site has a privacy clause in our contract - and the other site you write for probably does as well. You need to respect the privacy of other BellaOnline editors and not spread private BellaOnline information to your other networks. BellaOnline will never ask you for any information about any other site you work with, nor about private information about any other person. You need to provide us that same level of respect.
Q. Can I earn money?
A. You take home 100% of any and all sales you make on your site. You are paid directly by whichever vendors you choose to work with. Your sales are all context-driven by the content of your articles and we boast a 10% or higher clickthrough rate on many of our targeted sales items. You're free to sign up with Amazon.com, CJ.com, Art.com, and any other affiliate program you wish. We also let you sell ebooks you write, and you keep 100% of the money. Most publishing houses charge a large up-front fee and 50% or more of profits for this ability. Editors at BellaOnline care about their topics, and this helps them build a trusting relationship with their visitors. When editors then recommend quality products related to their topics that they find useful, visitors are likely to trust these suggestions and buy them. Visitors don't have to "search out" a separate shop area or interrupt their reading pleasure. They simply read your quality content, see the link for the related product, and click the link to purchase it.
Q. Why wouldn't I just create my own website / blog on my topic?
A. Many editors do run their own websites and blogs in addition to writing at BellaOnline. Running your own website costs you money to host and then traffic has to be built up for it from scratch. Free blogs also start from zero visitors. Even the largest personal sites often get only 50,000 pageviews or less a month. In comparison, the BellaOnline network gets over 20 million pageviews a months and is recognized as the second largest women's site on the web.
If for example you wrote about gardening on your personal site, you might get a few readers. If your aim was to earn an income, this would equate to pennies a month. By writing about gardening as the BellaOnline Gardening Editor, you immediately have high traffic and an established newsletter membership. You'll receive free books to review, free products to review, and requests for radio interviews. Many editors get asked to write books based on their online content. Being an editor with BellaOnline brings you free publicity for your personal site, publicity for products you sell, and recognition for you. Plus, we offer free training, forums, and chats by recognized experts to help you with search engine ranking, great content creation, and much more.
Q. What type of personality works best at BellaOnline?
A. We are an extremely nurturing, supportive group. A person who was very competitive and wanted to "outdo their neighbors" would not be a great fit for us. We all share our tricks and tips with each other, to help each other get better. We are all volunteers, so we have to be patient with each other on getting things done. We come from different countries and different cultures, and are different races and religions. So a tolerance for different opinions is also important! We take respect very seriously - respect for each other, and respect for our visitors. If you have a low tolerance for disagreements and a tendency to want to 'get back' at people who upset you, this is probably not a good environment for you. Being a web writer tends to attract both praise from supporters and negative attention from those who feel differently than you do. We've found this even on generally 'neutral' topics like Birding. So you need to honestly look at your personality and see if this would be a good fit for you.
Especially in our BellaOnline forums, the ability to take a deep breath, think for a while, and then create a respectful, calm, quiet response is critical. Please be sure to read our BellaOnline Forum Guidelines to learn more about our dedication to supportive, quiet, non-confrontational forum areas. We realize our forums are fairly different than many other forums on the web. We treasure our style, and welcome all who share in our desire for a utopia of compassion.
Q. Can I Apply to Multiple Sites?
A. When a trainee becomes a fully fledged editor and has learned the whole system then they can certainly apply for a second topic! However we have found over and over again that a person trying to train on two different sites at the same time is burnt out in a matter of weeks. It’s like trying to go to school to be a doctor and a lawyer at the same time. It really is best for the editor if they focus on one site, do really well on that one site and learn how to do ebooks, forums, chats, and all the other skills. Once they are comfortable with all of that, it is much easier for them to then put in the time investment to learn a second site.
Q. How soon will I hear from you after I apply to become a editor?
A. It depends on the number of applications we're processing that month. We will get back to you as soon as we possibly can - we need you! We try to move fast, but we are all volunteers here and sometimes get backed up. The latest you will hear news is 30 days. Please refer to our application process overview for details.
Q. I would like to apply. Where do I go?
A. Please go to our BellaOnline Editor Application. We look forward to hearing more about you!
