Intranet content manifesto – 2nd draft

1. Responsible and accountable: we are responsible and accountable for what we write, share and publish.
2. Fresh and relevant: we consider the lifespan of the information we share / publish. We know when and how to update and refresh the content we are responsible for.
3. Version control: we use version control mechanisms on documents so that people know what version they’re reading.
4. Think of your audience: we publish material to the appropriate audience; either simply to our team mates, our department, and when appropriate, to the whole Company. What action should the audience take?
5. Reduce clicks, reduce depth: we focus on keeping our intranet sections (and departmental websites) wide and shallow – not deep. Reduce the number of clicks needed to get to content. The sweet spot is within three clicks of the Home Page or your Team’s Home Page.
6. Appropriate location: we publish material within the appropriate section, not within the department that happens to own / maintain the information.
7. Linking: we link to other pages around the intranet and the Internet as appropriate at every opportunity. Help readers move on to the next page or activity.
8. Avoid email: we promote (and use) the sharing features of our intranet, to help people refrain from emailing material around.
9. Great layouts: we learn from those people who write and publish interesting and well written / well laid out material, rather than simply copying and pasting paragraphs from Word into web pages.
10. Great content: we avoid publishing material without checking it over for sense; we will not publish material without context; we will not assume that ‘everyone knows what we’re talking about’; we will not use acronyms without explaining them the first time in each article / document. We will not ask people to open the attached document when we could simply tell them everything in the web page. We write in the active voice.
11. Considerate publishing: we avoid publishing transient news without updating it. We will not spend time publishing material that does not add value to the business and our colleagues’ work. We will not create ‘welcome pages’ – we will publish pages that immediately communicate details. We will not publish nine pages where seven will suffice.
12. Useful titles: we use descriptive page titles loaded with keywords that require no further context. The title says it all; we know this helps the search engine. Titles, unlike general writing, can be in the passive voice.
13. Don’t delete, retire: we refrain from simply deleting material, but rather ‘retire’ it. Other intranet pages may well link to our pages, and so total deletion is not the appropriate remedy for out of date material.