Commissioning web content

You may decide to hire a consultant to help you create impactful web content for your campaign or research.

It’s brilliant that you want to make your work as impactful as possible.

There are a few things you need to know about how we manage content on amnesty.org with the Amnesty WordPress Theme before you put together your brief and hire someone:

• Access to the back end of your website
• Designing, styling and brand
• Accessibility
• Embedded content
• Content security

We recommend building the page in WordPress from the start, rather than prototyping or designing the page in a different application first. This will ensure that the design is feasible using existing templates and blocks.

For Amnesty.org content:

1. Microsoft account: you will need to put in a request to IT for a Microsoft account for your contractor.
2. WordPress access: you can then arrange access to WordPress and an induction to our WordPress theme, by getting in touch with Web Ops on [email protected].

For other Amnesty WordPress sites:

Show your contractor around the Amnesty WordPress Theme (send them a link to this site!) so they know what kind of content blocks are available and what kind of page design will be feasible.

The Amnesty WordPress Theme helps ensure that page designs are consistent with Amnesty’s brand and visual identity.

We do not allow the use of custom code or fonts, because:

• It can result in off-brand designs
• It may not work responsively or on different devices
• It could be broken by future code updates
• It may cause problems for translation
• It may cause problems for content migration

Since custom css styling is not recommended, we can use image editing, graphic design and illustration to bring the a creative visual identity to your content.

You can also be creative with layout using the blocks within the Amnesty WordPress Theme.

For example, flagship campaigns which have their own brand identity, such as Write for Rights and Protect the Protest used custom banner images, background graphics and image textures to create the visual impact and campaign branding we were looking for.  

You may wish to include embedded content such as YouTube videos, petition forms, maps charts and other visualizations.

We have an approved list of providers and any new tools will be blocked from embedding content on amnesty.org until they have been approved by the Web Ops team.

Please make sure your content follows our content security guidelines:

• Any links in the content should be secure: https (not http).
• Ensure links or PDFs do not contain staff names.
• Do not include links to OneDrive, Sharepoint or OpenSend. 
• Do not include staff emails and phone numbers
• Use approved providers for embedded content

We want our web content to be as accessible as possible to all users. You should ensure that any web content professional you hire is well-versed in the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

Any content created for amnesty.org should follow these accessibility requirements at a minimum:

• Images should not contain text
• All images should have alt text
• Content should use structured headings
• Copy should be written with short sentences and paragraphs for readability
• Follow Amnesty’s House Style and A – Z of terms for inclusive language

Find out more about accessibility.

Hire someone who:

• Can work with WordPress.
• Can create content that fits within Amnesty brand guidelines and is achievable with existing blocks in the Amnesty WordPress Theme.
• Is committed to creating accessible and secure web content according to best practices.