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CALMideas is a quarterly newsletter that's mailed to all CALM members. It's a workshop in a newsletter, with tips on all kinds of things, from writing, to design, to desktop publishing. Below are a few articles from recent issues: |
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BUILDING
A LOCAL UNION WEB SITE
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making your own web site is no easy job, despite what the computer magazines say. Some of your basic writing and design skills will help you out. But there’s a lot of new technical and software stuff to learn. It’s likely to take weeks or months – not days – to build your site.
Here’s a brief overview. You’ll need to get help from other sources – friends, your internet service provider, books, the web. This guide will give you a basic procedure to follow, and an idea of the decisions you must make, plus some great tips and web resources.
1. Your audience and purpose
You should define your audience and purpose before you do anything else. Many other decisions will flow from this starting point. Do you want to reach existing members? Or newcomers? Why? What would they want to find on a union web site?
2. Your service provider
You will "build" your web site on your local computer, but then you’ll transmit a copy of it to a "host" who will store it on an Internet server (a computer connected to the Internet 24 hours a day). Your host will likely be your Internet service provider, either a local service, or a national one like Sympatico or Web Networks. Call and ask how they can help in hosting your web site. You’ll want to know how much it costs, and whether they can provide technical assistance when your site is ready to launch.
3. Your site’s address
Your site will need an address, or URL (Universal Resource Locator, or internet address) as it’s called in the web business. You have two choices. You can have a "personal" type of page, where the address is an extension of your host’s internet address (www.host.net/~local 999). Or, you can have your own virtual domain name (www.local999.org). The latter costs more, but it is easier for people to remember, or guess. Your service provider can outline the costs of these two options.
4. Content
How do you decide what to put on your site? Partly it depends on your audience. A bare bones local union site might include: contact information, list of officers, history of the local, the collective agreement, news releases, calendar of events, committees, photos from recent events, a link to your provincial or national union, and a place where visitors can give feedback. Have a look at some other local union web sites. TIP Brainstorm with other people to come up with some unique, interesting, funny, or especially visual content.
5. Mapping
Once you’ve established five or more content areas, try to group them into logical subject areas. Your "home" page (the one that users reach when they type your address) should offer three to eight broad subject areas, with the specific content areas linked to these sub-pages. You should be able to sketch out a hierarchical flow chart of your site before you attempt to build it on your computer (see the site map at Adobe).
6. Web building software
You have two choices here: code-based HTML (Hyper Text Markup Language, the web's universal code) editors, or graphical editors that look and feel like a word processor. You should get someone to show you both options, and see which you prefer. Code-based editors are available for free on the web (HoTMetaL). Graphical editors will cost you $100-$200. Try Microsoft FrontPage or Claris HomePage. TIP Hard-core web designers insist you need to learn and edit HTML code in order to produce a good web site. That’s crap! The graphical editors produce great pages, without tedious code.
7. Logo, icons, colour
You’ll want visitors to recognize your site, as much by your logo and colours as by the text. Contact your provincial or national union for a high-quality colour version of your union logo (like the slick CAW logo). You can help visitors navigate your site by using icons that represent your major subject areas (you’ll have to be creative here, or choose from an online collection like Pam Bytes. TIP There’s an excellent on-line tutorial on how web colour works at PageLab.
8. Text
There’s one simple rule when it comes to writing for the web: be brief! Few visitors will wade through mountains of text. You must be even briefer than in your newsletter. All your major subject pages should contain small amounts of text. Write documents in a word processor, then save as text. For additional web writing tips check out Net Tips for Writers and Designers. TIP Proofread and spell check everything that goes onto your site!
9. Graphics
On the one hand, graphics make your site interesting, attractive, and colourful. On the other hand, they slow "download" times – the wait suffered by visitors as they enter your site. So, web graphics are a delicate balancing act between attractiveness and speed. You need to get and learn a graphics program like Paint Shop Pro. You’ll create your graphics in the paint program, then save them in either the GIF (Graphic Interchange Format, for line art) or JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group, for colour photos) formats. Lots of learning here! Entire books are devoted to this subject. We recommend Preparing Web Graphics by Lynda Weinman. TIP All your graphics should be saved at a resolution of 72 dots (or pixels) per inch, which is the resolution of a computer monitor.
10. Layout
You can’t apply many of your newsletter layout tricks to the web. The "pages" are horizontal, not vertical. And the concept of a single page is irrelevant – visitors scroll down their browser’s window. You must determine the typical size page that most visitors will see in their browser (probably about 500 pixels wide by 265 pixels high), and design for that. Your first page should be one screenful, two at most. Your sub-pages (what we called "subjects" above) can be longer. There are some excellent web layout ideas in Web Concept and Design by Crystal Waters. TIP Indent any lengthy text from both margins (this text is indented from the left). The line length of a typical screen is too long for easy reading.
11. Links
The revolutionary part of the web is that you can link to anything else on your site – or on the entire World Wide Web. You can have text links (like throughout this article), graphic links (we don't have any of these on our site, but they're very common, where you see a blue line around a graphic), or image maps (like on our opening web page). You use links to organize your site, and to tie your site to like-minded places on the web. Exploit this resource!
12. Uploading your site
When you’ve finished building and testing your site locally (on your computer), you’ll transmit all the pages and graphics to your service provider’s server – to the particular spot they’ve set up with your web address. After that, you’ll send individual pages as you update or add them to your site. You need special, FTP (File Transfer Protocol, the software that accurately moves big files over the internet) software to do this, like Cute FTP. Contact your service provider for help. TIP Your must duplicate the organization and directory structure of your web site when you copy it to the web server, otherwise your internal site links may not work.
13. Testing
Before you announce to the world that you’re on the web, spend some time testing your site. Get your friends to test it out. You want to make sure that it appears as you expected, that all the links work, and that it downloads quickly. Your home page should load fully in 30 seconds or less. TIP Don’t use those annoying "Under Construction" graphics; if you’re site isn’t finished, don’t publicize it; start small, then add to it.
14. Launch
When you know everything works you can launch your site. Start with your service provider. They should have a spot where they list all the sites they host. Then ask for links from your affiliate union’s page, and from other local unions. Announce the site in your union newsletter, or on a special poster or flyer. Finally, go to the major Internet search engines and request a listing of your web site. You’ll need to provide a description of your page, along with key words. TIP Put your web address on all correspondence, stationery, and at the bottom of your e-mail messages.
15. Marketing and updates
Just because you’ve built a site, don’t abandon it! If you want visitors to return, you need to keep adding content. You should update your site at least once a month. Reserve a special spot on the home page for late-breaking news, or stuff you want to draw visitors’ attention to.
Finally, keep in touch with other union "webmasters." When you visit other local web sites, you’ll find e-mail addresses for their creators. There is a rich pool of talent and creativity out there. You can tap this resource with a series of inquiring e-mails, asking about their sites, and requesting feedback on your own.
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POWER
HEADLINES
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a good headline does two things: it attracts a reader’s eye, then grabs the mind with interesting content and leads directly to the story that follows. Here are some simple tips for improving the power of your headlines.
Give every headline a verb (action)
News stories convey action, so every news headline needs a relevant verb, or action word. Union agreement isn’t enough. Enlarge the meaning: Union and city reach agreement.
Use the "active" voice
The active voice is livelier and more interesting, and it’s usually shorter (an important feature in headline writing). Man bites dog is active. Dog is bitten by man is passive -- see the difference?
Use the present tense
Even if something happened in the past, your headline should be written in the present tense: Local strikes parts factory instead of Local went on strike at parts factory. Use the future tense to announce an upcoming event: Local will hold Christmas party.
Use short words
Try to find short synonyms for long words. You could reduce Negotiating committee recommends acceptance of new collective agreement down to Leaders recommend new contract.
Be specific
As much as you can, use precise words that describe exactly what’s going on. This will help readers decide if they want to read the story. Union wins grievance is too vague. Union wins repetitive strain grievance is much better.
Avoid punctuation
Headlines don’t need periods; use commas sparingly; don’t use exclamation points; but you must use a question mark for a headline that asks a question. A comma can replace the word "and," like this: Citizens form new coalition of unions, parents, teachers
Use upper and lower case
Most headlines should be written like a sentence, with an upper case letter at the beginning only (Not On Every Word!). Use all-capitals for very short headlines only (like power headlines, above).
Use department heads
Make a department head for regular columns like President’s Report (see "Write Stuff" on this page), then write another headline describing that month’s column: We’re getting ready to bargain.
Unusual symbols, and their origins
certain symbols have become commonplace in the last few years, due to changes in technology and the need for new typographic characters. But in most cases, the people who decide these things have simply adopted older, scarcely used symbols that happened to be on the standard computer (and before that, typewriter) keyboard.
@ Everyone calls this the at symbol, and it’s a required part of an internet e-mail address. It originally meant each at, as in, four oranges @ (each at) 10 cents. The symbol is a combination of the letters e and a. (In France they call it petit escargot, meaning little snail.) If anyone knows the true name for this symbol (not "at"), please let us know!
~ This squiggly worm is now used in World Wide Web addresses. It’s called a tilde (pronounced tild or tilda). It seems to have been adopted simply because it was available on the keyboard. In fact, it is a Spanish accent signifying the sound nya when placed over the n: señor.
# This gets variously called the number or pound sign, and we hear it constantly today, thanks to voice mail. Originally, it was called an octothorp. Fifty years ago, it was a standard abbreviation for pound(s) as a unit of measurement.
& The and or ampersand symbol has been commonly used for centuries. But the origin is particularly interesting. It’s an abbreviation for et, the French word meaning and. In certain typographic fonts you can still see this origin when you type the ampersand:
(Poppl-Laudatio).
• The proper name for the dot over the letter i is a tittle (useful party trivia!).
A THOUSAND WORDS
the worth of a good picturenothing can add warmth, colour, drama and personality to your newsletter like photographs can.
People like to look at people. So putting faces, especially members’ faces, in your newsletter is bound to increase readership.
Here are a few tips for taking good photos for your newsletter:
Get close
The person, or the crowd, should fill your camera viewer, otherwise they will look tiny on the page. A zoom lens can substitute a little, but it’s better to approach your subject until it fills the viewer.
Tell a story
This is harder. Look for shots that will convey meaning for a reader. The obvious example is including a picket sign in a strike photo. But shooting action works the same way.
Look for motion
Even in static situations, like a meeting or a public address, there are tiny moments of motion – when a speaker makes a hand gesture, or when someone in the audience raises their hand. You have to anticipate these moments, and click the shutter at exactly the right time. You don’t get a second chance.
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FOUR CLEVER IDEAS from local newsletters
• Instant win contest Editors of The Voice of UFCW Local 1977 inserted the names of local union members throughout their 12-page newsletter [in brackets]. Then they announced on the front page that the winners could claim a prize simply by phoning the union office.
• Responding to rumours Earlier this year, a story in the Globe & Mail insinuated that the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers union was going broke. Local 603 responded quickly with a story for their own members that included the facts and context missing from the Globe.
• Covering union politics Paranoia is the newsletter for Canadan Employment and Immigration Union members in Ontario. Its editor has dealt forthrightly with a bitter internal battle between the union’s national president and his opponents. The Paranoia reports stuck to the facts of the case, with quotes from both sides of the dispute.
• Company Corner CEP Local 402’s What’s Nooz has an unusual feature: a company column. Managers of the paper mill in Mackenzie, B.C. regularly address union members with warm thoughts ("As we strive to achieve performance targets, I want to express my appreciation for the effort ..."). In return, the union gets a column in the company’s newsletter!
