Automated latest news

Before you start

Automated latest news can only be added to landing pages and not standard pages.

You should check the Tags that have been applied to the articles that you want to display in your Automated latest news. You should have at least 5 articles with the same tag. See how to create an article if you're unsure of the tags. 

The Automated latest news component won't display if there are fewer than 5 articles that include the tags you have selected. 

Using Automated latest news

Do

• Use Automated latest news as a visual feature on landing pages.
• Continue to monitor that the correct news stories are being populated over time.
• Use appropriate images in news articles that will feature in the Automated latest news. 

Don't 

• Add Automated latest news to a page if you're not regularly publishing lots of news articles. Your page will look out of date and irrelevant if it is featuring old news articles. 

How to add Automated latest news to your landing page

Go to:

1. The Layout screen and click Add block.
2. Select + Create custom block and click on Automated latest news and the Configure block screen will open.
3. Add a heading for the news section in the Heading field. This will display as an H2 on the page at the top of the news section. If this field is left blank an auto-generated heading will appear that says 'Latest (filter) updates'. (The filter is selected in the next step).
4. Select how you want your news to be filtered. When you start typing in one of the fields, a dropdown of options will appear for you to select from. You can choose one or multiple options to filter by. If adding more than one, see Adding multiple filters. Filter options include:  
   • Topic
   • Agency 
   • Audience 
   • Industry
   • Region
   • Category (not available for media releases).

The filter options all come from the Tag fields in the news article template. How you have tagged your individual news articles will provide the tags that are available for you to use in the Automated latest news component.

See how to create an article if you are unsure about article tags. In the news article template only Topic and Agency are mandatory tags, which means that there may not be as many news articles with the other tags applied. 

5. After you have selected how you want your news to be filtered, scroll down to Article type and select from the list:
   • Ministerial media release
   • News
   • Official notice
   • Departmental release
   • Inside DCS blog
6. Add the Link text. This will be on the link that takes users to other news information. An example of link text could be: See all media releases from the NSW Premier. 
7. In the Type dropdown choose the type of link:
   • Content – for links to other pages on this site.
   • Managed Link – for webpages on other websites.
   • Media – to link to a media item on this site, for example an informational PDF. 
8. In the Link field add the link of where users will go for further news information.
9. Click the Update button. 

Adding multiple filters

Multiple filters selected in the same filter category

You can add multiple items within a single filter category, for example the Topic field. There are 5 empty fields below each filter heading. If you are adding multiple filters within the same field then articles with either tag will display.  

For example, if in the Topic field you select Aged care in the first field and Bushfires in the second field, news will be displayed for both topics. If there are 100 articles tagged with Aged care and 50 articles tagged with Bushfires then your Automated latest news will show the 5 most recent stories from 150 articles. 

Multiple filters selected in different filter categories

If you add multiple filters in different filter categories, for example the Agency and the Topic filter categories, then only news items that are tagged with both tags will appear. News items tagged with only one category will not display. 

For example, if you select the Agency as Health and the Topic as Community Services, the Automated latest news will display the 5 most recent news articles from the many articles related to both Health and Community Services.

If there are 100 articles with the Agency as Health, 50 articles with the Topic as Community Services, and 20 articles tagged with both the Agency as Health and the Topic as Community Services the Automated latest news will only show the 5 most recent articles from the 20 articles tagged with both. 

If, for example, you select the Agency as Health and the Topic as Driving, Boating and Transport, and there is only 1 item that relates to both, nothing will appear. There must be at least 4 articles tagged with both for the Automated news article to appear at all. 

If your Automated latest news isn't displaying

The Automated latest news component won't display if there are fewer than 5 articles that include the tags you have selected. Although it is best to have more than 5 articles. 

Check the filters of your Automated latest news component

You should check the filters (Topic, Agency) or Article type (media release, official notice) you have applied in the Automated latest news component. It may be too restrictive and there aren't enough articles that have those tags applied.

Check the tags of your articles

You should check that your articles have been correctly tagged.

There are many similar tags, for example, the agencies NSW Digital or NSW Government Digital Channels.

Tags could also have been entered under the wrong tag type, for example Health is both a Category tag and a Topic tag in a news article.