I’ve knocked together a quick and simple acronym-based guide for developing a ‘web presence’.  My new acronym is BPADCOSM – a bit of a mouthful.

In reality, it’s nothing new and nothing revolutionary – but I thought it was appropriate to come up with a nice, memorable (?) acronym that puts everything in order.  I think there is a tendency for many budding website owners and operators to do the steps out of order, which can result in costly changes down the track.  Best to get everything right from the outset by following the BPADCOSM steps!

BPADCOSM stands for: business case; platform; architecture; design; content; optimisation for search engines; social media and on-site content production; and marketing.

Why ‘web presence’ and not just ‘web site’? A web presence implies a wider existence on the web than just a website – for example, many organisation now have a presence on Facebook and Twitter and these act as an ‘extension’ of their websites.  Hence, I use ‘web presence’ rather than ‘website’.  In some circumstances an organisation’s social media assets are more important than its website and this is likely to become increasingly so on the web.

Here’s an explanation of the BPADCOSM steps:

STEP 1: Business case – why get a web presence in the first place?

This step is frequently overlooked – most people’s mindset is: ‘I’ve gotta get a website for my business’ without really thinking about the reasoning behind it.  In some cases, it is not appropriate for a particular business to have a website at all and the money spent on a website could be better directed elsewhere.

In many cases, businesses hurriedly engage a web designer with a portfolio of attractive websites to design something that looks pretty.  But ultimately the final website doesn’t achieve the desired outcome because no thought has been given to the underlying ‘business’ needs (not to mention the fact that most designers know little about copywriting, search engine optimisation and content strategies)

The business case should consider the following three elements:

• People – who will you be targeting with your web presence?

• Objectives – what do you want to achieve through your web presence?

• Strategies – how will your web presence achieve your objectives?

This business case step is drawn from Forrester Research’s POST methodology (see http://forrester.typepad.com/groundswell/2007/12/the-post-method.html)  for implementing a social media strategy, but it can equally be applied to the development of a ‘web presence’.

STEP 2: Platform – the foundation upon which the web presence is constructed

Like building a house, it’s necessary to build a strong foundation for your web presence.  If you get the foundation wrong, then it’s mighty hard to dig it all up and start again, so it’s necessary to think carefully about this step before proceeding.  The foundation stones include:

• Domain name – important to consider up front because it’s hard to change it later on.  The domain also has implications for search engine optimisation.

• Software – eg. A content management system, email marketing software, dynamic scripts, contact form scripts, etc

• Hosting – fast and reliable?  Can it cater for the software required?

STEP 3: Architecture – how it all fits together

Now we have a business case for our web presence and the underlying platform upon which our base website is going to be constructed.

It’s time to consider the components, assets and functions that our website will contain, and where they will all go.

• Information architecture – how information is ordered and ‘discovered’ on the website; what goes where

• Pages and page hierarchy – what content do you want to display and how will the pages be arranged

• Navigation structure – top level navigation, subordinate level navigation, footer navigation

• Page elements and included content (content that appears across the site) – eg. News feeds, buttons, widgets, graphics, banners, columns, textual content, etc.

STEP 4: Design – what it looks like

Unfortunately, this is where most web designers start – without thinking too deeply about the business case, platform or architecture.  Design is extremely important, but no more important than the three preceding steps.  In this step, we look at the following:

• Corporate logo, colours, fonts and styles

• HTML/CSS templates – the ‘look and feel’ of the pages

• Fixed graphical elements – banners, page graphics

• Rich and dynamic media – video, Flash animations, etc

STEP 5: Content – what people will read

Another thing that designers aren’t very good at – copy writing.  Compelling copy is critically important for your website.  And not just for human visitors, but also to ensure that your website figures prominently in the search engines.

STEP 6 – Optimisation for search engines – how the website will be found

You can have the most attractive website in the world – but in most cases, how it looks won’t guarantee a steady stream of visitors to your site.  Websites need to be optimised for search engines so that your site can be found by prospective visitors.

Over 90% of web traffic in Australia is referred by search engines, so it is imperative that your website figures prominently in Google, Yahoo! and Bing.   Optimisation involves:

• Keyword analysis – working out which keyword combinations people should use to find your site

• On-page optimisation – tweaking the textual content, metadata to ensure keyword relevancy

• Inbound link building – obtaining links  from authority websites and thematically-linked websites, providing the search engines with a ‘vote of approval’ for your website and a subsequent elevation in search engine results.

• Directory submission – submitting your site to the world’s biggest and best web directories

• Technical optimisation – implementation of sitemaps, 301 redirects, etc – you might need some assistance with this step!

STEP 7: Social media and on-site content production – keeping the website fresh

These days, it’s not enough to simply publish a site on the web and just let it sit there.  To maintain relevance and ensure a constant stream of traffic, it’s important that organisations use their website as a ‘channel’, constantly adding and updating content.  Organisations should consider:

• News / article production – regular contributions via a content management system

• Blogs – a simple way to contribute and syndicate content

• Facebook – consider a Facebook Page as a content delivery and two-way communication mechanism

• Twitter – consider a Twitter stream as a content delivery and two-way communication mechanism

• Online video – consider regular uploading of online video using YouTube or similar

• And others… Slideshare, Flickr, MySpace, Wikipedia, etc.

STEP 8: Marketing – attracting more visitors

Once your web presence is perfect, then it’s time to start actively marketing the site.  To this point, it’s best that you don’t spend any money marketing.  Only when you are satisfied with the end product should you dip into the pocket to spend money on advertising or other marketing initiatives:

• Search engine marketing (SEM) –pay-per-click advertising on Google or Facebook

• Email marketing – an often neglected form of advertising; it’s free and it’s targeted

• Offline marketing – traditional marketing channels if you have budget