Summary

Responsible for communicating with the public via publishing informational content directly to the City’s external website via the Drupal Content Management System (CMS), and ensuring that content meets appropriate communications, branding, and accessibility standards.

Description

As a Web Content Specialist, you will:

Responsible for communicating with the public via publishing informational content directly to the City’s external website via the Drupal Content Management System (CMS), and ensuring that content meets appropriate communications, branding, and accessibility standards.
Manage all day-to-day content updates for City departments, including news and announcements, calendar events, and updates to informational content about the City’s departments, projects, initiatives, and services.
- This will include writing new content, editing existing content, and creating new page and section layouts from scratch.
Oversee and implement numerous ongoing, multi-part content projects, balancing competing priorities to meet client needs and deadlines in a fast-paced environment.
Coordinate with all City departments to conduct content audits to keep existing content up to date and eliminate outdated and/or irrelevant content.
Locate opportunities for website improvement and provide viable solutions.
Write and produce high-quality and engaging features, articles, and informational digital content, in collaboration with communication specialists, department heads, program managers, and others.
Organize and streamline content to make the City’s website user-friendly and easy for the public to find the information they are looking for.
Participate in creating the visual and functional design of the website and work with the City IT webmaster and web developers to enhance features and create a more practical end-user experience.
Track analytics, including desktop, mobile, app, video, and social traffic; implement usability recommendations and Search Engine Optimization (SEO) improvements
Design and create various graphic materials and digital collateral.
Participate in the department's 24-hour on-call calendar approximately 1 week per month for emergencies.

Learn more about this job by reviewing the class specification on the City of Colorado Springs Class Specifications page

We are looking for candidates who demonstrate:

Knowledge of:

Web accessibility standards and best practices
Emerging multi-media and website trends and platforms
Basic operations, services, and activities of a municipal public communications program
Strategic communications planning, advertising, publications, and community relations procedures

Ability to:

Communicate effectively, verbally and in writing, with a focus on writing for web
Successfully engage stakeholders on existing and emerging issues
Perform effectively in a fast-paced political environment with multiple stakeholders
Establish and maintain effective working relationships

Minimum Qualifications

A bachelor's degree from an accredited college or university with major coursework in communications, marketing, journalism, media, or a related field
One year of full-time public relations, communications, digital media content creation, or marketing experience

Substitutions: We value a diverse range of qualifications and experiences. Our organization views each year of further education as equivalent to each year of relevant work experience, and each year of additional relevant work experience as equivalent to each year of required education. We encourage all to apply!

Preferred Qualifications

The following qualifications are not required, but they are considered desirable. If you possess any of the preferred qualifications, please include specific details in your application. This information may be used to identify a top group of applicants.

At least three years of website content management experience
Proficiency using web and graphic design tools and software (e.g. Adobe Creative Cloud, including Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign)
Experience using Drupal or other website Content Management Systems (CMS)
Basic-to-intermediate skills in HTML and CSS
Experience working in Google Analytics
Strong writer/editor and communicator with expert-level English usage, including spelling, grammar, and punctuation.