Archive for the 'Features' Category

Introducing the new toolbar!

Published
by
Talia
on May 18, 2009
in Features and News
. 7 Comments

Most of you have probably noticed that last Thursday we implemented a new feature to the site: The Wibiya toolbar. The toolbar is another step we have taken to help you and your readers make the most of your articles by integrating community and social networking features.

Wibiya Toolbar on ArticlesBase

One of the great features of the toolbar is the Share button. Each article page already has 2 share buttons (beneath the article title and beneath the article) that allows your readers to share your articles through Facebook, Twitter, Reddit, email, Delicious, and more.

Share items

Now sharing is made even easier by placing a button at a prominent spot on your screen. We have already seen an increase in shared articles just from the past few days!

Next to the share button, you will see the new ArticlesBase Facebook community – you can join through Facebook Connect. Meet other ArticlesBase members, and receive updates from us – we promise to keep them to a minimum. You can also update your Facebook status directly from the toolbar without even leaving the page!

Facebook Connect

On the right side of the toolbar you can see our Twitter stream, and if you aren’t already following us, go ahead and follow us. We update often and we’re always available to answer any support requests. We’d love to hear your suggestions and let us know what you think about ArticlesBase.

Another feature of the toolbar is the ability to translate any page on the site into a variety of languages (that currently include French, Polish, Spanish, Italian, German, Chinese, Swedish, Dutch, Portuguese, and Hebrew).

This will help more readers who are not proficient in English notice your articles and read more. While there are translation tools online, having a built in tool makes it more efficient, meaning your international readers are more likely to read your articles.

If at any point you’d like to minimize the toolbar, click on the arrow on the right side of the toolbar.

Minimize toolbar

Click them again to make the toolbar reappear.

Mazimize toolbar

What do you think of the new toolbar? What social features would you like to see added? Let us know in the comments!

Subscribe by RSS to your favorite authors and categories

Published
by
Talia
on March 29, 2009
in Features, News and Tips
. 0 Comments

Did you know you can subscribe to your favorite authors and article categories?

If you click on any category or subcategory, you will see a little orange RSS icon by the category title. Click on the button and choose your favorite RSS reader.

RSS icon

You can do the same with your favorite authors - and your readers can do the same with you!

You can add an RSS feed of your favorite topics and/or authors to your website, and drive more traffic to your own articles as well.

So go out and let your readers know they are able to subscribe to your articles and make sure your fans come back for more.

Tip of the Day: Share your articles - it’s even on the article page!

Published
by
Talia
on March 24, 2009
in Features and Tips
. 0 Comments

Hi all,

One of the big questions we get from new authors is “How do I get more traffic to my articles?”

While there is no magic formula that will get your 100,000 views (and if there is, please let me know), there are a few simple steps that you can take to give your article an initial push.Tip of the Day

  1. Email your friends and family. Have them read your article and forward it on to their friends.
  2. Tweet about your new article, and ask your followers to retweet you. While you’re at it, send us a tweet as well. @ArticlesBase
  3. Share your article on such sites as Facebook, StumbleUpon, and countless others. You can do this directly from your article page: You can find a button that says “share”  at the top and the bottom of your article page, that gives you the option to easily share your article across multiple platforms.

These, of course, or just a few of many actions you can take to promote your article.

What techniques do you use?

Tip of the day: Edit your profile to increase your viewership!

Published
by
Talia
on March 22, 2009
in Features and Tips
. 1 Comment

Yes, I realize it sounds funny, but editing your profile and even just adding a picture can greatly increase your exposure.

Your profile says a lot about you - who you are, what you do, and how people can contact you. If you include a biography, your readers will know you better and will be more likely to follow you to your own website. Explaning why you are an expert on the topic you are writing about will give you more credibility, and this, too, will increase the chances of your readers clicking through to your website.Tip of the Day

We recommend including the following information (in whichever order you’d like to present it):

  1. Why you are an expert in the field you are writing about (education, skills, and/or qualifications)
  2. A photo
  3. A link to your website(s)
  4. Contact information
  5. Publications - if you have been published or interviewed in know publications, mention or link to them.

Remember to keep it short, yet informative. Pretend it’s an elevator pitch - and you have one floor to travel.

Do you have any blog posts about ArticlesBase or blog suggestions?

Published
by
Talia
on March 15, 2009
in Features, Tips and Writing
. 0 Comments

HI everyone!

It’s been a while since we’ve posted on the blog, but now we’re back full force. Before I really get into things, though, I’d like to ask you a few questions:

1) Have you written a blog post about ArticlesBase and how it’s helped you? If so, please let us know and send us a link - we may republish your post!

2) What would you like to read about? What kinds of posts would you like us to make?

3) Do you have any tips or tricks that you’d like to share with our community? If so, contact us about writing a guest post for our blog.

When contacting us, please be clear that you are talking specifically about the blog so I can get back to you.

As usual, you can follow us on Twitter and let us know what you think.

Have a great day!

Make your voice heard!

Published
by
Simon
on September 28, 2008
in Features
. 0 Comments

Hi All,

We have just setup a new feedback forum where all members can vote up (or down) new features based on what you want & suggest to the community.

Please check it out:

http://feedback.articlesbase.com

New: Rich Text Editor

Published
by
Simon
on May 27, 2008
in Features
. 2 Comments

Hi All,

You now all have the choice of using the old fashioned plain textarea (and enter your own HTML) or our new Rich Text Editor (you can past directly from Word with all your links intact and online images!)

Here is a screenshot (in red: swap between active rich editor and non active.)

ab_blog_270508.png

If you have any questions feel free to contact us or leave a comment.

New Widget - Personal Articles Widget

Published
by
Simon
on March 11, 2008
in Features
. 8 Comments

Hi All,

We have again teamed up with WidgetBox to bring you our latest Widget.

You can use this widget to display all or some of your published articles from our articles directory - including your Author Photo.

You can place this widget on your blog, website or favorite social network with a click of the mouse, just login to your account and you will see a new image ‘Get Widget’ - Click it once and install, its that simple.

Here is an example of an active widget on iGoogle.

If you have any questions or comments feel free to express them.

New Feature: We now allow images in articles

Published
by
Simon
on February 25, 2008
in Features
. 5 Comments

We have added the option for you to display images within your articles.

The images must be hosted on a external web site for you to link to - following this example:

<img src=”http://www.mysite.com/myimage.jpg” alt=”My Image” />

We believe this can help authors that need to describe complected processes and it makes it easier to have a photo with it.

Keep your images small (you can always link to a larger image) as it can mess up the nice layout of your articles.

If you need any assistance our team is here to help.

Simon - ArticlesBase.com

Extending your Author Profile

Published
by
Simon
on August 2, 2007
in Features
. 1 Comment

Hi everyone,

In order to better understand our authors we have added two new fields to your author account.

Gender & Date of Birth.

We would appreciate you all filling this in as it will help us with future features on our site.

Thanks, ArticlesBase.com Team.