Before you start
To build and edit grants using the nsw.gov.au templates, you will need to get access to our content management system and complete the online training.
There are 4 easy steps to adding grants to the finder:
- Apply for access
- Create your grant in the nsw.gov.au template
- Send to the Content Operations team to review and publish grant
- Add grant recipients
Note: if your team has been onboarded to OneGMS (SmartyGrants), you must build, edit and publish your grants and recipients in SmartyGrants. They will appear on the finder within 30 minutes.
Email the team: onegms@dpird.nsw.gov.au
Overview of the grant template
The Grant template on nsw.gov.au contains a set of content fields, categories and tagging options that help you build your grant.
All grants are published using the uniform template, designed to take people through the information, from discovering a grant to making the decision to apply.
Important: this is one of three grant templates that can be selected based on the type of grant you are publishing. You will need to choose 'Grant: Grant' sub-type at the beginning of the content creation process:
If you are looking for instructions on how to create a 'non-competitive' grant, read the non-competitive grant editing guide.
Using the editing guide
This step-by-step guide describes each grant field, what they do and how they display on the finder.
You can either work through the full template as you are building a grant or jump to a specific item in the list to refresh your memory.
- Login to the CMS
- Scroll down to Quick Actions and click +Add Content
- Choose 'Grant: Grant', then click Submit:
The Key information fields include basic information that is displayed on both the grant finder and the grant page, such as dates, the amounts offered and the grant’s open or closed status.
These fields include:
- Grant name: name of the grant program/fund. This forms the title of the page and also sets the URL. Suggested limit for this field is 50 characters. See OneCX general component guidelines for page titles.
- Summary: why the grant is available; Suggested length 200 characters or less. Hard character limit is now set to 250 characters. This is a plain text field. It cannot contain any formatting including links.
- Category: what type of grant it is. You can choose multiple selections from a list of options.
- Grant audience: who can apply for the grant. You can choose multiple selections.
- (Optional) Fund: the funding program the grant is a part of (you can request a new Fund if one does not already exist).
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Agencies funding this grant: select the agency or agencies that funded the grant from the list provided. In some cases, this will be the same as the administering agency that you will tag later, but in other cases may be a different or additional agency. This will display both on the grant details page under Program objectives and on any grant recipients of the grant.
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Grant amount: the amount people can apply for, required field. The available amount fields will vary depending on what is selected:
- Minimum amount: the minimum value awarded
- Maximum amount: the maximum value awarded
- Single amount: a single amount every successful recipient will receive
- Range: from an amount to an amount (most useful for the customer as they can quickly see if their planned project costs fit within that range)
Note: the amount fields cannot have special characters. For example, 10 thousand dollars must be entered as '10000' rather than '$10,000'
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(Optional) Text override for amount display: displays a text message rather than a figure for the Grant amount. For example, 'Receipts up to $1000'
Note: you will still need to supply an underlying amount so that the filtering by amount function works. People have the option on the finder of using the amount filters to search for grants.
- Start Date: when the grant is open for applications
- (Optional) End date: when the grant will be closed for applications; if the grant is open-ended, leave this blank
Note about Rounds: when a grant runs for several different periods during a year or across years, it is generally referred to as rounds. You can click on the 'Add another item' button for additional Start and End date fields. Each round will show up in the key information field on the grant under the original start and end dates as 'Additional rounds'. As each round closes, this configuration will update.
- Round currently open, with next round upcoming (this is multiple rounds in one year grant)
- Round opening soon, with next round upcoming (this is a year on year grant)
- (Optional) Project start date: when awarded recipients need to start their work by
- (Optional) Project end date: when awarded recipients need their work to be finished by
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Location (Disaster Declarations): only use this location field for disaster relief grants that are funding recipients in a Disaster Declaration area or areas.
- This function is only available to Content administrators.
- As of 19 September 2022, all grants must be published on nsw.gov.au. However, there are some historic cases where we need to maintain a grant listing that will link to an external website.
- The default is to appear on nsw.gov.au. Old grant listings can be switched over (or archived if they can be redirected) to a full-content grant.
- Contact us using the Add or update a grant form if you need to work with a grant listing or change it to a full grant.
- The Program Objectives field outlines what the grant program is trying to achieve. It is usually included as the introduction to the grant guidelines. It can include high-level information on broader program or fund aims, and how the program might achieve goals for its recipients. The language should be clear and easy for applicants to understand.
- Note: as part of the program objective content, the agency owning the grant is programmatically identified with the phrase ‘This grant is administered by (agency name)’. The agency name is drawn from the Grant owner tag in the CMS. Tagging is done at a later editing step. In addition, the phrase 'This grant is funded by {agency name}' will also appear in same location (see details further down in the 'Add Tags to the grant' step).
The Eligibility section should give customers all the information they need to decide whether they are eligible to apply for the grant.
It is presented as a series of subheadings and copy inside a 'Classic Sequence' component.
Use the sample copy (by clicking the Add default content button) to guide your content in this section. While there is scope to vary the Subtitles in this section, we strongly recommend sticking as closely to the template as your grant content will allow as it has been based on researched customer needs.
- Variant: leave this as-is (Classic)
- (Optional) List style: leave this as is (none)
- (Optional) Overview: leave this as is (blank)
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Subtitle – Who can apply: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List out who can apply to the grant. This should be included in the grant guidelines.
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Subtitle – Who can’t apply: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List out who can’t apply to the grant.
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Subtitle – Types of projects funded under this grant: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List out things that will funded by the grant.
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Subtitle – What you can’t apply for: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List out things that will not be funded by the grant.
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Subtitle – Example projects: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List concrete examples of projects that would be funded by the grant to help people understand if the project they are trying to apply for is likely to be eligible.
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List concrete examples of projects that would be funded by the grant to help people understand if the project they are trying to apply for is likely to be eligible.
In this block you can link to supporting information that the applicant will need to understand before applying. This includes
- grant guidelines
- sample application forms
- other resources.
These documents can be embedded in this section so that users can launch them directly from the grant page.
On the What your application needs to include section, fill in the fields as required:
- Content block: use this section to provide program guidelines and other information or links as required.
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Subtitle – Prepare your application with this checklist: recommended to leave as-is. Used as a 'get ready' checklist
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List out things that applicants will need before they start to fill in the application form. For example, documentation, ABN and other materials or evidence of eligibility.
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Subtitle – Address the eligibility criteria: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: additional information about how best to address the eligibility criteria. This is an adjunct to the eligibility section above.
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Subtitle – Address the assessment criteria: recommended to leave as-is
- HTML: in a bulleted list. List out the criteria that the applicant will be assessed against and what the applicant needs to be assessed. This could be a merit table with scores or percentage matches against which applications will be marked.
This section details the steps people will need to take to apply. They can use the ‘Apply now’ button to get to the grant application portal, such as SmartyGrants or to an equivalent agency application site.
On the Start the application section, fill in the fields as required:
- Body text: details on where applications for the grant will be available. For example, the name of the grants portal being used. Can also provide a checklist of what the applicant will need before they login to the portal for the first time.
- Type: choose whether the grant application is on another page on the site (for example, a content page with a webform), a PDF file to be filled in, or to an external page.
- Call to action link: paste in the full URL of the external page, search for a content page, or search for a PDF file from Media Library.
This section lists the processes that take place after the application is made. It can show key dates and post-assessment activities.
1. On the After the application is submitted section, fill in the fields as required:
Content block: details on what happens for successful and unsuccessful applications. For example, how long the assessment will be, response times, acquittals and reporting process.
2. Fill in the Decision maker textbox. This details who the final decision maker is when judging the applications as successful or unsuccessful. For example, this could be a minister or an assessment panel.
Note: This is used for transparency and will also be shown on any grant recipient records alongside the actual decision maker for that grant round (in the case that the actual differs from the intended). There are additional fields available in grant recipients to record the reason for different decision maker plus any discretionary decisions made by a minister.
Check privacy requirements for this grant
If your grant has recipients that need to be de-identified, you will need to check the box. Find out more about how to de-identify grant recipients for privacy.
This details the phone, email address and postal address (as applicable) for applicants who need support for their applications or to ask about the process.
It can also contain information about other sources of support, such as webinars, videos or links to other websites where appropriate.
- Delete details that are not applicable. For example, if there is no postal address or phone number.
- For phone numbers and email addresses, take the extra step of linking the number/email address so that people who click on the details can call or send an email straight away. This can be done using the first link icon on the editor bar.
- Delete any spaces for phone numbers when setting up the link.
For information to do with program evaluation after a grant has been awarded and projects completed. You may want to include PDFs or other links here.
Scroll back to the top of the Grant editing screen and click on the Media tab. Add in a thumbnail image associated with the grant from the media library by clicking on Add media. The image should give people searching the finder some information about the kind of grant program that is being funded.
Scroll back to the top of the page and click on the Tags tab. Fill in the fields as required
1. Agency: choose the Agency or Cluster that the grant belongs to
Note: this also sets the 'This program is administered by...' on the grant details page as part of Program objective.
If this Agency:
is the same as the 'This program is funded by...' agency tagged earlier on the Content tab, it will display as:
- This program is funded and administered by (same Agency tagged in both places).
is in addition to or different to the 'This program is funded by...' agency/ies tagged earlier, it will display as:
- This program is administered by (Agency tagged in this Tags tab) plus This program is funded by (Agency tagged in Content tab)
2. Topic: choose the most relevant topics that apply to the grant.
3. Location: only use this field when your grant is targeting specific regions of NSW. Use the drop-down option to add locations line by line. Don't use this field for Disaster Declaration targeted grants. You will have already added these in the Key information area.
On the right-hand side, expand the Governance accordion. Fill in the Editorial group for the grant. This dictates which editors will have access to edit the grant. These are usually grouped by cluster, team or specialty.
Sending your finished grant for review
When you have added or edited your grant, scroll down to the bottom of the page, and change 'Save as' from Draft to Needs Review.
Top tip: preview links help you share drafts
If you need to share your draft grant with your team before sending for review, the CMS has the capacity to create a shareable preview link.
Learn more about our publishing workflow, including how to create a Preview link.
This is how the grant is submitted for review by our content team.
- Click on Save. A preview of the grant page in draft will be opened.
- The grant is then sent off for final checks, and the user who submitted the grant will receive an email notification once it has been checked, has been published, or has been returned requesting for additional information.
- If the grant needs to be updated, click on the Needs Review button on the top-right of the page, and click on Edit content. The details for the grant will then be opened. Once the updates have been made, scroll down and click Save.
Head to the Grants page for more articles on editing your grants, or adding recipients so they appear on the funding finder.