Calendar
Calendar is self-publishing, which will save your staff time when posting local events by date. Allow the public to submit events and customize sub-calendars for organizations and clubs. Events can be exported into XLS or XML format, providing a reverse publishing option.
Readers can search by keywords, jump to a new month, or click on a specific date to see what’s going on.
Offer subcalendars to local organizations and allow them to maintain their own events.
Event details display the name, date and time of the event, along with a “full details” link.
Use CSS, color code active and inactive dates, allowing your readers to quickly identify what dates have events listed.
The Basics
Allow users to view events on your Web site. Promote interactivity by letting readers post their own events, managed by an approval system. Easy navigation allows readers to filter through events by date, sub-calendar or search for events by keyword or category.
Key Benefits
Target specific audiences by creating sub-calendars. Increase reach by allowing readers to view feeds of events via their favorite RSS reader. Reverse publish events posted online into your print edition by exporting the data in XLS or XML format.
Revenue Opportunities
Sell sponsorships along with tiles and banners on calendar pages. Offer groups and organizations their own sub-calendar page for a monthly fee. Upsell outside groups with the ability to maintain their own sub-calendar, allowing them to bypass the approval process.
Contact Us:
For more information on this or any other TownNews.com product, contact your regional sales manager. Main TownNews.com Office: 800-293-9576 • E-mail: info@townnews.com
12.3.08
Calendar
Product Features
Customization
Tailor calendars to best meet the needs of your community. Offer customized sub-calendars to organizations, clubs and even advertisers! Using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), the color scheme of each calendar can be adjusted to match the page’s layout, or a sponsor’s logo. If you are using sub-calendars, a “select a calendar” drop down menu allows your readers to select the calendar they want to view. This makes finding the event(s) they are interested in easier. Each date on the calendar module containing events is hyperlinked. Readers can simply click on the date they are looking for something to do on and view a list of events. They can also search for events by entering keywords in the available field. You can also designate as many calendar event categories as you like, allowing your visitors to quickly search by category. All options improve the usefulness of your calendar.
Easy Navigation
Calendar provides any Newsys-based site the ability to create multiple calendars for community groups, search calendars, allows users to submit events, and much more!
For more features, visit www.townnews.com/ solutions/calendar/features/
Multiple Search Options
Approval System
By default, sites are set up to require your approval of all events submitted by end users before they appear online. You can turn this off, if desired, and it is easily managed through the administrative interface where entries come in as unapproved until you approve or delete them. You can also allow specific users to bypass the approval system. The approval system allows you to maintain content control of what appears on your Web site. The calendar administrative interface contains Advertiser Settings, which allow you to grant creation, editing or deletion privileges to local businesses. The list of advertisers is pulled from the Advertisers portion of the administrative interface. This alleviates some of the workload on your staff. Since the calendar allows user submission, it’s a great source of content for your print product as well. Calendar events can be exported into an Excel spreadsheet or XML file. The content in the spreadsheet can then be copied and pasted into your editorial system. The XML export can be imported directly into InDesign. Both are great ways to reverse publish from your online calendar items into your print edition. This enhances the reader experience. Users can enter their calendar events right from your Web site. No need for your readers to take time away from your staff’s busy schedule to get their event(s) posted. This interactivity also increases your Web site’s importance to the community. Users can have an RSS feed of up-to-date calendar events sent to their favorite RSS reader. Since your events are RSS-ready, a feed can be set up on your sister paper(s) or your local chamber and tourism sites for additional reach. Spice up calendar events by allowing photos to be used. Photos draw extra attention to key events, and make the calendar more fun for your readers to view.
Advertiser Access
Reverse Publishing
User Submitted Content
RSS Capability
Submit Photos
Category Drop Down Menu
The user can easily locate each category within a calendar in a drop down menu. Easy access to categories prompts the user to add events and frequently utilize the calendar.
Contact Us:
For more information on this or any other TownNews.com product, contact your regional sales manager. Main TownNews.com Office: 800-293-9576 • E-mail: info@townnews.com
12.3.08
Calendar
Frequently Asked Questions
Can calendar data be used in other media formats?
Yes. Calendar events are RSS-ready, so they can be picked up by news readers, such as My Yahoo! or Google Reader. This also enables you to set up a feed for a sister paper, chamber site or local tourism site if you choose. To access the RSS feed access your site with the URL http://www.domainname.com/?calrss. There are three parameters you can set: 1. You can select the number of days you want on the RSS feed by supplying a days argument, such as http://www.domainname.com/?calrss&days=5. 2. You can request that the events only be shown from one calendar by specifying the calendar name, such as http://www.domainname.com/?calrss&calendar=davenport. 3. Also, events from a specific category can be requested, such as http://www.domainname. com/?calrss&category=music.
Have a question not listed? Contact the TownNews.com customer support staff by phone at 800-293-9576, or by submitting a ticket to
http://support.townnews.com
to have your question answered.
For more FAQs, visit www.townnews.com/ solutions/calendar/faqs/
Can calendar items be reverse published into our print edition?
Yes. This is a nice way to integrate a Web site and print product. Calendar items can be exported to an .xls spreadsheet in the administrative interface. That .xls file can be used to push calendar items from a Web site into a regular newspaper. In addition, if you use InDesign for you print edition an XML file can be exported from your Web site and imported into InDesign.
Can the color scheme of my calendar be changed?
Yes. Using Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), the color scheme of each calendar can be adjusted to match the page’s layout, or even a sponsor’s logo.
What’s the difference between sub-calendars and categories?
Categories add another layer of flexibility to your use of the calendar, and offer your readers more criteria to search by. You can display either all or one calendar if you use the calendar token, and you can give each calendar a list of categories. For instance, you could set up a sports calendar and divide each type of sport into it’s own category. That will allow your readers to see all sports events in one area, as well as to hone in on the particular sports their children participate in.
Can Web site users add calendar events?
Yes, a submission form is a default part of the calendar creation on your site and is available to users directly on your Web site. Included is the option for you to add three customer fields to the submission form as well.
Do I have control over events submitted by our readers?
Yes. By default, once your reader submits the event form it becomes an unapproved event in your calendar’s administrative interface. Unapproved events remain in a queue until a member of your staff approves, deletes or edits them.
Can an advertiser add their own events without my approval?
There are two ways this can be handled. 1. In your calendar’s administrative interface, click on “Edit” next to the name of a specific sub-calendar. A small pop-up window will appear with an option for “User Entry Type”. Change that from “Require Event Authorization” to “Accept All User Events”. 2. The calendar administrative interface also contains Advertiser Settings, which allow you to grant creation, editing or deletion privileges to local businesses. The list of advertisers is pulled from the Advertisers portion of the administrative interface. This alleviates some of the workload on your staff.
Contact Us:
For more information on this or any other TownNews.com product, contact your regional sales manager. Main TownNews.com Office: 800-293-9576 • E-mail: info@townnews.com
12.3.08