What is the process involved in getting the text customized?

As with many change requests, this should start with a meta discussion.

The process is as follows:

1. Community members create a meta post to discuss changing one or both elements on this page
   • This post should have the featured tag so that it appears on the front page for community visibility.
   • It may be better to have one meta post for each element (modal and pane).
2. Once the community has reached some sort of agreement on the content (after a week or two minimum), add the status-review tag to the question to get the attention of the CMs.
3. The CMs will triage the request and assign it to a CM, who will review the request.
   • The CM may leave comments or an additional answer making recommendations or asking clarifying questions. The goal of this process is to ensure that the messaging for the UI is clear and concise.
4. For changes that can be made by a CM, they will do so once the copy is finalized.
   For changes that require a developer, a ticket will be created by the CM for the Public Platform team with the copy and a link to the meta post. In general, these requests are quick and shouldn't take more than a week to be completed.

Important note: please do not add the status-review tag on the same day the post is created. CMs need to see community engagement in the form of comments, edits, answers, and/or votes, and this will take some time. Tagging too early could put your question in a state where it gets missed. As such, to avoid this, we will remove the status-review tag and leave a note reminding the community to wait for at least a week before tagging the post.

What should we include in our discussion/request to customize?

The goal of the discussion is two-fold.

1. Determine if there's community support for the change.
2. Determine the content of the change.

As such, the things that should be in each request include the following:

• What do you think should change and why? - Make sure to introduce the concept to your community with a link to this post and a brief TL;DR so they know what's going on. Screenshots of the current version are helpful here!
  • Be specific about which of these elements you want to change so that it's clear to both the community members and the CMs reviewing the request.
  • As noted previously, consider using more than one meta post if you want to change both the modal and the right side info pane.
• Discuss what you think should be included in the new text - This could be by listing some things that you think should be included in the question or proposing text for the element in an answer.
  • When thinking about what to include, keep in mind: common reasons for closure, elements that are often omitted from questions, special instructions or guides the community has created... anything in the other answer's list of stuff for each of the elements.
• Invite community participation in drafting the text for the element/s by encouraging them to propose their ideas in answers.
  • While it's good to open the discussion with an initial proposal with an opening suggestion (rather than waiting on community members to propose something), post this as an answer rather than including it in the question as it allows people to vote separately on the idea of customizing the site vs. the proposed text for the elements.
• Give a general timeframe for discussion - While a hard deadline isn't necessary, being clear that the post is going to be escalated based on community feedback by [date] lets community members know what the schedule is.
  • Keep your community activity levels in mind here. Lower-activity communities may want to wait a bit longer than more active ones.

Once you've finalized the text you want to use, be certain to indicate that clearly so that the community and the Community Manager looking at the request know which text is the final choice.

Resource renewal & creation (Bonus points!)

There's also a secondary part to this process that I find really useful in many cases - reviewing existing help guidance for current accuracy and checking whether there's any additional content that would help users more effectively. This could mean any number of things:

• Reviewing/updating your /help/on-topic page (mods can edit this page)
• Reviewing/updating any existing meta guidance
• Creating new meta guidance for common issues people run into when asking first questions that you might want to link to from either this page or the Help Center

It's not uncommon for these pages to get slightly out of date over time or to benefit from an upgrade with new examples or links, so be certain the resources you need for this feature are available, even if it means waiting another week or two before adding the status-review tag.

Short version for only removing the third bullet point

If your request is just to remove the third bullet point from the "Asking a new question" modal (i.e. "When appropriate, describe what you’ve tried"), the process is a bit simpler but the steps are largely the same.

1. Post a request to remove the third bullet point with an explanation of why.
2. Give time for community feedback/agreement.
3. If the community agrees, add the status-review tag for CM review.
4. A CM will review the request and make the change. If they have questions or concerns they may voice them but, generally, we trust your expertise on this.