General

Directory & Profiles

Events

General Profile Information

Preferred Members

Free Members

NLN currently covers most of the Mid-Atlantic region, including all of Virginia (with a bit of West Virginia), Washington DC, all of Maryland, all of Delaware, Eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey. We also have service providers outside these areas who sign up as well so feel free to search in a larger radius to find more options.

No, absolutely not. You are encouraged to use the Directory, Events Calendar, Learn/Article section, and sign up for the Newsletter—and none of this requires a membership. If you want to list an event or create a profile in the Directory, you will need a Membership.

Click on the “Add to My Account as a Favorite” link shown at the top of each profile and event you choose. This will add that particular profile or event to your “My Account” page. Then, every time you access your “My Account” page,  your favorites will be there waiting for you. Events will show up in your "My Calendar" section in the left sidebar and profiles will be listed in "My Personal Provider Directory" on the lower right.

Please be assured that we will never share your information, including your name or email address. We also do not view or store any credit card info. All financial transactions are handled directly through our highly secure credit card payment gateway.

Our chosen merchant account provider, Dharma Merchant Services, contributes 10% of its gross profits to the charity of each merchant’s choice. NLN has chosen BALLE (www.LivingEconomies.org) for this donation. BALLE stands for Business Alliance for Local Living Economies. It’s an organization for businesses that are looking for tools and resources on sustainable, local, and environmentally sound practices. BALLE members regionally include the Sustainable Business Network of Greater Philadelphia, Sustainable Business Network of Lehigh Valley, Susquehanna Sustainable Business Network, DC-Area Local Business Alliance and Chesapeake Sustainable Business Alliance.  If you or anyone you know is in the market for a merchant account company, we would recommend Dharma Merchant Services—it’s rare to find a company in this field with a similar thinking and mission. Very refreshing. Read more about them at www.DharmaMerchantServices.com.

NLN uses only printers who offer FSC (Forest Stewardship Council) certified and/or recycled paper options for all our mailings. Although we must begin with mailings and flyers to get the word our locally about what we offer, our ultimate goal is to utilize enough cutting-edge search engine optimization strategies, personal appearances and other media that we will eventually be an entirely online business with minimal need for the use of paper or “snail mail.”

First choose a section of the Directory by clicking one of the sections from the header of any page:

When that section page opens, you will select a category of service (from the list on the left), then put in your starting zipcode (this is usually your home) and choose a preferred radius in miles for the database to search. This will yield a list of profiles based on these search parameters. You can also use the Advanced Search function to search by keywords or phrases, or even a service provider's name. We suggest you play a bit and you'll soon see how it all works.

No, we do not verify or validate the information. You should always check stated credentials yourself if this is important to you, especially if you are seeking treatment or guidance with a medical issue. Here are the links for state websites governing licensed health professionals:

• Virginia: http://www.dhp.state.va.us/profbyname.asp ;   
• Maryland:  http://www.dhmh.state.md.us/html/proflicm.htm;    
• Diistrict of Columbia: http://app.hpla.doh.dc.gov/weblookup/ :        
• Pennsylvania: http://www.dos.state.pa.us/bpoa/cwp/view.asp?1104&q=434136&bpoaNav=| ;                   
• Delaware:  www.dpr.delaware.gov/ :                                                                                                                    
• New Jersey: http://www.nj.gov/lps/ca/medical.htm

To check out a business or non-profit organization at the Better Business Bureau, go to www.bbb.org. There are other state and local agencies that regulate certain professions and they may be contacted to determine whether a business has the required license, certification or registration. You should refer to the “Government Pages” of your local telephone book to find these agencies. For example, states have a Department of Consumer Affairs and/or Business Regulation where you can check for complaints that have been filed against a business you may be considering using.

DISCLAIMER: Natural Lifestyle does not provide medical advice. The contents of this website may contain health or medically-related materials, including text, graphics, images, information obtained from the profiles, event pages, articles and other material (“Content”), Content contained on the website is for informational purposes only. The Content has not been evaluated by the FDA and is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified healthcare professional with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition. You should seek medical advice before undertaking any diet, exercise or other health program described on this website. Information obtained here is not exhaustive and does not cover all aspects of any diseases, ailments, physical conditions or their treatment. Should you have any healthcare–related questions, please call or see your physician or other healthcare provider promptly. You should not disregard medical advice or delay in seeking it because of something you have read here.

This is because the profile owner has unpublished their profile or it has become inactive due to non-payment, violating the terms of service or inappropriate content.

Anyone can list an event in the Natural Lifestyle Event Calendar providing it meets the following criteria:
For full details, please see our event listing guidelines page.

1. Must be a natural lifestyle event.
   Your event must  fall within the “natural lifestyle” parameters of health and wellness, spirituality and consciousness, exercise and fitness, green living, sustainability, or socially conscious business.
2. Must occur one time and can last up to 5 days.
   Each single event listing can cover an event that occurs one time and lasts up to 5 consecutive days, such as a conference, seminar or training. Recurring events such as a weekly yoga class or bi-weekly networking group do not qualify to be listed in the main events calendar and should be listed in your profile.
   
3. Must be intended for larger audiences of 25 or more people.
   The events directory is for larger events with attendances of 25 or more people. Smaller events or meetings should be listed in your profile and do not belong in the main events calendar.
   

***Natural Lifestyle reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to refuse or remove events we feel don’t meet these listing guidelines.

In order to list an event in our event calendar, you must first have either a Free Membership or a Preferred Membership. Once you have an account, and have read our event listing guidelines:

1. Log into your account in the upper right corner of any page
2. Click 'My Account' in the upper right corner
3. Click 'Create an Event' in the left sidebar under the My Account heading
4. Now you can enter all of the details of your event including an image if desired
5. Next you can link this event to any of your published profiles under 'Profile Links'
6. When you are finished, simply click the 'Add/Edit' button to publish your event
7. You can come back at any time to edit your event or unpublish it if you no longer want it to show

Sometimes if you copy and paste text in from Microsoft Word or from a website, it brings formatting along with it that you can't see. This will sometimes cause your text to look different in the editing window than it does on your event page. We recommend that if you are going to paste text in, that you copy it as plain text, which can be done by saving your Microsoft Word document as plain text or using a program like Notepad. This should eliminate any extra formatting. If you are still having problems with the formatting of your event, you may just need to delete everything and type it out again.
Tip: If you need to put text on the line right below text, you may need to hold the Shift key while pressing enter.

There are 2 reasons that your event will dissapear from your account. Your event may have expired. Once your event passes its end date, it is deleted from our system, which will delete it from your account. The other reason an event may not be in your account is because it violated our listing guidelines and was therefore deleted.

Please note that once events have expired or have been deleted, they can not be brought back for any reason, so please consider this when listing an event, and please be sure that it meets our listing guidelines so that it won't be deleted.

This can be because of several different reasons. First, be sure that your event is published in 'My Account'. When looking at your event, if it says Not Published like the example below, then you need to click on Not Published to change it to Published.

You be sure that you have entered a city, state and zip code in your event listing. Without that information, your event can not be found in searches. The final thing is to be sure that you have the right zip code in the search box, because every time that you log in to your account, whatever zip code you have set in your Account Info is what the site sets your  zip code to. So if the event zip code differs from your Account Info, then you will not see. Simply type in the correct zip code and search again.

• Service providers in a natural lifestyle field.
  This includes individuals, businesses or organizations providing a service related to living a holistic, sustainable or socially conscious lifestyle. Certain types of services are not appropriate for this website and therefore may not be accepted for a profile including, but not limited to, plastic surgery; cosmetic dentistry; churches with strict dogma or beliefs (religion vs. spirituality); groups with unusually restrictive or exclusive memberships; highly unusual or explicitly sexual practices; or any business, group or service not generally considered “natural,” “holistic,” ”sustainable,” or “socially conscious.”  Profiles cannot be used by individuals for personal or social networking purposes and no objectionable language or profanity may be used. 

• Natural Lifestyle Network Profiles are for Services, not Products:  Natural Lifestyle does not accept specific product listings as Profiles in our Resource Directory. We’ve chosen to focus exclusively on service providers. For example, a Profile for a specific vitamin supplement or type of solar panel would not quality, but a health food or sustainable products retail store would.  Service providers who have products for sale may describe them within their profiles and provide a link to their personal websites for sales. There are other ways you can participate with Natural Lifestyle if you have products to share.

  • Buy a banner ad on our website. See Advertise for details.
  • Sponsor an edition of our newsletter. See Advertise for details.

**If you have any questions, please email us and ask before creating a profile. Natural Lifestyle reserves the right, at its sole discretion, to remove any material or profile that does not follow stated Guidelines, our Terms of Service, or that we feel is objectionable or inappropriate in any way.

This is a comprehensive and complex website and we have attempted to include and engage as many service providers in as many categories as possible. However--not every possible specialty can be listed separately, and we trust that our readers are savvy enough to find your profile with a bit of simple searching. If you think another category or specialty should definitely be added, please contact us via the contact form in HELP and we’ll consider what you suggest. Please know that there will be instances where we make the decision to keep the list shorter and less specific however. NLN’s primary goal is to educate and inspire our readers and encourage them to read through multiple profiles to find what truly resonates with them, learning as they go.

Yes, it would be unusual and we would try to notify you in advance, but we could make the decision to cancel your account and membership. Reasons might include not supplying current or correct credit card info, inappropriate content, not abiding by stated Guidelines for Profiles, Events, Articles or our Terms of Service. As stated in our Terms of Service, NLN reserves the right to cancel any membership at any time—for any reason. NLN reserves the right to edit, refuse to post, or to remove any information or materials, in whole or in part, at its sole discretion. Any refunds of monies paid will be handled according to the guidelines stated above.

This can be because of several different reasons. First, be sure that your profile is published in 'My Account'. When looking at your event, if it says Not Published, then you need to click on Not Published to change it to Published, this will make your profile show up in the directory.

You need to be sure that you have the right zip code in the search box, because every time that you log in to your account, whatever zip code you have set in your Account Info is what the site sets your  zip code to. So if the zip code in your profile differs from the zip code in your Account Info, then you will not see. Simply type in the correct zip code and search again.

This means that when you create your profile, it is created with search engines in mind. Your title and description fields not only show up on our website, but they are what the search engines find and index. And the keywords are used by search engines to know if the current search applies to you. Be sure to take your time and fill out all of these fields to have a better chance of being found by search engines and by consumers on our site.
TIP: Be sure to mention your name in either the Title or Description fields, this will make it easier for the search engines to find information about you, as well at let the consumers on The Natural Lifestyle Network know who your profile is about.

This is most likely due to us inactivating your profile due to failure of payment, violation of the terms of service or inappropriate content. You should recieve an email regarding this, so be sure to check your email.

You may cancel your membership at any time—for any reason. We want to have only happy, satisfied, engaged members so please let us know what’s wrong. We will do our best to resolve any problems and honor your requests, but there will be times we simply cannot. If you choose to leave, you should know the following. If you cancel within 5 days of joining, the full amount charged to your account will be refunded. Otherwise you will need to cancel by 3 days before your membership anniversary date or the following month’s charge will be made. For example, if you join on August 18, and you decide to cancel on December 31, you will need to notify us of the cancellation of your membership by midnight on January 15 at the latest or your credit card will be charged another month on January 18. We do not offer partial month refunds. If you have an annual subscription, you will receive a pro-rated refund, based on the number of months remaining in your membership. Refunds will be credited to the card you signed up with. Any profiles or events you created under your membership will be immediately deleted when it is terminated. Please Contact Us to cancel your membership.

There is a TUTORIAL page with screenshots that shows you how the process works.  This should answer most of your questions.  There's even more information included in the step-by-step process that we walk you through once you've purchased your membership.  It's extremely user-friendly and easy to follow--and it's actually a lot of fun!

Currently there is no way to downgrade your account. If you no longer wish to pay for a Preferred Membership, then you need to cancel your membership and then create a new Free Membership.

Upgrading your profile couldn't be simpler. While in 'My Account' Click the "Upgrade to a Preferred Profile' button to the right of your profile.

Next, you will be asked to be sure that your account information is up to date. Once you are done, simply click 'Update'. Next, choose your preferred option, monthly or yearly. Then you fill out your credit card information and you are done. All of your information and settings from your free profile will transfer over to your preferred profile and you can start editing immediately. Please see our Tutorial for help setting up your preferred profile.