Each Thrivent Financial for Lutherans chapter has a customizable website in Lutherans Online (www.lutheransonline.com), which can be viewed by anyone with Internet access. Chapters must have their websites on Lutherans Online, and leaders can update the site any time at no cost.

Important: Respect Member Privacy
There are privacy guidelines in CHIP that you need to follow as you customize and update your chapter website. Please read these guidelines carefully.

For Chapter website guidelines, getting started information and additional information on setting up your chapter website, log on to Lutherans Online and click on Help, which is located in the upper right hand corner of the page, then click on Web Sites, and finally Chapter Sites. Review the Chapter website guidelines very carefully before working on your site (e.g., to find guidelines about using photos, getting consent to use photos, etc.).

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Benefits of Chapter Websites
Chapter leaders can:

• Publicize upcoming chapter activities including chapter meetings. (If cohosting an activity with another organization, link to its site and vice versa.)
• Recognize volunteers who have gone the extra mile.
• Share what the chapter has been up to by posting photos and stories from past activities.
• Keep members informed of chapter activities, such as meetings, Care program activities and any locally supported activities, by posting dates, times and other details on your website.
• Communicate the names of chapter leaders and how to contact them. (Tips for doing this)
• Learn what’s on members’ minds by holding online chat sessions.
• Hold online meetings of the chapter leadership board.

Chapters don't have to create a site from scratch – a basic shell of each chapter's website already is available. Chapter leaders need to enhance and build on it. The shell includes basic and proper information about Thrivent Financial and its chapters, the correct representation and appearance of our logo, and suggested categories that chapters can customize such as "Meet our Chapter Leaders," "Upcoming Important Dates" and "About Our Chapter."

In addition, content feeds are available that allow you to post information that automatically gets updated, such as content for the "Meet our Chapter Leaders" page.

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Why Chapter Websites Must Be on Lutherans Online
Chapters need to use Lutherans Online to create and host their websites because:

• It's free and there's space for chapters to expand their websites if needed.
• It includes a template that follows legal and brand compliance guidelines.
• Assistance is available through the Lutherans Online Help Desk.
• Chapter sites are within a community of other chapter websites and receive equal exposure.
• Websites are consistent.
• Services are continually added and improvements made to the template, interfaces and processes.
• Thrivent Financial regional financial offices (RFOs) have websites that provide links to chapter or other sites within Lutherans Online.
• Lutherans Online has no outside advertisers. Other websites are at the mercy of the hosting company and what they want to advertise, so there could be pop-up or banner ads for goods or services that may be offensive to our members, prospects, volunteers and others.

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Finding Your Chapter Website
To see your chapter's website, go to www.lutheransonline.com/(official name of your chapter)chapter (e.g., hartfordcountychapter) or follow the directions below:

1. Go to www.lutheransonline.com.
2. From the upper navigation click on Websites > Search Sites.
3. Click on Chapters/RFOs. A map of the United States will appear on your screen.
4. Click on the area on the map where you live. Your Thrivent Financial regional financial office's (RFO) website will appear on your screen. This site will include a list of chapter websites within your region.
5. Click on your chapter's website.

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Selecting a Primary Administrator
While all chapter leaders are considered "administrators" of the site, which means they are authorized to make changes, one chapter leader should be responsible for adding content and updating the site on an ongoing basis. The time required of this person will depend on the amount of information and detail added to the site. If your chapter has an Internet advisor, he/she may be the logical choice for administrator. If not, decide as a group who on the chapter leadership board can take on this responsibility. See "Adding/removing administrative privileges" below for details on how to update your chapter's administrative privileges.

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Selecting a Contact Person
Each year, a chapter board should review and consider who the contact and administrator(s) for their chapter website should be. There can only be one contact, but there can be multiple administrators (contact and administrators can edit the website). A contact and participants will receive email notifications of changes within the site if they have the notification feature switched on.

When a site is created, by default the creator is the contact person. Your chapter may decide that the Internet advisor (if your chapter has one) is the logical contact person. Any chapter leader can change the contact person and administrator by following the steps provided in "Adding/removing administrative privileges" below. It is not required that a contact/administrator is a Thrivent member. If the contact/administrator is not a Thrivent member, they cannot serve on the chapter board in the Internet advisor position.

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Adding/removing Administrative Privileges

• If your chapter leadership board has any new leaders this year, you will need to update the "Meet our Chapter Leaders" section.
• If any new chapter leaders need administrative privileges, authorizing them to make changes to the site, they should:
1. Complete the registration process for Lutherans Online if they haven’t already. However, if they are registered on Thrivent.com, their Thrivent.com User Name and Password also gives them access to Lutherans Online, which is where the chapter website is located.
2. Change their privacy preferences to allow the current chapter website administrator(s) to add them as an administrator to the site:
   1. Access www.lutheransonline.com.
   2. Click Login in the left navigation bar and login.
   3. Click Manage my Profile in the left navigation bar.
   4. Click Web Site Profile.
   5. Under Privacy Preferences, click Click to add name.
   6. Click Done at the bottom of the screen.
3. Send an email to the current chapter website administrator to request access to the site. If they do not know who the current administrator is, they can click on the Feedback link on the chapter website, type their request on the form and click Submit.

The current administrator then must:

1. Access lutheransonline.com.
2. Click Login in the left navigation bar and login.
3. Click My Site in the left navigation bar to bring up the chapter website.
4. Click the Web Site Manager button.
5. Click Manage Participants.
6. Type in the new user’s name in the first name and last name fields.
7. Click Search for Users.
8. In the section below that, find the person’s name and click Add to the left of it. This user now is a participant on the chapter website.
9. Click Done at the bottom of the screen.
10. Click Manage Administrative Roles to see a list of all current participants and administrators for the site. Administrative privileges can be added or removed from this page.
11. Click Done.

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Website Content & Design Tips

• When listing upcoming activities, include name and date of the activity, description of the activity, name of the recipient (if recipient provides permission), a contact person and phone number or email, and a description of how members can help, including time commitment.
• Invite all members to chapter meetings and include the date, time and location of the meetings.
• Include an online activity request form.
• Use the whole page while leaving enough "white space" to make it easy for the eye to skim the page.
• In Lutherans Online, font sizes XS and S work well, which are similar to using font sizes 12 and 14 on your word processing software.
• Use black text on white or light color backgrounds. Consistent use of the color black for the font is preferred.
• Order of items/information should be logical (order of importance, frequency of use, alphabetical, etc.).
• Multiple levels of navigation are generally preferable to drop-down lists. However, drop-down lists can work in the overall design of your website.
• Font size and use should be consistent throughout the site.
• Italics are hard to read online.
• Use bold sparingly.
• Blinking text or elements are hard on the reader’s eyes.
• Use bulleted lists.
• Minimize scrolling.
• Because color is usually a cue for a label or link, avoid colored text for emphasis.
• Reading online is more difficult than on paper. Make sentences direct and short.
• Write in short chunks, using active writing style.
• Keep information current. Remove items that no longer are relevant.
• Get permission and provide credit when using another’s material or code.
• Align to the left. Do not center elements other than headings and titles.
• Eliminate unnecessary words and phrases.
• Spaces between letters (e.g., E X A M P L E) shouldn’t be used.
• When creating links to documents or forms found on another website, be sure to link to the original instead of copying the form to your site. Copied content is not updated when the original form changes, which could cause compliance issues.
• Avoid linking to unfinished pages or sites. Always get permission from the website administrator of the site where you wish to link.

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Removing Outdated Chapter Mailings
When your chapter sends a newsletter to its members via the Chapter Mailing Service, the newsletter is automatically posted to your chapter's website. If you only want the current year's newsletters to display:

1. Go to www.lutheransonline.com and click Login on the left navigation bar.
2. Enter your login information and click Login.
3. Click My Site on the left navigation bar to go to your website.
4. Click on the Chapter Newsletters link to get to that page.
5. Click Edit Page.
6. Scroll down to the list of newsletters.
7. Click on the link titled Link to which Chapter Newsletters?
8. Click on All current year Chapter Newsletters to move this to the "Newsletters already selected:" column.
9. Click Done and your website will display this year's newsletters only.

Note: Any chapter leader can delete individual newsletters via the Chapter Mailing Service. From the Chapter Leadership Administration Menu page, click on Add/Update/View/Delete Chapter Newsletters to get to the Manage Chapter Newsletters page. Simply click on Delete for those newsletters you'd like to remove from your chapter website page.

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Adding Content Feeds
Content feeds are postings that you can use to enhance your site. These postings are updated automatically as the information changes – no updating by you is necessary after you add it to the website.

There are a variety of content feeds to choose from, including a poll, mini-calendar, and daily devotionals. Three content feeds you may find helpful to include on your chapter website are links to Chapter Leader Display, Member Activity Highlights, and Thrivent Financial news releases:

• Chapter Leader Display: This creates a list of all your chapter leaders, Thrivent Builds chapter specialists and advisor, as well as their phone number and email address on record with Thrivent Financial for Lutherans. We encourage chapters to use this content feed on the "Meet our Chapter Leaders" page of the chapter website. See "Adding a Chapter Leader Display content feed" below for complete details.
• Member Activity Highlights: This creates a new posting on your page where visitors can enter their ZIP code and get Thrivent Financial for Lutherans Member Activity Highlights statistics by region, state or chapter from the previous year. This content feed would be excellent addition to the "About Our Chapter" page on your website or to the home page.
• Thrivent Financial News: This displays links to the five most recent Thrivent Financial for Lutherans news releases posted on thrivent.com. This content feed would be excellent addition to the "About Our Chapter" page on your website or to the home page.

To add a content feed to your site:

1. Go to www.lutheransonline.com and click Login in the left navigation bar.
2. Enter your login information and click Login.
3. Click on My Site on the left navigation bar to go to your website.
4. Go to the page on your website where you'd like to add a content feed.
5. Click Edit Page.
6. Decide where you would like to insert a content feed, then click Click to Insert a New Posting Here!
7. Click Next Set in the lower-right corner.
8. Choose the single Content Feed posting type.
9. Add a posting name (this step is optional).
10. Click Continue.
11. Scroll to your newly-created posting and click Format Content Feed.
12. Choose a content feed from the list on the left (e.g., for chapter leader information, click "Chapter Leaders Display").
13. Click Done.

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Adding Chapter Leader Display Content Feed
Your chapter may add a "Chapter Leader Display" content feed to the "Meet our Chapter Leaders" page of your chapter website.

• This will automatically post all your chapter leaders, Thrivent Builds chapter specialists and advisors – providing each leader's name, phone number and email address on record with Thrivent Financial.
• The contact information listed is pulled from the records we have on our online system. If information is incorrect, we ask chapter leaders to correct the information online or contact the Member Connection Center.
• After the posting (content feed) is added to your chapter website, it is updated nightly to agree with the records on our online system. Therefore, if a change in leadership or a change in a leader's contact information was made to our online system, this will be reflected on the chapter website by the next business day.
• The posting cannot be edited (e.g., to take a chapter leader's email address off the list). If your chapter would like to customize this page, the content feed needs to be deleted and the website administrator can post the information the chapter wants on the page.

For easy instructions on how to add this content feed, click on the following link: Instructions for adding Chapter Leader Display content feed.

It's important that chapter members can easily find who their chapter leaders are and how to contact them. Therefore, chapter websites need to have up-to-date information about the chapter leadership board. If contact information is missing or outdated, members may give up trying to contact the chapter, which could be a missed opportunity for the chapter, for the member, and more importantly for the volunteer activity that could benefit from Care Abounds in Communities® funding.

Because of this, please note that Thrivent Financial will manually add this content feed to chapter websites that have no information or outdated information in the "Meet our Chapter Leaders" page.

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Developing Online Forms
You may develop as many online forms (e.g., activity requests, "help wanted" or "volunteers needed" pages, surveys, sign-up forms for indicating interest in a leadership board position, etc.) as you'd like on your chapter website. To do this, create a new page and choose the "Online Form" option.

Help is available by clicking on Online Help > Web Site Publishing > Editing Your Site > Publishing Site > Online Forms. For an example of forms, visit www.lutheransonline.com/rfo270 and click on the bottom two links (registration form and survey).

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Chat Function
Using the chat function, your chapter can conduct chapter leadership board meetings, communicate with congregational advocates, and more. For details about using Chat, click Online Help on the left navigation bar.

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Promoting Your Chapter Website
Do members know about your site? If not, consider promoting the site in your next chapter newsletter mailing and suggest they bookmark the site as a "favorite" in their Web browser. There are two ways members can access your chapter website:

• Enter url address, which is: www.lutheransonline.com/officialchapternamechapter (e.g., hartfordcountychapter).


OR


• Follow these steps:
1. Visit lutheransonline.com.
2. Click Chapters/RFO in the upper top navigation bar titled Channels. A United States map appears.
3. Click on the area of the map where you live. This brings up your Thrivent Financial Regional Financial Office’s Fraternal website.
4. Click Chapter Web Sites.
5. Choose the appropriate chapter website. (When communicating to your members, list the chapter they need to choose.)

And be sure to take advantage of the Chapter Mailing Service!

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Getting Help with Technical Questions and Editing
The Lutherans Online Help Desk is a great resource to use when you have technical questions or need help editing your website (e.g., adding a photo). You can reach them at 866-201-1522 on Monday through Friday, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Central time. Or you can send them an email at LOHELP@thrivent.com.

Additional Topics:
Chapter Mailing Service
Lutherans Online
Privacy – Impacts on Chapter-related Issues