Content design: planning, writing and managing content
Planning and managing digital content to meet the needs the public has of government.
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What is content design?
Introduction to content design.
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User needs
How to write and record a user need for GOV.UK.
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Planning content
Find out how to decide if something is suitable for GOV.UK, what the content lifecycle is and why accessibility must be planned for.
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Helping users prepare for change
How to plan and create guidance about a change to a policy, scheme or process so that users know what they must do and when.
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Content types
When and how to use the GOV.UK formats.
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Organising and grouping content on GOV.UK
When to use the different options for grouping content on GOV.UK: topics, mainstream browse and collections.
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Writing for GOV.UK
How to write well for your audience, including specialists.
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Content maintenance
How to manage your content.
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Withdrawing or unpublishing content, and content from previous governments
When you should withdraw content, when you should unpublish content, and what content gets labelled as from a previous government.
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Research and evidence
Tools and evidence to back up content design decisions.
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Welsh language on GOV.UK
The policy governing use of Welsh language on GOV.UK.
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Links
Adding links to content, making them accessible and GOV.UK's external linking policy.
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URL standards for GOV.UK
You must meet these standards when creating URLs to be used on GOV.UK
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Data and analytics
How to use tools such as Content Data and Google Analytics to improve your content's search engine optimisation (SEO) and get data on how users are interacting with your content.
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Images
Guidance for GOV.UK content publishers on how to use images and make them accessible. This chapter also includes the copyright standards for GOV.UK.
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Campaigns on GOV.UK: standards and guidelines
Options to support promotions and marketing campaigns, from short URLs to standalone websites.
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Guidance for publishing on GOV.UK, exempt websites and service domains after a royal death (a 'Bridge' event)
Find out what can and cannot be published.
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Use of government logos on GOV.UK
When government logos can be used on GOV.UK.
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Use of European Union funding logos on GOV.UK
GOV.UK policy on use of the EU logos for EU funding schemes.
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Blogging
How and when to publish a blog.
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Tables
When to use tables and how to make them accessible.
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Feedback
How to send the Government Digital Service comments and suggestions about this manual.
Update history
2024-04-25 11:47
Content types – Added a new section about fatality notices.
2023-11-30 14:37
Content types – Updated guidance on what to use a document collection for to include grouping related content on a topic
2023-11-28 16:16
Data and analytics – Information added on the GovSearch tool.
2023-11-16 14:39
Content types – Added information about licence pages.
2023-10-25 14:43
Organising and grouping content on GOV.UK – Changed ## Document collections to remove guidance saying that this content type cannot be used to group content thematically (because document collections can be used to group content thematically).
2023-08-30 16:42
Content types – Updated the good example for the promotional material content type.
2023-08-08 10:12
Content types – Information on Call for evidence, a new content type in Whitehall.
2023-08-03 13:43
Writing for GOV.UK – Document collections added to examples of content types that need change notes.
2023-08-03 13:39
Withdrawing or unpublishing content, and content from previous governments – Under ‘Unpublishing content items’, document collections added to list of content types that users who have subscribed to email updates about that page will be notified about when the page is unpublished.
2023-07-18 09:25
Content maintenance – Information about adding an optional review date which is a new feature in Whitehall.
2023-05-16 16:46
Content types – Updated how lead images are used in the following content types:Case studyNews article : government responseNews article : news storyNews article : press release
2023-01-17 16:32
Images – Restructured to expand the section on using charts, diagrams, infographics and scientific equations as images. Clarified alt text should only be used in the body text and there is no need to use the alt text field.
2022-12-01 10:41
Writing for GOV.UK – Updated the guidance on headings in the ‘Structuring your content’ section to make the rules around heading levels clearer.
2022-11-22 13:44
Guidance for publishing on GOV.UK, exempt websites and service domains after a royal death (a ‘Bridge’ event) – Section not new – just reordered.
2022-11-08 12:55
Links – Updated with a new section on how to link to documents on other websites.
2022-10-28 16:40
Content types – Added a new ‘Publication: maps’ section, as this publication type was missing from the previous content.
2022-10-13 14:46
Writing for GOV.UK – Added information to the ‘headings’ section about not using questions in headings and subheadings.
2022-10-05 14:13
Campaigns on GOV.UK: standards and guidelines – The section has been updated with amended guidance on getting your campaign online and managing it once it’s live.
2022-09-13 17:35
Guidance for publishing on GOV.UK, exempt websites and service domains after the death of Her Majesty The Queen – New section added on what can and cannot be published during the national mourning period following the death of HM The Queen.
2022-08-23 16:03
Images – Updated with new guidance on how to make images accessible, with more detail about how and when to use alt text, and how to describe images that present a lot of data, such as graphs and diagrams. The section on copyright is unchanged.
2022-06-24 15:17
Links – Added a section on linking to a page in a different language. This is because a link text must accurately describe the link destination for accessibility and prepare the users for a language change in their journey.
2022-06-06 12:32
Planning content – New guidance has been added on how to get an exemption for publishing new content somewhere other than on GOV.UK, and what to do if you don’t get one.
2022-05-05 11:26
Writing for GOV.UK – Updated the headings section to clarify whether text is always necessary between headings for accessibility.
2022-02-18 10:49
Writing for GOV.UK – Removing examples in the ‘Summaries’ section that are no longer accurate. Making the information in the ‘Titles’ section more concise. Fixing several broken links.