Getting Started for Content Creators

As a content creator, you play a key role in driving engagement and communication within your organization and shaping your platform's appearance. This guide will walk you through the essential tools and features available to help you create, manage, and share content effectively on the platform. From creating news and pages to understanding apps and widgets, you'll learn everything you need to get started.

If you want to revisit the Basics of your Haiilo Platform, take a look at the following articles:

Pages and Communities

Most of your platform's content is contained in pages and communities.

  • Before creating a new page, consider its purpose: Is it meant to share team updates, serve as a hub for cross-department news, and/or provide key resources? Think about your target audience and the content that will be most valuable to them, as this will guide decisions like visibility—public or restricted to certain users.
  • The same approach applies to creating communities, while the use cases and purpose differ: Is the community meant to connect members of a location or department, is it about creating a help community for your users, or is the purpose of the new community about exchange around a particular topic? Always keep the future character in focus, define if the community should be open or protected, and decide who you want to invite to join it first.

Also, plan which Apps and Widgets will best support your page's or communities goals. For example, a blog app for updates, an events app for important dates, or a timeline app to drive exchange and engagement. The right mix can greatly enhance the user experience.

Once set up, your page or community is ready to house content. Using different Apps and Widgets will help you fill your page or community and fulfill its purpose. For some initial inspiration, check out our articles on building an informative department page or an engaging help community.

Apps and Widgets

Following up on the "Understanding the Haiilo Structure" article, let's further clarify the difference between Apps and Widgets.

  • Apps are tools used on pages and communities. Some apps are standalone tools, like the Forms or Timeline App, while others, specifically the Blog, Content, or Wiki App, need widgets to display and carry their content.
  • Widgets are small blocks that not only fill the Blog, Content, or Wiki App with content but can also be installed on homepages and various other locations in the platform. Regardless of the location of where they get installed, Widgets can display content dynamically or even personalized to each user, offering endless customization options for your platform.
    • To cater to various use cases, Haiilo offers numerous static, dynamic, and personal widgets. 
    • The Rich Text Editor widget enables you to easily create, edit, and format text-based and HTML content without requiring advanced technical skills. Therefore, the widget is already preinstalled in every blog and wiki article and can be installed everywhere the platform offers space for widgets.

For more detailed information, check out our articles on Apps and Widgets.

Page and Community Admins

To edit a particular page or community, users need to be its admin. This applies to a variety of actions, including adding apps, changing the settings, inviting new members to an individual community, or accessing the analytics of a specific page or community.

Additionally, the general permission granted via role is needed to perform the actions described above. While the permission defines whether a user can perform a certain action, the admin status defines which pages and communities the user can do so on.

If you create a new page or community, you automatically become its admin and can define further admins beside or instead of you.

Content Studio

While the timeline app and blog app are all about engagement through horizontal and bottom-up communication, the content studio is your tool of choice when it comes to official top-down news. It provides content creators with the option to precisely address flexible and granular target groups across your organization. Additionally, the content studio enriches your platform with multichannel capabilities to make sure to reach your audiences throughout multiple channels like your platform's timeline, Microsoft Teams, Digital Signage, or Email.

As the Studio is meant for official top-down communication, its access is typically limited to a selected group of content creators, while the timeline and blog apps have a highly democratic character and should be offered to your platform's entire user base.

Learn more about the use of the Content Studio.

Homepages

The homepage is a user's first impression of the platform. It typically offers a high level of personalization, ensuring maximum relevance of the content and information displayed. To cater to the diverse needs and use cases of various organizations, homepages in Haiilo are highly flexible and provide the option to use numerous layouts and widget combinations. To make every homepage even more relevant, it's possible to have more than one homepage and display different homepages to different target groups. Generally, homepages are the place where the content of your platform becomes accessible in an effective and personalized way.

Similar to the principle of page and community admins, you need the right level of permission granted per role and need to be defined as an editor of a specific homepage to edit it.

For some initial inspiration, take a look at some popular best-practice versions:

Moderator Mode

The Moderator Mode provides you with temporary full-level access and control over your platform's content. Moderators can't access the platform's administration area but can see, access, edit, or even delete every page, community, or further piece of content throughout the entire platform. 

To avoid bottle-neck situations, and clean your platform periodically, the moderator mode is a central element of effective content management, but it is highly recommended to limit access to the moderator mode to a very small group of users.

Analytics

Haiilo's Analytics section gives essential insights into user engagement and platform performance. Built-in reports provide a basic overview of active users and posts, while the Haiilo Analytics add-on offers a more comprehensive view, enabling you to track deeper metrics like page, community, and content performance over custom periods.

There are two levels of access to platform analytics:

Depending on the needed permissions, page and community admins, can view the KPIs and analytics for pages and communities they are an admin of.
Analytics admins can access the entire platform analytics, including the performance for all pages, communities, and homepage of the platform, as well as extensive insights into user activity.

Please also see Using Analytics in Haiilo and the Haiilo Analytics documentation for more detailed information.

Further Tips & Tricks

  • Don't forget to customize your Launchpad with the tools and apps you use most often. This will streamline your workflow and make content creation more efficient.
  • In addition to content creation, you can use Haiilo to organize and promote events. The Events App allows you to create event pages, send invites, and track RSVPs. Whether it's a company event or a social gathering, you can manage everything within Haiilo.
  • Depending on your role, you might also want to read Getting Started for Admins to learn everything about Administration.

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