Welcome to WryteStuff

Welcome to SearchWarp, we sincerely hope you have a positive experience here.  My name is Bruce Horst and I operate this website with my wife, Jean.  My job is to support SearchWarp users and make the website as useful as possible for both readers and writers.

SearchWarp is a place where creative writers gather to practice our craft and receive encouragement and feedback from other writers. We hope to become a valuable part of your daily routine.

To help you get started, I'd would like to go over a few basic policies and offer some tips on how to get started quickly.

Acceptable articles

First, I need to point out that SearchWarp is not intended for commercial use.  Articles which are business related or submitted for marketing or link-building purposes probably won't be accepted.  Sometimes we'll publish these articles on one of our sister websites, but they won't be permitted on SearchWarp.  We prefer articles which are personality driven, not product or service driven.

Article formatting

When submitting an article, please do not put the title or you name at the top of the article body, or you name in the title.  Your name and the article title will automatically be included on your article pages, so adding them again will mean that they are repeated, which won't look good.

Please don't use excessive formatting of your text, such as too much italicized or bold text, or two many color or font changes.  To maintain quality levels, we want articles to have the same basic appearance and we will remove the major formatting of articles if they contain formatting that we feel goes overboard.

Readers enjoy pictures sighing articles, and we provide a simple interface to upload images to our servers.  We don't allow images that are hosted outside of SearchWarp as this is too hard for us to manage when the images disappear.  Also, please make sure the images are not too large for the article.  A maximum with of 500 pixels will work fine.

Finally, please limit your articles to containing a maximum of 3 self-serving links, or links which benefit you, including links in your bio.  SearchWarp does not allow affiliate links, or links which redirect the user when clicked.  Self-serving links belong at the end of your articles.

Ok, now onto more useful information...

Control Panel

Whenever you log in to SearchWarp, you will be taken to the control panel.  The control panel is a starting place where you may read the latest announcements, add or edit your articles, edit your profile and account settings, and view some reports.

First things first (head shot, pen name, bio)

Before you do very much in SearchWarp, you may want to add a headshot image of yourself, create your bio or select a pen name.  These can all be done from the control panel. (Your pen name can be selected by clicking 'Edit Account & Email Settings'.)

Notifications, points and badges.

You'll notice that on most pages on SearchWarp there is a link for Notifications and Points at the middle of the very top of the page.

Notifications appear when important events happen, such as you receive a comment or a new fan member.  You will also be notified when you earn a new badge.  You can click in the notification count or the work "View" to see your most recent notifications, and you can dismiss each of your notifications if you'd like.

Badges are given out when you perform certain tasks like when you reach special milestones like when you submit your 1st article, leave your 10th comment, or gain you 25th fan. There are also mystery badges you will earn by surprise.  You can only earn 1 of each badge, regardless of how many times you perform that task.

Points are given for earning badges, and for doing more trivial things like logging into SearchWarp on consecutive days.  You can click on the points at the top of the page to be taken to a list of the points you've earned in the past 7 days. After 7 days you may notice your points going down, this is because generally SearchWarp looks only at the points you've earn for the past 7 days to judge how active you've been.  To keep your 7 day points total high, you've got to keep participating on SearchWarp.
 

Weekly writing assignments.
Every week at midnight (CST) Saturday evening a new writing assignment will be announced in the control panel.  If you successfully submit an article as a writing assignment before the end of the week, you'll receive a badge and points for completing this assignment.  Writing assignments are a great way to keep your writing skills in practice, and to interact with other writers on SearchWarp.
 

Submit your first article.
After you understand all of the above, you'll want to submit your first article.  Most people compose their articles on their own computer and then copy and paste it into the HTML on SearchWarp.  This usually works well.

After your article is submitted, a SearchWarp editor will review it, usually within a few hours.  Articles which don't meet our guidelines will either be move to one of our network websites, or deleted completely.  If your article is removed completely, we will send you a message via email telling you why it was removed.

SearchWarp editors may make formatting changes to your article to make sure it complies with our guidelines and is presented in a uniform manner with other articles.

Join a team and some groups.
SearchWarp groups are a place to interact with writers with similar interests.  To join a group, simply click on a group logo from the SearchWarp home page and then click "Join this Group" in the sidebar on the right.  You may join up to 3 groups, and 1 team.

Teams are more for competition between writers than for interacting with writers with similar interests.  When you join a team or some groups, your 7 day total points is combined with the 7 day total points from other members in the team or groups as a way of knowing which teams and groups are most active.
 

SearchWarp Home Page
The SearchWarp home page is a prized position for writers as many people come to our home page every day to see what's new.  Our home page displays the latest articles in each group, so you'll want to join at least one group for your articles to gain exposure.  Articles which our editors deem as written for commercial purposes won't be displayed in groups or our home page.

You will notice that articles that appear on the home page which you haven't read appear with a light-red background, and articles that you've left comments on appear with a light yellow background.  This is to help you keep track of new articles.

Group Home Pages
Group home pages work much like the main SearchWarp home page, except they list articles specifically submitted to that group. 

Tell your group what you're up to.
At the top of each home page there is a place for members to add a line of text.  This is called a 'bulletin board.'  This is a great way to keep in touch with members of your group.  Group statuses are also displayed on the main home page. 

Join some fan clubs.

A great benefit to SearchWarp is that you have the ability to become fans of other writers, and attract fans of your own.  By default, you will receive an email every day with a list of new articles written by writers that you are a fan of.  This setting can be changed in your control panel under "Edit Account & Email Settings".

Read & comment on the what your fellow group members have written.

How do you improve your writing skills without feedback?  Comments are a great way to interact with writers, and you can even respond directly to specific comments.

 

Ask & Answer Questions.

View your statistics and your rankings.

Weekly & Total Points.

Popularity Rating.

Number of Articles.

Number of Comments.

Number of Fans.

Money-Making Opportunities.