How are the Web headlines going?

It's been about a week since we started writing teaser headlines on the Web and main headlines for search-engine purposes.

It looks like some people have this down pat. Some of the main headlines, though, are a bit long, and they tend to delay using key words.

Here's an example of one that looks too long: "Friends, family gather to remember, celebrate life of Troy Schmitt, a Marshfield teacher who died Friday when a train collided with his vehicle."

That's 122 characters long, almost twice the recommended maximum of 65 characters stated in our training.

Also, if you do a Google search for news items, you'll notice that usually the stories are listed partly according to how soon in the headline your keyword appears. So taking the above example, you might figure that people interested in this story would search using "Troy Schmitt" or "Marshfield teacher" or "train crash." They probably would not search using words such as "family, friends, gather, remember, or celebrate."

This might be a better headline to make the news clear and get attention: "Funeral for Marshfield teacher killed in train crash focuses on zest for life"

That's 65 characters. Not perfect, but better.

Headlines for the Web

This week we received training in the art of writing headlines for the Web and for maximizing the potential for getting hits through search engines, such as Google and Yahoo. We learned that the teaser field under edit in Saxotech delivers that headline to our home pages, while the headline in the headline box is what search engines pick up. Please correct me if I am wrong or don't have this entirely right. The purpose of this post is to remind everyone that this is our new procedure, that we no longer simply transfer the print story wholesale to the Web, because as we've learned and know intuitively, print headlines often fall flat on the Web, without the accompanying deckheads and art that we have in print.

Reporters and front-line editors: Please start including two suggested headlines on the top of stories: one for our home pages, more of a traditional headline but with more specifics than we use for print and another with even more specifics and key words that is intended for search-engine maximization.

Copy editors: Remember to rewrite headlines for Web postings. Do not just ship the print version over to the Web.

Please weigh in with any ideas you might have on how to improve on this.

Thanks,

— Kerry

Aldest one in the book

Alderman and alderwoman, or alderperson? This is a common question of mine looking at stories about city councils.

The entry for "alderman" on the AP stylebook Web site says to use the same rules for congressman/congresswoman. So alderman and alderwoman seem to be the rule... but there are no rules set for the plural in the book or on the Web site. Is it aldermen? Aldermen and alderwomen? Alderpeople?

Stylistically speaking

A conversation in the newsroom got me thinking about AP style. There are certain rules within AP style (advisers with an e, comes to mind), that when read by the general populace (who are not, for the most part, versed in AP style) seem like errors. This same argument could be made for using 'proper English' versus using slang and what you hear on the street every day (healthy vs. healthful comes to mind here).

I'm not suggesting at all that we not follow AP style or proper usage (that would be beyond crazy). I just thought it might be interesting to have a discussion about what elements of AP style could be viewed as errors to readers, or what aspects of AP style seem like errors to editors (if there are any).

Anyone?

--Kristy

Bad breaks

I noticed in today's Journal (County budget lowers taxes, 1A, second graph) that "homeowners" hyphenated after "hom," instead of after "home," creating "hom-eowners." Blech. This is a common word for a bad break, but we've all seen others.

Is there a way to get InDesign to not hyphenate words incorrectly? I know we can choose to hyphenate or not hyphenate paragraphs, but I'm not sure about flagging individual words. Anyone know?

Mystique

More on fading photos

There have been some questions about which tools you should use in PhotoShop to "fade" a photo. Use the image here to find the gradient tool (1). Make sure the color white is the foreground color (2) and if you have the gradient setting above (3) set to white to transparent (checkered boxes), you're set.

Do you CQ?

One step that seems to help with accuracy in our newspapers is the practice of CQing proper names and figures in notes format at the top of every story. This seems to be an automatic habit for some reporters but not others. Maybe some papers require it but others do not? If you don't CQ, why not? When a reporter CQs a story, it gives copy editors confidence that proper names are spelled correctly and that figures are accurate. If, as sometimes happens, there are spelling discrepancies within the story, it helps to be able to verify the proper spelling with the CQ notes.

Editors, if a story is not CQ'd by the reporter, is the copy editor expected to make a point to CQ each name? I don't mind double-checking spellings if I have doubts, but I imagine reporters often have a better set of resources than I have -- perhaps some inside information or at least greater familiarity with the source. I am likely to check our archives and to use Google. Unfortunately, the archives are imperfect, and some of the Web sites I find might be outdated.

I appreciate that we all are striving for accuracy, but is there more we can do to help one another?

~ Elizabeth