Contributor Program Welcome
Getting Started
You will receive an invitation to Camayak. STACK uses the Camayak platform to make contributing to STACK as easy and efficient as possible. You will start off by submitting an article Pitch. Once approved the pitch will turn into an assignment. From there, you will create your article. You can also track the status of your articles, see how your articles are performing, and leverage powerful social promotion tools.
What We Are Looking For (Ranked Highest to Lowest)
- Youth Athletes: (middle school, varsity, college): What can I do to be more successful in my sport?
- Parents: How can my athlete improve safely? And the Parents’ perspective.
- Coaches/trainers: What techniques can help me succeed for my athletes to keep my business going and growing?
- Sports News: We aren’t able to break sport news stories but we welcome those who can put a spin on those stories that are trending. For example, the Olympics. Each athlete has a unique path. If this is something you are interested in, please let me know and I can give you more details.
- Everyone: What can I do to live a healthy lifestyle? What is the latest fitness trend, and is it worth it?
Please look at our site to see if similar articles are already published before you submit a pitch.
How to Submit Images and Videos
We encourage you to submit images and videos along with your articles. Here’s how to do it:
Images
You can upload your own images to your article within Camayak. These must be original photos that you own and are not sourced from another website. To upload your photos, click on the camera icon found on your article’s right side and select upload in the top right corner. There’s no need to embed the image in the text. We will download the photos and embed them in our system.
You can also search through istock.com and send us the image link. Our art department will make a final decision on what photos to include in the final product. By applying to the STACK Contributor Program, writers agree that any unoriginal or unlicensed images uploaded/embedded into articles without the image owners’ consent will be the sole responsibility of the contributor/writer, and they are thus liable to copyright or other intellectual property infringement. STACK will not be held liable for improper image usage and reserves the right to retract any content if such infringement is suspected.
Videos
When it comes to videos, sending along a URL link to a YouTube, Vimeo, Instagram or Twitter post of the video inside the article is the easiest way to go about it. We can then embed it inside the article in the appropriate area. Again, videos shot horizontally rather than vertically are greatly preferred.
You can use your smartphone or a camera to shoot video. Please do your best to keep the camera steady and avoid background music or chatter that may contain profanity.
If you are sending us a photo or video, please make sure that everyone has their shirt on.
Article Length
Articles need to have a minimum of 600 words. Some articles that provide a quick tip to improve exercise form may fall under that mark, especially if they include a video, while a deep dive into a complex topic might exceed 2,000 words. Make sure that the content is complete and doesn’t leave the reader with any burning questions. At the same time, don’t feel the need to outline the entire history of the broader topic you’re tackling. Conciseness keeps attention.
Cite Sources
- Include source notes for all facts, figures or other data included within a piece. Relevant facts that back up your statements make for more credible and engaging content.
- When sourcing facts from another online article, include an active and clickable hyperlink within the body of your article (not at the end) linking back to the source article.
- Limit your hyperlinks. Link back to each of your sources just once. Linking to one of two sources is acceptable.
- Avoid unnecessary hyperlinks. Don’t hyperlink terms, places, people, etc. or to sources like Wikipedia. Link only to sources used.
- If you reference a study, we prefer that you link back to the study rather than including a works cited and in-text references.
Editing
We will no longer be accepting super technical articles or articles that need a lot of editing. If your articles are too technical or need a lot of editing, they will be sent back to you. Your articles should not read like a college paper. The easier your article reads, the more it will show up in Google search.
We are looking for a clean article, with, minimal formatting (underlines, headers, bolds). Please proofread and check for spelling and grammar. We strongly recommend using the free version of Grammarly. Articles with poor grammar and lots of spelling errors will get rejected.
Article Format
To see how an article should be formated, please review our sample article here: https://www.stack.com/a/sample-article/
Passive Voice
Avoid writing in a passive voice. Using the passive voice almost always makes your writing more distant and your message less clear.
Paragraph Length
If your paragraph is over 200 words, it’s almost certainly too long. At that point, it becomes difficult for most readers to understand, and you’re probably better off breaking it up into different subparagraphs.
Use Headings
For web copy, it’s good practice to make sure that your headings are informative to the reader. Some people like to tease their audience in the headers, trying to entice them to read further. While that can work very well, it’s easy to get wrong. Remember that the main focus of headings should be on the content – and the primary purpose should be to make the text easier to read and understand.
Write Shorter Sentences
Longer sentences are generally more difficult to read than shorter sentences.
Plagiarism
Plagiarized content and copyright violations are strictly prohibited. If we detect plagiarism, your article will be rejected and you will be subject to removal from the program.
Payments
W9
We will need new W9’s from everyone. Even if you had already submitted a W9 for 2021, the form needs to be updated every year.
Please fill out the form, date it 2022, include your name in the file name and email it to [email protected].
At this time we are not able to accept any new writers outside of the United States.