SharePoint Magazine aims to provide high quality content and we put a lot of effort into improving that content through rigorous quality control and editing efforts.

To help authors write good quality content, we have put together these guidelines. Please note that these are guidelines only and not strict rules. Some authors have personal styles which may not adhere to all of the guidelines, and for some types of content it may not be possible or even desirable to adhere to play strictly by the book.

Clarify with your editor if you want to make exceptions and feel free to also suggest further guidelines that you think makes sense.

Please make sure you read all of the guidlines before you make an article pitch. Also, please note that because we pay you to write these articles, we require all publishing rights, meaning that you cannot cross-post these articles without prior approval.

General Guidelines

Each article will be unique and we strongly encourage you to put your personal style into what you write. That said, we have some basic guidelines to which you should adhere.

Keep in mind that readers come from all over the world and may not share the same cultural references that you have. Refering to an NFL superstar may make sense to US readers but will make little or no sense to someone from Japan.

The same applies to humor. What may be considered funny in one part of the world may be considered offensive in other parts of the world. Do not under any circumstance use humor related to religion, gender, sexual preferences or activities, violence, crime, or political views. All use of culturally dependent humor should be avoided.

Stay focused; articles in SharePoint Magazine should be targeted and provide a clear message. If you want to write about multiple topics, please consider writing multiple articles instead.

Feel free to use a personal tone in your articles. Readers like to connect to the author. If you like something, say that “I like this” rather than “Some users like this”.

Share your opinions, but make sure you make readers aware what are your opinions and what is fact. Saying “I dislike SharePoint user management” is better than saying “SharePoint user management is bad”.

Use a spell checker. SharePoint Magazine supports Windows Live Writer which has a good built-in spell checker. Even better, write your article in Word and turn on the style checking in the options (Word options->Proofing->Writing Style, select Grammar & Style) and paste your text into Live Writer after you have corrected your style.

Your copy editor will correct most mistakes and bad language.

Topics

SharePoint Magazine provides content related to, you guessed it, SharePoint. This means that all your articles should be related to SharePoint. That may seem too obvious, so let’s look at what does not constitute SharePoint related content.

Bad Example 1: Visual Studio 2010 Review for .NET Developers

A general review of Visual Studio 2010 and all its new features may be reasonable for general developers, but may not be related to SharePoint.

Instead, how about writing an article covering what’s new for SharePoint 2010 developers in Visual Studio 2010?

Bad Example 2: Active Directory Best Practices for Large Networks

SharePoint Server relies heavily on Active Directory, so knowledge of AD is important. However, general AD knowledge is better suited for other publications that can provide far more and deeper knowledge about this topic.

Instead, how about writing an article on “What you need to know about Active Directory as a SharePoint Administrator” and point to valuable resources?

Premium Content

If you are providing premium content for the SPM Premium offering, clarify with your editor what this content should be. Make sure that the content you are adding adds real value. A link to a YouTube video is not real value, but a high resolution, iPod-friendly, and downloadable video file may be.

Further, commercial messages or content, for example product brochures or flyers, is not considered additional value. See the Commercial Messages guidelines below.

Article Classification and Target Audience

SharePoint Magazine targets SharePoint professionals. A good indication for a target reader are readers who have or want to have SharePoint as part of their job title. Examples of this is “SharePoint Developer”, “SharePoint Programmer”, “SharePoint Administrator”, “SharePoint Analyst”, “SharePoint Architect” and so on. However, some job roles and readers may fall outside this categorization, for example “Solution Architect” or “Project Manager”.

At SharePoint Magazine, we consider development to cover three tiers as described in Marc D. Anderson’s Middle-Tier manifesto. In short, that means that developers develop solutions, whether they do that through the web interface, SharePoint Designer, or in Visual Studio. If you develop something in SharePoint, you are classified as a developer.

Further, all content is categorized in one or more of three skill levels; beginner, intermediate, and advanced.

A beginning SharePoint Professional is a person who is starting out with SharePoint. Keep in mind that a beginning SharePoint professional may have years or decades of IT experience.

An intermediate SharePoint Professional has extensive experience with SharePoint and have likely worked with SharePoint for a long time. They will know all of the basics within their topic or discipline so you can safely assume that you can skip the introductory material.

An advanced SharePoint Professional has a long track record with SharePoint. They will have multiple years of experience, a proven track record, and have mastered most or all of their topic or discipline through multiple past projects. An advanced SharePoint professional are not looking to learn basic topics from your article but rather to hone or explore new ways of utilizing best practices or your own ideas for how to better solve a problem.

Also keep in mind that skill level does not necessarily relate to article depth. A beginning article may go deep enough to cover intricate details on how list provisioning happens as long as you also cover the basics of that topic.

Layout

Please use simple layout as much as possible. Use Heading styles rather than direct formatting of headers. Use the quote tool rather than try to format a quote yourself. User a single space after full stop.

Try limiting your self to at most two or three leves of headings. Only longer articles will benefit from having three levels. Your article outline submitted as part of the article pitch should serve as a strong indication of the heading levels.

Avoid doing direct HTML editing as much as possible. Contact your editor or layout editor if you have questions on how to properly format content.

Always use ALT texts for your images and illustrations.

A layout editor will review your article and correct any mistakes, but keep in mind that the more time we need to spend on editing the layout, the less money will be left to pay for your article.

Commercial Messages

Your content should not unduly promote your product or service. Writing a review of your own product or being paid to write such a review for a vendor is considered unethical. If you receive any incentive to write about a product, you should clearly state so in the article and you need to clarify this with the editor before the article is approved.

Instead, how about writing about the general features of SharePoint that your product or service handles. For example, if you write a user management product, how about writing a description of the good and bad of SharePoint user management. Properly written, readers who are interested will inquire further, and your name will be connected with expertise on the subject, so there is a high chance that the readers will contact you to learn more.

If you are doing a review of multiple products within a certain niche and you have incentives or are connected to any of the providers, make sure you clarify that you have such incentives or connections in the text.

You may, of course, use your profile bio to mention that you work for a company and what that company does, as long as it adheres to the bio guidelines.

Please note that SharePoint Magazine does offer sponsored product reviews as a separate service to vendors. These articles may be authored by you, but will be clearly marked as Sponsored by Vendor.

Profile Bio

Authors of articles will be presented alongside the article with a profile picture and a short text. In that text, you are allowed to link to your personal site or blog as well as one link to the company for which you work or a commercial product or service you provide. If you work for multiple companies, please clarify with the editor or staff before you add multiple links beyond the default personal blog and company url.

Your profile picture should accurately represent you or, if you are writing on behalf of a company, your company logo.

All profile changes are subject to staff review and approval.