As the the NGO Bulgaria project evolves, so does our perception on how to initiate people to web publishing. This documents represent a guide, which covers a few basic ideas of what to expect from your first website, and a few common mistakes to avoid.

Needs and requirements

Basic examples of websites:

 To publish information about the NGO history, members, supporters, etc. To have a basic presence on the web and a way to receive feedback from the visitors.
 To occasionally publish news about your projects or internal organisational changes.
 To publish research documents or other publications from your organisation (such as results or analysis from projects).
 To regularly publish news about events in which your organisation plays an important role.

Additional requirements to consider:

 Bilingual or trilingual websites, depending on your focus groups, require alot of efforts from translators.
 Highly esthetic websites require the help of a web designer (this may cost from 100 to 1000 leva).
 The site should be accessible: the structure and presentation should be clear, and the content of the site should not depend on software which is not universal, such as "Flash" animations. (more information on accessibility)

Analysis of the requirements

Basic presentation website: From 2 weeks to 2 months

This is the minimal type of website, but it does not mean that it is a simple and easy work. Building a basic presentation website can take up to two months if you work on it part time but dedicate sufficient resources to it.

 Minimal required information:

• A short name that represents your organisation. We will need this so that people can find you on the web and remember your location. You can either register a domain name (myname.org) or we can provide for free a myname.ngo-bg.org.
• 2-4 lines description of what your organisation’s aims.
• 2-10 lines biography of each member of your staff / main members of your organisation: past experience, interests and role in the organisation.
• 2-10 lines of who are your main partners (if you have any): what they do, how do you work with them and since when.
• A list of your current projects (if any): start date and expected end date. It is also suggested to include the source of the funding for transparency. If your projects are self-supported by volunteer contributions (date/time), it is also good to mention.

 Suggested information to show on every page (usually at the top):

• A small logo;
• One line (10 words) description of the aims or activities of your organisation;
• A banner to put at the top of the pages (as an alternative to showing the name of the site).

 What you will need to do to create the site:

• Writing all of the above information is more work than it seems if you do not already have them. In many cases, this self-analysis exercise pushes organisations to ask themselves questions that they had never been asked - such as a history of past activities. This information is in the interest of other organisations or people who may be interested to work with you or support your organisation.
• Learn how to use SPIP, the web content management system used by NGO-bg. This means experimenting by creating new sections, publishing articles, learning the typographical shortcuts and reading the documentation. While this sounds trivial, it is often the most problematic aspect as people consider it a waste of time and constantly postpone their work on the website - but the more you are acquinted with Spip, the faster and efficient is your work.
• If you wish to have multimedia documents such as a logo, you should consider hiring a graphist and discuss with him/her about the symbols which are related to your organisations and how to present them.
• Update your website within a reasonnable delay when changes are made inside your organisation. If changes are made to your staff or if a project was finished without being mentioned on your website, the public will have the impression that you are no longer active. Many people rely on this information, especially foreigners.