Create a post (article)

The following details instructions on how to create a post and associated home page graphics. It also includes some best practices to ensure readability and search engine optimization, which is very important.

Creating a Post

  1. Create a new Post. From the dashboard – after you have logged in – simply click on the Write a New Post button.
  2. Use good keywords in the title of the post.
  3. Ensure that the opening paragraph includes good keywords and answers the questions who, what, where, when and why. This is very important for the reader.
  4. Choose a category; either Featured, Articles, Events or Training.
  5. Select appropriate tags for the post. Tags are not categories, but are more specific to the post. As an example, Sports is a category; and baseball, football and soccer are all tags.
    An other example specific to this Web site would be the Articles category. Posts in the Articles category may have tags like ‘cold exposure’, ‘decompression illness’, and/or ‘Hendrick’ (no quotes).
    Avoid using tags that are already categories since it will not help the reader find information.
    If you use the tag ‘arterial gas embolism’, you should also use the familiar acronym – ‘AGE’ – if there is one (again, no quotes).
  6. You can preview the post in context with the rest of the site by clicking on the Preview this Post button.
  7. If you want to save the post without publishing, just hit the Save button, you can come back and continue writing later and the post will not be published.
  8. To publish the post live to the site, simply click on the Publish button.

Featured Posts

Featured posts are highlighted on the home page at the top with an image that is 588×330. If you want to publish a Featured post, you must have an image. Note, the image can be smaller than 588×330, it will have a black border around the image.

While you are working on the Featured post or when you are done, you need to remember to upload your image – which must be sized to 588×330 or smaller – using the Add media section of the visual editor.

Once you have uploaded the image, you need to simply copy the full URL for the image location. Do not embed the image into the post, just click on the Save all changes button, and close the Media view; which returns you back to the post editor.

Back in the post editor area, scroll down to the Custom Fields section. Select the custom field key called articleimg, and for the Value, insert the full Link URL that you copied from when you uploaded the image.

Once you have added the custom field, you are all set and you can Save or Publish the post.

Training, Events and Article Categories

The Training and Events categories on the home page use an image that is 75×100. The style sheet is designed to use this size image.

To associate images to these posts, ensure that you have a 75×100 image available and follow the same instructions as for the Featured post above, but instead of using the articleimg custom field, use the thumbnail custom field.

General Notes

  • Best Practice: Use this naming convention for all images that will be used on the home page. Start the filename using the custom field key – articleimg or thumbnail – so you know what they are and how they can be used in the future.
    • 588×330 images should be named articleimg-description-here.jpg
    • 75×100 images should be named thumbnail-description-here.jpg
  • Best Practice: Each image should include a caption and a description. Search engine results will be improved with this information included, and if a caption is not used (alt text) the site will not validate as HTML compliant.
  • Yes, you can use all both custom field images for one post. This way, you can have a post show up under Featured using the 588×330 image (articleimg) and under Articles using the 75×100 image (thumbnail) at the same time.
  • Ensure that images are “knocked down” to 72 dpi. Computer screens can only display 72 dpi so images that are higher resolution will just slow down the site load times.
  • Do not stretch images to meet the size requirements, they will show as stretched on the home page.
  • You can reuse images loaded previously. To see what is available, click on the Add an Image button in the Visual editor and click on the Media Library tab. You can see miniature thumbnails of the images you can select from, hit the Show link to see all the information about the image along with the full Link URL to place in the custom field.