Making a content and style guide that is both rhetorically effective while also comprehensive can be a challenge, namely because picking a place to start isn’t as simple as with other projects. A style guide combined with a content guide requires you to think about nearly everything going into a website as well as what it publishes; in short, you can’t cut any corners.To make it a bit easier on other also taking on the task of creating a content / style guide, I’ve created this database of resources and advice that should help you get a foot up in the process.
Where to Start?
When starting to create content and style guide, you likely will go through the same process that I did: Googling everything. In doing so, you’ll want to think about what you value in the process as you’ll be looking up more than a basic style guide. You’ll be looking up sources that will shape your writing and style practices.
Worried that you don’t have the time to sift through countless websites, finding guides that can help shape your action plan? I’ll go through some of the ones that helped shape my own process:
Themeisle’s Blog Style Guide on How to Create a Style Guide
This relatively short article gives you a crash course on the fundamentals of having a style guide for your blog, complete with simple graphics that make understanding their ideas clear and accessible. If you’re just starting out and still unsure about why you might want a style guide, or what one would even look like, start here!
Buffer’s How To Create a Content Style Guide to Improve Your Blog’s Quality
This page emphasizes the visual design aspect, explaining the importance of such practices as well as how you can go about picking a style for your own website. It’ll also give you a framework of things that you should consider as you put your style guide together; it doesn’t go too in-depth, but it’s perfect for someone who’s just starting out and wants to jump into the deep end.
Sources of Inspiration
Reviewing guides on how to create a style guide can only get you so far, as they will give you the base templates of information to include; they can’t possibly cover everything real style guides will. As such, you might find that after creating a sketch of a style guide for your organization, something’s still missing, that not everything that you want to be included is there.
If, well, when, you hit that wall, these style guides can help you see what various organizations use to shape their content and their image. As you sift through them, you might think about how each one has differing priorities and how each end result looks quite different. Consider how your style guide will reflect your organization, website, or blog.
The ADA Nation Network’s Guidelines for Writing About People with Disabilities
Related to some of the sources below, it’s critical to ensure that you’re writing about people with respect, no matter who they are. To avoid talking down to people with disabilities, or have content unwelcoming to them, review this source and think about how some of its advice can be implemented within your own style guide.
Associated Press’ Stylebook on Race Related Coverage
Depending on the topic of your website or blog, people may or may not be the focus. Regardless of how prominent the discussion of people are, your writers, readers, and users are still people, and you’ll want to take care to write about them with respect. To ensure that you’re doing so, take some time and see what might be applicable to how your organization writes.
This style guide embraces accessibility, ensuring that writing is as approachable, accessible, and understandable as possible no matter its content. In reviewing this guide, you might consider sections or aspects to bring into your guide, taking care to understand the various needs of your readers and users.
Mailchimp is an invaluable resource in looking at a style / content guide that is complete, fleshed out, and evocative of an organization’s values and vision. Although their style guide won’t quite tell you what to do, it will certainly show you how to implement the ideas and suggestions that could be found above.
Where to Now?
Now that you’ve read what you should include in a style or content guide and seen it in action in a variety of forms, you’ll probably want to dive in and create one yourself. One of the easiest ways can be to look at the sections that the existing style guides have, consider what your site or blog needs, and then begin to fill in some of the gaps.
You’ll also want to consult organizations’ documents, guidelines, and existing advice to ensure that you are carrying on the themes of those who have come before. If it’s your own website and you’re the boss, then you should consider the goal of your site, the message that you want it to convey. In doing so, you can consider what stylistic choices would lead to this result, and what else such decisions might entail.
Really, it all comes down to the final goal that you have in mind. What do you want to create?