by Jayne Cravens
via coyotecommunications.com & coyoteboard.com (same web site)
 

 

  Basic Web Development & Maintenance
  for Nonprofits, NGOs, Government Offices
  & Other Mission-Based Organizations

(nonprofit organizations, NGOs, civil society organizations,
charities, schools, public sector agencies & other mission-based agencies)


 

Your organization must have a web site. If anyone suggests that you don't, that your organization can get by with just a blog on a third party platform that you don't own, or a Facebook page, run away from that person immediately.

You don’t control Facebook. You don't control Medium. You don't control LinkedIn. You don't control YouTube. You don't control Instagram. Big companies own those platforms and control who gets to see what on those platforms. Also, any of those platforms could all go away tomorrow. And in addition, not everyone uses those platforms: they are walled gardens, meaning a potential reader has to be a member to interact and, perhaps, even to view the content. More and more people are deleting their Facebook accounts. Many people refuse to use it at all.

Yes, your nonprofit, non-governmental organization, charity, school, government agency or other mission-based initiative should use social media, absolutely. But your agency also must have a web site. The core of an organization's or program's online presence is still a Web site - it's what all of the organization's other online activities point to.

And, yes, an individual program may need an entire web site - and a web address - of its own.

The consequences of not having a web site? You make it hard, even impossible, for people to be able to find official information about your organization or program online: to find your address, your phone number, a list of your events, how to donate, why to donate, what you do, how to volunteer, and more.

Without a web site, your organization also gives the impression that staff have difficulty managing basic communications activities - a negative impression that you probably don't want potential donors, potential volunteers, the media and others to have.

It's NOT cost-prohibitive to have a web site. If your organization already has computers (even old computers), you will not need to purchase additional software to have a basic Web site.

Who is in charge of your web site

A mistake many organizations have made in their Web site development is handing over the entire Web development process, from content creation to regular maintenance, to a consultant, or another company, or to just one employee or volunteer. This leads to many, even most staff, seeing the web site and other online activities as something completely external to what they do - the volunteer manager, the program director, the box office manager, etc., may not feel any ownership of the organization's online activities, even though all of those people are affected by what the organization does - or doesn't do - online.

Instead, everyone in your organization should have continuous opportunities for input into Web site development and maintenance - every staff member, paid or volunteer.

Everyone at your organization, particularly department heads and managers of programs, should feel ownership of influence on some part of the web site; the volunteer manager should have a section that is hers (or his), the program director needs to feel ownership of the part of the web site focused on clients and particular clients, etc. Encourage your organization to integrate Web development and management into the work of ALL employees, not only those who produce content for publications and are involved with any communications or outreach activities, but also your program director, volunteer manager, and anyone who has anything to do with those your serve or the public at large.

Everyone at your organization who works with the public or partners in any way should also have input into all of your organization's other online activities as well, like online social networking, online discussion groups, etc... but those recommendations are on another part of my web site.

Initial web site development

Your focus on your initial Web site development for your nonprofit, NGO, government agency or department, school, or other mission-based initiative should be to get a simple, easy-to-navigate site up quickly, a site that provides the basic, essential information about your organization (physical address, mailing address, contact information, announcements about upcoming events, directions on how to get there, etc.).

Once this basic site is up and regularly maintained, the web site can be expanded and advanced features can be developed and implemented.

Note: old versions of your web site will be available at The Internet Wayback Machine / archive.org. You will be able to achieve at least one iteration of your web site from each year that it's been available on this resource. This is very helpful in retrieving information someone deletes off of the web site and didn't back up. It also helps you create a record of your organization's history. Do NOT let any web designer put coding into your pages so that they will NOT be archived by this resource!

These tip sheets offer advice for the most basic "starter" information for a first web site, and are focused specifically on people who are NOT web designers. These tips are also meant to help those who aren't directly involved in web site development to still feel involved and in control of some or all of the process, and to manage web designers and developers:

Also read: E-Commerce: The 8 Corners.
"Like the Kudzu in my Maryland yard, the more you try to bring sense to the Internet hype, the denser it seems to get. The only thing growing faster is the number of people who believe that the digital world somehow overcomes and changes the fundamentals. P.T. Barnum was intimately familiar with the breed and swore that one was born every minute." A must read for anyone wanting to know what a web site can and CANNOT do.


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Disclaimer: No guarantee of accuracy or suitability is made by the poster/distributor. This material is provided as is, with no expressed or implied warranty.

Permission is granted to copy, present and/or distribute a limited amount of material from my web site without charge if the information is kept intact and without alteration, and is credited to:

Jayne
                Cravens & Coyote Communications,
                www.coyotecommunications.com

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The art work and material on this site was created and is copyrighted 1996-2024
by Jayne Cravens, all rights reserved
(unless noted otherwise, or the art comes from a link to another web site).