Content checklist
Last updated: 17/2/2019Table of contents
Preparing your content
Whether you're a marketer preparing content, or a CMS user thinking about building pages, its important to stop and think about your content first. The following checklist provides details of the key things you need to think about before publishing on arup.com.
- Does your content address user needs? Write for users first and Arup second. Users want to be able to understand what you're trying to tell them and be interested by the content. Where possible, avoid the use of jargon or overly technical terminology
- Is your content needed? It might sound silly, but stop and think 'would I read this article?' If you're creating a project, is there sufficient information to convey the problem or challenge, Arup's input and solution and what the outcome is (or will be)? If you're writing a News item (not a press release) is it really news and of interest? Do you have a 'hook' to attract readers? Content for content's sake does not help our users or Arup.
- Have you written the best possible title and headings? Your title is probably the single most important element of your article - it will make or break the content. A title that interests and excits will draw more users. Try and include reference to problems overcome, firsts established or elements of enormity (or smallness!). Questions can work well for titles - provided your article sets out to answer the question.
Alongside your title, using strong headings throughout your copy helps to break things up, and highlight key sections. Try and clearly include reference to the subject under the title and avoid jargon or 'marketing speak'. Ultimately, headings that say what your talking about work best for the user. - Have you got a clear purpose for your content? All content needs to serve a purpose. You should be clear with your purpose and ensure that users can interact with your content to achieve this purpose. Does your article have a clear call to action? Have you thought about what you can encourage users to do after they've read your piece? Wherever possible, pages on arup.com should simply never 'end' - there should always be something we want users to do after reading your page
- Have you pulled together your supporting assets? Remember, content is not just words. arup.com can support all kinds of media including video, imagery and where appropriate interactive graphics and other elements. If you've got something completely new and think it could work - talk to GMC and we'll look at how we can support you. Again, think about how these elements will support your copy. Adding lots of images or a funky video is great - but not if it bares little relation to your article or serves no obvious purpose.
- Have you thought about SEO? Considering search engine optimisation should take place right at the start of your content creation process and run throughout the drafting and page construction phase. See the SEO guide for more details
- Have you added all the relevant metadata to your page? This includes things such as the meta title and meta description for SEO purposes, but includes other key elements such as 'tags' (selecting appropriate industries and services), themes (for perspectives) and additional information such as 'job number' and 'office location' for projects. Users will not see all of this data, but together it helps to power the user experience
- Have you thought about your page layout? Before you start adding content in the CMS, its worth spending some time sketching out your page with pen and paper. This can help you appreciate if your elements work together and is a lot quicker than building and editing within the CMS
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Are you using the right elements and modules? The best practice guides on this site each explain how to build and implement individual modules, but they cannot fully convey the best way to work with multiple modules. You need to stop and think about this. A few key points to remember:
- Don't put 'full width' modules next to one another - you shouldn't put a full bleed image on top of a carousel, or immediately underneath a text image split
- Don't cover up high quality images with too much text
- Don't put information of high importance on top of images at all - unless its a caption
- Have you tested your page? Once you've built your page you need to test it. Get someone else to read the content and comment on the layout. Check the page on different devices to ensure that for users on mobile or tablet the content still 'works' - see the guide below for checking pages using your web browser
Checking your pages on different devices
Modern web browsers now come with an array of tools to help us understand what different users will see an experience on our website. Most importantly, we can use these to mimic what a user on a mobile device will see.
The following guide briefly outlines how you can use the Chrome browser to preview your page(s) on a mobile device using only your desktop PC. Other browsers provide this functionality as well, but GMC advises you to use Chrome where possible.
To browse the site as a mobile user you should:
- Open Chrome and ensure you're not logged into the Sitecore CMS
- Visit https://sitecore.arup.com and find the page you want to preview (NOTE - this URL is a preview of arup.com and shows content before it is published. You should NEVER circulate this URL outside of the business and you should never use it for linking purposes
- Once on your page, hit 'F12' on your keyboard - you should see a screenshot similar to the below (NOTE - the new window may open to the right of your screen rather than at the bottom)
- Once the developer tools are visible, you'll need to select the 'device toolbar' - this is an icon in the top left of the window that's opened in your browser. Click it
- After clicking the icon, you should see your browser reframe and display the page in a mobile (or tablet) shaped window. You can choose what kind of phone to preview, whether its in landscape or portrait and also increase the 'zoom'