Open Forum

This is one part of a series of blogs about maximizing your experience with our online Community, not only to help newbies get their bearings but to also help experienced users learn more and take the next steps, or assist others. Today, we'll talk about how to write an effective subject line for a new discussion post. 

Using the word “HELP!” as a subject line is certainly useful for grabbing someone's attention, but it doesn’t give anyone a hint as to what you actually need help with. Think carefully about how you interact with Community posts. When you are skimming the Daily Digest in the morning, aren’t you more likely to read and reply to one with a catchy subject line on a topic that interests you or that you know something about?

The best discussion subject lines:
Are short and sweet.
Summarize what your post is about.
Are spelled correctly.

Subject lines are also easily searchable. Help others who may want to know more about this same topic in the future by making your subject line clear. Take a second and review for spelling errors before posting. Think about what someone would type in the search bar to locate this discussion.

Here are some examples of great subject lines:

Building Water Pump for The Miracle Worker
Renting Transformation Dress for Cinderella
Stage Combat Training in New Jersey
Stage Makeup Curriculum Needed

These short descriptions give an accurate preview of the post and tell fellow Community members what answers the author is hoping to collect. Try out these tips the next time you have a question and see if it makes a difference in the number of responses you receive!

In previous Community Tips blogs, we've covered Signatures, Participation Notifications, @mentions, Searching the Community Library and Discussions.  Stay tuned in the coming weeks for tips on many more exciting aspects of Community.