The SNO Report: Fresh FLEX and SNODrift

Fresh FLEX

Today, we released a new version of FLEX, and we all know what that means – awesome new features for your SNO Site. The latest edition of our FLEX theme comes with a new Immersive Splash Page option for your site. This feature allows you to display a single story and it’s featured image as the homepage of your site.

The splash page will be displayed anytime someone enters your URL, but your regular homepage is still viewable via the “View Full Site” link displayed at the top of the splash page. The right side of the page also features a collapsible, fully-functional menu.

Of course, to utilize this feature, you’re going to want a story with a pretty stellar featured image – the photo should be 1500×1000 pixels, as it’s meant to span the entire width of your homepage. (We’re not using the term “immersive” lightly.)

Why the new addition? Some stories are so good, they deserve an entire page. While the Showcase Carousel already does a fantastic job exhibiting your top stories, the immersive splash feature gives your site that “front page of the newspaper” effect – when there’s big, breaking news that needs to be seen, the immersive splash page makes sure that happens. If your school’sbasketball team wins the state championship, (or your program earns the honor of being a SNO Distinguished Site) the immersive splash page makes your biggest story noticeable in a whole new way.

Think you have a story that’s front page worthy? Test out the new immersive splash page feature and show us your results – we’d love to see what you come up with!  We’ll send a prize to the first program that Tweets their immersive example to us.

Join us for the first SNODrift

Today also marks the beginning of our new webinar series – if you’ve got 30 minutes to spare, you can join us at 3 p.m. CST to learn all about the basics of site design. To join, simply follow this link.

Next week Wednesday, March 16th, we’ll be covering the SNO Story Elements for your story pages.