Meetup Organizer Newsletter

Newsletter once per month via email with the help of the Marketing Team, and we also publish it on the Community Team blog.

General Structure

  • Friendly introduction (a short paragraph)
  • News from around WordPress
  • The body of the post
    • one-three main points
    • one call to action
    • MeetupMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. of the Month photo (optional, here the folders with the photos already featured and to be featured)

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General Time Frame

Because this is coordinated with Brett McSherry of the Marketing Team, it does have a timeline. The goal is to publish by the end of the third week of each month.

Gather Content: first week of the month or very early in the second week.

Check around for any news. Look through the most recent Month In WordPress and the Community Team blog. Ask the Training and Marketing teams, as well as community program supporters in Make.WordPress.SlackSlack Slack is a Collaborative Group Chat Platform https://slack.com/. The WordPress community has its own Slack Channel at https://make.wordpress.org/chat/. if they know of anything.

If you ask in the Marketing team, introduce yourself to Brett McSherry, you’ll be working with him later.

Write the Content: first half of the second week.

Please make a copy of the newsletter template.

If needed, you can check previous newsletter editions.

The new style I’ve been using for the last few has been shorter and more conversational, and around 2 doc pages long. You’re already aiming for a single main point and single call to action, so that helps right there.

The goal is to provide actionable information without additional obligation in a style that is like friends talking over coffee.

Have the Content Proofread: no later than Monday of the third week.

  • Ask Community Team Program Supporters to proofread it.
    • Set a date to get feedback by
    • Check word choice: is it understandable for a global audience.
    • Check tone: is it friendly and conversational (or whatever tone you’d like it to have).
    • Feel free to add boundaries to the proofreading, and you’re never obligated to automatically accept anyone’s suggestions. 🙂
  • If you included news from any of the Make teams, check back with whoever supplied it to see if it matches the messaging they want sent. Set a date for feedback on this as well.

Hand the Google Doc over to Brett McSherry: Submit a request via GitHubGitHub GitHub is a website that offers online implementation of git repositories that can easily be shared, copied and modified by other developers. Public repositories are free to host, private repositories require a paid subscription. GitHub introduced the concept of the ‘pull request’ where code changes done in branches by contributors can be reviewed and discussed before being merged be the repository owner. https://github.com/ on the third week of the month, as early as possible.

Once Brett is done: often 2 days.

  1. Ask if Brett has made any changes to the content. If so, update your Google Doc.
  2. Once the content of the doc matches the content in the newsletter, start a new post in the dashboard of the make.wordpress.org/community/ website.
  3. Title it: Meetup Organizer Newsletter: MONTH YEAR
  4. Copy in the content and save as DRAFT.
  5. Add a Separator blockBlock Block is the abstract term used to describe units of markup that, composed together, form the content or layout of a webpage using the WordPress editor. The idea combines concepts of what in the past may have achieved with shortcodes, custom HTML, and embed discovery into a single consistent API and user experience. at the end of the content and set it to full width. It might stay short in the dashboard, but should be long when Previewed.
  6. Add this footer after the Separator block and include the WordPress.orgWordPress.org The community site where WordPress code is created and shared by the users. This is where you can download the source code for WordPress core, plugins and themes as well as the central location for community conversations and organization. https://wordpress.org/ usernames of anyone who helped:

    If you have any questions, Community Team program supporters are here to help. Please email us at support@wordcamp.org or join the #community-team Slack channel. Thanks for everything you do to grow and support the WordPress community—let’s keep sharing knowledge and inspiring each other with our contributions!

    See you online soon!

    The following people contributed to this edition of the Meetup newsletter: @bmcsherry

  7. Check these two CategoryCategory The 'category' taxonomy lets you group posts / content together that share a common bond. Categories are pre-defined and broad ranging. boxes: MeetupsMeetup Meetup groups are locally-organized groups that get together for face-to-face events on a regular basis (commonly once a month). Learn more about Meetups in our Meetup Organizer Handbook. and Newsletters
  8. Add at least these three tags: #community-team, #meetup-organizer-newsletter, #newsletter. You can add others that fit your specific topic.

Again, finish off by saving as DRAFT.

When checking on edits, find out when Brett plans to publish the email version.

Once you know you can:

  • Then either:
    • Schedule the Draft Post to publish just after the email goes out. Simply click on Immediately to bring up the date and time settings. Again, save as DRAFT.
    • Set a calendar reminder to publish it yourself.

On Publishing Day:

Check that everything is ready on Brett’s end. If it is, proceed with publishing. If it’s not, adjust accordingly.

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