Features Used On This Blog

1. Google Calendar

It is pretty easy to set up a google account and then a google calendar. You can note your events and meetings in the calendar, once a member clicks on a particular event they will be directed to a page with more specific detail, you can even include a map.


The calendar can be displayed as a gadget in the sidebar like the one we have in the sidebar on this blog (picture to the right), or you can put a larger version in a post like we have here.








2. Make it Easy To Find Relevant Info

You can add tags to each post you make. Try and think this out so you are using tags consistently. This is a way of categorising the information on the site. In the picture below the tags have been circled.


Then you can add a labels page element in your side bar so people can easily find the info they are interested in like this.


3. Provide Links To Other Sites and Information

In the picture above you will see a list of LINKS. These are displayed in the sidebar. Place links that relate to your blog, or ones that will be of interest to members. These links help make your blog relevant and useful for visitors.

4. Making It Easy For Members To Keep Up To Date

One of the great features of blogs is the ability to subscribe. This means that whenever you add a new post subscribers have this fed to them directly rather than waiting for them to visit the site.


Subscribing to blogs and internet newsfeeds is pretty new and people are not that familiar with it. However, it won't be long and everyone will be doing it. You may also want to consider teaching people how to subscribe at one of your meetings or at a union training day.

5. Slideshows, Videos, Audio and More

Often you want to get across relatively complex information that would take pages of text to explain. No-one wants to read that, the secret of a good post is to keep it short. However, you can utilise a number of other formats in your blog to get across info.

Here I have embedded a slide show. It is hosted for free on another website called SlideShare. Setting up an account only takes a couple of minutes and then you can upload a slid show. They provide instructions on how to embed in your blog.


You can also embed videos from places like YouTube or Google Video. It's also possible to include music players.


6. Polls

You can gauge the opinion of visitors to your blog through the comments feature, or you can add a poll to find out opinions and preferences on issues that have have more clear cut or specific options.

Polls can be added to a post like this. This means they will be prominent when you post them but will move down the page as new posts are added.

The poll you can see on the left was created using Poll Daddy but there are plenty of free options available on the internet. There is useful review here.

Another very simple option is to incorporate a Google Poll Gadget in the sidebar like the one you can see to the right. This is really straightforward. You could incorporate it as a regular feature of your blog, changing the question to reflect whatever is topical. It can get a little lost on the sidebar, but you can put up a post that alerts visitors to it.