1. News Centre 1.1 Logging into the News Centre and creating your release LPO direct

2. 1. Open Internet Explorer and type in the following URL: 2. Select Windows Authentication from the dropdown menu 2. Select Windows Authentication from the dropdown menu

3. 3. When the Windows Security box appears, please enter your full username and password and click ok You need to enter the full username so it should look like this: Joe_Bloggs@rnli.live Please note your login is case sensitive You need to enter the full username so it should look like this: Joe_Bloggs@rnli.live Please note your login is case sensitive

4. This is the News Centre dashboard You can set your preferences – this saves you work later. The system remembers some key data, including your location, station or beach name

5. Set your preferences – and click ‘Save’ at the bottom. You can change these at any point or tailor them to individual news stories if you need to

6. Type in your headline – 80 characters max – and click ‘Continue’

7. The spellchecker reviews all text on the form The first sentence is automatically formatted in bold and is limited to 255 characters, around three lines in Word on the standard template Type in your news release. Alternatively, you can copy-paste from Word, etc, by clicking on the ‘Paste’ button top left or by right clicking on your mouse and pasting. You can use bold, italics and bulletpoints from the menu above Use the blue ‘?’ help buttons for handy tips To get links to work, re-type the address in full. Don’t worry if the font appears bigger – it will correct itself when published

8. Click on blue ‘Select Location’ link.

9. Type in the location of the event or incident and click ‘Zoom to place’ then ‘OK’, below

10. The lat-long coordinates will appear next to ‘Select Location’ – this allows the RNLI website to tailor news stories to the reader’s location Select regions and topic fields Start adding photos at this point – the primary photograph appears at the top of your news release. If you plan to add a video, your first photo will appear below the news release

11. Complete the fields and click ‘Upload’. A progress bar will appear. Then click ‘OK’ at the bottom of the pop-up box

12. You can add up to six photos You can add up to two videos – the primary video will appear at the top of the news release, the second video at the bottom. Insert the link from the video player (see next page)

13. Click on the ‘Link’ symbol on the video player in the News Centre. This displays the full link - copy this and paste it into the video box. You can also use the ‘Copy to clipboard’ button

14. Paste the video link into this box. Add a second video if necessary Put an interesting quote or fact into the ‘Key quote’ field – copy it from your text, above. There is no need to use quotation marks If applicable, select lifeboat stations and beaches You can add a photo of yourself - a small JPEG is best, cropped to a square. Warning – the photo should be appropriate – a smiley face linked with a tragic story will be offensive. You can also upload for other people and overwrite names

15. Save your work! Click ‘Save as draft’ Next steps – two options to choose before you save your draft You have the right to publish direct to the News Centre. But if you want somebody to proofread your news release, tick this box This sets a date and time for the story to appear on the News Centre once you have taken the next step to publish or, if you ticked the box for review, when Communications have approved it

16. News Centre 1.1 Publishing your news release

17. ‘Save as draft’ puts your news release into your own work basket – but you still have to publish it or send it for review At this stage you can check how your news release will look by simply clicking on the headline – this throws up a full preview version Don’t worry if the headline has added a ‘1’ or ‘2’, etc. This will not appear on the published version

18. Find the dropdown menu with your mouse and click on ‘Publish/Send for approval’. The status will change to ‘Approved’ unless you have ticked the box asking for review. In that case the status will change to ‘Pending’ as Communications reads your story)

19. Once you have published your news release, or Communications has approved it, the status will change to ‘Approved’

20. News Centre 1.1 Making changes to your published news release

21. To change, remove or delete an approved and published news release, click on the dropdown menu ‘Edit’ leaves the news release on the website but allows you to make changes. Remember you will need to republish it (or send for approval) to make those changes appear ‘Unpublish’ removes the news release from the website and changes the status back to ‘draft’ – this is useful if there is suddenly a question mark over the contents ‘Delete’ destroys the news release entirely ‘Unlock’ can be used if the system says the news release is locked for editing. Sometimes this occurs as a technical glitch but it may also mean somebody else is editing the document – proceed with care!

22. News Centre 1.1 Sending your news release to journalists

23. First create a new email and write an introduction to the journalist and add a link to the press release. Method 1 – copy paste your news release into an email Warning: this may not work with all email and browser combinations. See Method 2

24. Go to your published news release and click on ‘Print this page’

25. Press ‘Ctrl’ and ‘A’ to mark the entire text. Then press ‘Ctrl’ and ‘C’

26. Press ‘Ctrl’ and ‘V’ to paste your news release into the body of the email

27. First create a new email and write an introduction to the journalist and add a link to the press release. Method 2 – if copy paste does not work

28. Go to your published news release and click on ‘Print this page’

29. Then press ‘Ctrl’ and ‘PrintScreen’ to effectively take a snapshot of the screen Tip: enlarge or reduce the size of the screen with ‘Ctrl’ and ‘-’ or ‘+’. Tip: remove the webpage header with F11 Tip: enlarge or reduce the size of the screen with ‘Ctrl’ and ‘-’ or ‘+’. Tip: remove the webpage header with F11

30. Press ‘Ctrl’ and ‘V’ to paste your news release into the body of the email