ChaCha has the BEST Guides in the world and we want to make sure your work continues to be meaningful, fun and rewarding. So today we are announcing the first phase of a new experimental recognition program that will give you the opportunity to stand out among your peers, be recognized by ChaCha customers — and in the second phase coming soon, share in revenue from the fast-growing ChaCha.com website.
Today’s launch involves just Phase I of the GuideShare Program. We’re introducing a new supplemental compensation model that is Points-based.
- In Phase I, as we test and finalize the program, the focus is on recognizing top point-earning Guides on ChaCha.com.
- In Phase 2, Guides who earn points will share in the monthly revenue from the fast-growing ChaCha.com. This phase is targeted for launch in the December/January timeframe.
Our recent coverage on the Ellen Show and on NBC Nightly News has created an enormous amount of traffic, with more and more questions coming in every second of the day. You’ve also seen the awesome news about ChaCha.com skyrocketing up the charts of the most popular websites, closing in on the Top 100, and I’m sure you’ve noticed lots of high-volume alerts as we’ve experienced tremendous growth in our traffic.
We want to keep the momentum going, driving growth in both our unique users and overall query volumes, while cutting down on frustrated customers who’ve hit question limits. We know this is frustrating for you too.
All this is why we are launching the experimental GuideShare program. The new Points-based rewards program does NOT replace ChaCha’s current pay system, which remains as is. GuideShare is a way to supplement the current volume of paid questions that we do, not take away that paid traffic. The optional program is open to all Guide roles and will enable you to (soon) share the revenues with the company you helped build.
Here’s how the GuideShare Program works:
- The program is totally optional for existing Guides. All Guide roles are eligible.
- You can toggle between your normal paid-guiding mode and the “Points” based mode as often as you like, or not at all. (Toggling takes just one click in the Universe.)
- In Points mode, Specialists & Generalists earn 8 points per completed session, and Expeditors & Transcribers earn 2 points.
- A Leaderboard shows the entire Guide community who the top point earners are. Guide names for the leaders will appear on ChaCha.com in front of our 9.1 million and growing monthly visitors and on a palette in the Universe. Well-deserved recognition for the leaders, and something to aim for as Guides engage in a little friendly competition!
- The Universe will display every Guide’s own point totals for the last Hour, the current Day, and Lifetime, as well as your rank among all point-earning Guides. Because the Leaderboard updates regularly, you can watch yourself move up the rankings as you guide!
- In Phase 1, Points are earned toward the Leaderboard status, but will not be tied to revenue sharing. When Phase 2 rolls out (anticipated in Dec/Jan), Points earned after that time will earn you a share of ChaCha.com revenue.
An FAQ has more details on how the program works.
Try it out, and please tell us what you think as the beta test gets underway. I hope you’ll find it fun and exciting, getting those competitive juices flowing while enabling more and more people to experience the awesomeness of ChaCha. We’re excited to see where this unique program can take us.