Great stories don’t just come out of the Communications Office; everyone on campus can be part of the storytelling process. (But we can help you make the most of the stories you do create — by helping craft words and photos, or featuring your stories in more prominent places on our site.)
Adding Stories
-
From the Dashboard, click the Stories tab.
-
If you are creating a new story, click the blue + Add new. Or you can click on the name of an existing story to edit it.
-
Fill out the form with the relevant information for your story. A headline is required, and a summary and photo are strongly encouraged.
- Add a tag to the story if you’d like to it show up on a specific page that use a widget that pulls stories with that tag.
-
Save when finished. You can also click Save and Go to Story for a preview that will open in a new tab.
Making Stories Live
-
Unless changed, the default for stories is hidden.
-
Click Hidden and change to Live, or when creating your story, you have the option to make the story Live as well.
- Stories can be set to publish and expire at preset times if they involve time-sensitive information.
- Order your stories using balloons. Otherwise they will display in date order.
Images
-
It’s best practice to add an image to a story; photography makes stories more interesting, and stories with images can be shown in more places on the Sweet Briar site.
-
You can always check for shared images in the CMS if you don’t have one in your group.
- You can also choose to attach a gallery to the story. Make sure to add captions on the gallery images.
Summaries
-
Content entered into the summary usually appears under the title when widgets display stories onto a page.
-
Complement the headline. Add specific details (like a person’s name and program) that might overburden the headline, which should be very brief and engaging.
-
Don’t repeat the summary information in the body copy, as summary content is shown on the story detail page as well.
Sharing
- Get the most out of your work by sharing your story with other groups.
- Add other groups who might want to post or link to your story as well.
- You can suggest to the Sweet Briar Web Team with one click, for stories that may be appropriate for Sweet Briar’s main marketing pages.
- Any content shared with other groups will have to be approved by that group’s content manager, unless you’re also a member of the group you’re suggesting it to.
“In the News” items
Stories about Sweet Briar that are published in external sources should go on the In the News page. Here’s how to add one:
- In the Core: News and Events group, add a new Story
- Fill in the Headline
- Instead of filling in the other fields, under Story Details, look for the box titled “Story body or link to another page.” Click “link to another page.”
- The field changes to one titled “Story link or enter story details.” Enter the URL and name of the source.
- Click “Save this story”