You gotta love sitting around on a Saturday afternoon watching old movies. Rocky II is on and
\nBurgess Meredith is making Stallone try to catch a chicken. \u201cIf you can catch this thing, you\u2019ll be
\ngreased lightnin\u2019!\u201d Gathering content for your website can be a lot like chasing chickens \u2013 pretty
\nhard to pin down. However, with a good game plan and a little perseverance you should be able
\nto collect what you need to make a winning website.<\/p>\n
In starting our Web project (see last month\u2019s column here), we mentioned the importance of
\nunderstanding what you want your site to accomplish. Knowing what kind of reaction you desire
\nfrom your site visitors should help you in determining what kinds of content you want on your site.
\nDo you want people to feel that they\u2019re being sold something? If so, then you can just post a
\nbrochure. However, if you\u2019d rather have people interact with your site, then think about who will
\nvisit your site and what would they want to see.<\/p>\n
Give real world examples of how you\u2019ve helped your clients in the past, set up a Case
\nStudies Section \u00a0and created a form defining all the necessary\u00a0information to develop a standardized
\nlook and feel. E-mail this to your account team and asked them for contributions.<\/p>\n
This brings up another point. Content isn\u2019t just articles. In fact, long articles are many times not
\nread in the fast-skimming Internet age. Bullet-point lists, pictures and graphs, quizzes, and quotes
\nfrom supportive customers or donors all make great content. Best of all, they help you start a
\nconversation with your site\u2019s visitors.<\/p>\n
So, you\u2019re sold on getting interesting content, but how do you get it? This is the trickiest part, as
\nit takes some buy-in from the higher ups to make the website a priority for the organization, and
\nnot just the Webmaster. With their support, you\u2019ll have a much better chance getting busy people
\nin other departments to help you.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s something I suggest. First, have the company\u2019s president send out a letter to all the
\ndepartment heads stating that you\u2019ve begun a new Web project and you need content. Next,
\ncreate a folder on your computer\u2019s desktop and place in it a copy of anything you receive that
\neven remotely looks like it would be good for your site. E-mails, sales presentations, conference
\nnotes \u2013 anything. Finally, remembering your objective from above, weed out what you don\u2019t
\nwant. Don\u2019t be afraid to rip apart articles or informational copy. If you need to use a three-word
\nquote from a two-page letter and dump the rest, then do it. And don\u2019t forget your organization\u2019s
\nmission.<\/p>\n
Once you\u2019ve got your working content, catalog them into specific themes. Use a spreadsheet to
\nlist each item and create main subject titles for the groups. Then, look back at what you have and
\nadjust. If you\u2019ve done it right, you have just created a preliminary site map for your Web!<\/p>\n
Because getting content is so tough, and sorting through everything can be arduous, I really
\nrecommend that you start this process as soon as you know you\u2019ll be developing your site.
\nSchedule sufficient time to put out a couple calls for this – four weeks minimum. If you follow
\nyour plan well, you won\u2019t be stuck running after chickens all day. And the great content you\u2019ll find
\nwill make your website a heavyweight champ!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
You gotta love sitting around on a Saturday afternoon watching old movies. Rocky II is on and Burgess Meredith is making Stallone try to catch a chicken. \u201cIf you can catch this thing, you\u2019ll be greased lightnin\u2019!\u201d Gathering content for your website can be a lot like chasing chickens \u2013 pretty hard to pin down. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-home-page"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=108"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":111,"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/108\/revisions\/111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.genesisintegrated.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}