What is an Online Presence?
Chapter 1 Learning Objectives
This chapter will help you:
- Understand what an online presence is, why it is important, and what it looks like.
- Recognize the main features of an online presence.
- Apply a “problem-solving” approach to communications tasks, starting by learning how to fully discover, empathize, and define the problem before looking for solutions.
- Understand the importance of online privacy.
- Appreciate the complexity and iterative nature of maintaining an online presence.
- Apply content ownership licensing to online content.
- Determine online security choices for maintaining an online presence.
When you hear the term “online presence,” what comes to mind? Perhaps you think of a brand, copy writing, a social media channel, or business website. And you are correct. However, an online presence is much more than that: Creating an intention around the communication style and “look and feel” of a brand is at the heart of creating and maintaining a business’s online presence.
It also includes determining a privacy officer, how and what type of content must be produced, attention to file management, and image creation/sourcing. Furthermore, this involves deciding which platforms and channels the brand will use for communication, and ensuring authentic engagement in these spaces.
We might then define maintaining an online presence as using various modes of communication (design, written, and visual) within a business’s voice to connect customers with the solutions to their problems that the organization offers.
Why is Creating and Maintaining an Online Presence Important?
An online presence is often the first point of contact for customers to engage with your business. If the design and communication is clear (informing, instructing, and persuading), then it will build awareness, trust, and value for an organization (brand).
An online presence can be considered through the creation and maintenance of design systems and content, such as:
- Creating a marketing one-liner
- Technical privacy policy documents
- Documentation of project scope (i.e., a website development plan)
- Development of branding materials (i.e., logo, header images, photos of staff, etc.)
- Sketching a content wireframe for a website
- Writing and reviewing website content
- Creating a website designed with accessibility and usable design patterns
- Planning social media marketing
- Lead generation
- Sharing on social media
Thus, it is loosely a “designed” form of marketing communication that requires practitioners to have a heightened awareness of design standards (rules and expectations), technical know-how, and rhetorical situations (audience, purpose, and context) in which they are communicating.
This textbook aims to provide you with that heightened awareness in design communication. It introduces the basic conventions of design communication and trains you to adopt a reader- and human-centred approach. This approach is key for developing online content that effectively communicates your business brand to your target audience and achieves the desired results.
What Does an Online Presence Look Like?
An online presence exists in many forms, depending on the purpose and intended audience. Consider the following example of a one-liner, also known as a business elevator pitch, excerpted from the book Marketing Made Simple by Donald Miller. What can you tell about the intended audience?
A sample business one-liner:
“Many families struggle to spend time together, but at Acorn Family Camp time stands still and families create connections that last a lifetime.”(Miller, D. 2020)[1]
This one-liner describes a problem that is solved by the business Acorn Family Camp. In addition, it is short, creates a story-loop and makes people curious about the business.
Reflect on the example one-liner above in relation to your experience as a customer or as a business owner. What examples of an effective business one-liner (elevator pitch) that evoke a brand’s core purpose and brings the customer into the conversation, can you recollect?
Write a paragraph about a business that solves a specific problem. The solution should result in curiosity, emotional-connection, and action. For example, you might write about effectiveness of Patagonia’s Core Values in their marketing literature in relation to climate justice and action. Consider the business’s target audience when choosing how to write this. Then write a one-liner for your (hypothetical) business.
- Miller, D. (2022). Marketing Made Simple. A Step-by-Step StoryBrand Guide for Any Business. HarperCollins Leadership ↵
