Hello friend! Here are some pro tips on how you format blog posts according to the PCPJ standard and make them look totally awesome.

Featured Image

All PCPJ posts use featured images. They should be at the very least 500 pixels wide (or at least 1038 pixels to actually feature them on the front page of the site). Add a featured image through the Featured Image section in the right-hand panel when you write a post. If you don’t have a good picture yourself, download copyright-free images from Pexels or Unsplash. Do not steal other people’s images from Google, Facebook etc. without permission.

Images in the Post

You can also insert images inside the blog by either drag-and-drop or by pressing the plus sign (+) in the upper left corner of the tool menu. Click on the image to adjust its size, align it, add a caption etc.

Spell Check

Make sure to spell-check and grammar-check your text before it is published. Use the checking tools in Word, or download Grammarly for free and let them do the job.

Read More and Other Tools

Make sure to always insert a Read More line after the second or third paragraph, otherwise people won’t be able to scroll through all the different articles properly. It’s found in the upper tool menu. There you’ll also find the insert link button which is very useful – select some text and click it to add a link (or use ctrl+k on the keyboard). Add a block qoute by selecting text and click the quote (“) button. You can also add bold text, italics and lists as with any other word processor.

Categories and Tags

In the right-hand panel, select category or categories and add tags. Categories are broad, tags are specific. Do not add new categories, but feel free to add tags if they’re not available.

The tag Featured puts the post on the front page. Editors make the decision on what’s going to be featured, usually based on what readers are interested in. Contact an editor if you think your post should be featured.

PCPJ Presentation

Finally, we should always add a brief presentation of what PCPJ is and how to join our newsletter. It looks like this:

To add it, go to HTML mode (top right corner) and add this code at the bottom of your post.

Save or Schedule

If you’re not an editor, do not publish your article. Let an editor look it through first. WordPress automatically saves your post every so often, but you can also easily click save in the upper-left corner, next to PCPJ.

Alternatively, you can schedule the post at your designated blogging day (check with an editor for that) by pressing the blue “Publish…” button in the upper-right corner and then the calender (where default is “Publish immediately) where you choose date and time.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact Micael at micael@pcpj.org. Happy blogging!