How To Self-Publish on SOURCE – A Community Bulletin Board

FRAMINGHAM – As of May 1, SOURCE is moving from a journalistic media outlet to a self-publishing community bulletin board.

SOURCE owner has hired JVF Solutions in Framingham to oversee the day-to-day operations of the website.

Webmaster James Feudo will provide logins to the website.

Email webmaster@framinghamsource.com

Organizations, like the United Way of Tri-County, or public school districts, or individual schools like the Christa McAuliffe Charter School, to sports like Framingham Youth Hockey and Framingham High boys lacrosse, to government entities like the Ashland Public Library, or Natick Health Department, or the Town of Ashland can request a login to post press releases, public hearings, meetings, and events.

Funeral homes can have a login to post obituaries for free.

There is no length limit and there is no charge for a photo.

Framingham, Ashland, and Natick businesses are eligible to submit press releases.

This includes business organizations like the MetroWest Chamber of Commerce, Downtown Framingham Inc., Natick Common Cultural District, 495 Partnership, Framingham Business Association, Ashland Business Association, etc.

Businesses may submit news about innovations, finance reports, deals, mergers, acquisitions, new products, new hires, awards, proposals, public events, special events, anniversaries, celebrations, but are prohibited from posting about regular sales.

For example, restaurants can post about a spring or winter menu change, but can not post about dinner specials weekly or daily. Businesses that violate will receive a warning. Multiple warnings and posting privileges will be revoked.

As of May 1, 2023, there is no longer a sports journalist with SOURCE. Sports organizations, high school coaches, and high school athletic directors can request a login to post sports news, game highlights, coaching changes, sports registration information, awards, honors, etc.

The login is only for organizations and sports departments and NOT individual athletes or parents.

Logins are available for the communities of Framingham, Ashland, and Natick only.

To request a login email webmaster@FraminghamSOURCE.com

The webmaster will create logins and help with technical support, but the webmaster is not a journalist.

For that reason, the opinion section ended on April 30, 2023. There is no longer a politics section, as the webmaster does not have time to moderate posts. And because there is no opinion section and no political section, individuals will not be allowed logins under these new self-publishing guidelines.

Logins are limited to organizations, government entities, school entities, funeral homes, and businesses in Framingham, Ashland, and Natick.

Exceptions are allowed to organizations that cover multiple communities but may be based outside that trio of communities., For example, the Sudbury Valley Trustees or the 495 Partnership.

So How Do I Use the System?

Once you get a login, you will have a user name and a password. You will enter those two at this url:

Once you are in the system, visit the homepage, and look for new at the top of the page. Pull down and click post.

Once you click on new post, you will get a page that looks like this:

The site is set up so you do NOT have to code.

The title is your headline.

Please capitalize the first letter in each word. Try to keep it to 10 words or less.

Under paragraph is where you will put all of your copy. You have the ability to save it as a draft until you are ready to publish.

You can bold key words, but don’t go overboard with bold – it turns readers off.

LOTS OF CAPITAL LETTERS ALSO TURNS READERS OFF. So limit this kind of type.

On the right side of the page, there is the ability to add a featured photo. Please do that for each post as photos attract readers.

You can upload a photo you have – jpeg images are best but a png file will work. PDF does not!

If you don’t have a photo – there are thousands of photos in the SOURCE system.

For example, if you are posting an obituary and you don’t have a photo, type in the word candle, and you will get dozens of photos to choose from.

Once you are happy with your copy, your photo, and your headline, then there are a couple of other things for you to do to help you report get noticed by Google and readers.

Please select a category.

If your post has interest in Natick or Ashland, select Natick Source or Ashland Source, but also select a category, like sports, education, government, community, business, etc.

You can select up to 5 categories maximum.

Finally, if you want to help with search engine and Google tags, you can type in up to 10 tags.

A tag could be Natick Public Schools, Framingham High athletics, Superintendent of Schools Jim Adams, Framingham Public Library, Callahan Center, MetroWest YMCA, Framingham Youth Football, Natick Centre Cultural District, Ashland Is United, Downtown Framingham Inc, etc. There are probably already more than 10,000+ tags in the system.

When you have read over you copy for spelling errors, check your headline then you are ready to hit publish.

All reports will publish immediately.

Please check everything before you hit publish, as once you hit publish, the report or press release or calendar listing will be LIVE.

It will also automatically post on FACEBOOK.

It can not be deleted once it has published.

If you get stuck or have a technical issue, reach out to webmaster@framinghamsource.com.

But the webmaster does not work 24/7, 365 days a year.

You should receive a response from the webmaster with 24 to 72 hours.