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Ivan Petkov

The beginning

Photo: Justine Toms’ blog

The year is 2004, the date is 14 March and the place - a popular establishment in Sofia. The people around the table, from left to right, are Justine Toms, Petko Karamochev, Nicki Chakarov, Plamen Vushev, Kiril Apostolov, Petar Petkov and they represent 5 companies, primarily web agencies. What is happening at this event, which seems like a very informal gathering of a few friends and colleagues? It is the establishment of the Bulgarian Web Association (BWA).

The work of the members of the association results in the creation of the first criteria of the quality of the performance of web agencies as well as of criteria for fair competition, which are set in a Code of Ethics, adopted in 2004. The main points stipulated in it are politeness, loyalty, competitiveness and professionalism. Nowadays, the members of the Association are around 60 leading Bulgarian companies, including web studios, web media and companies dealing with web services.

Development

The Association is related to the launching and establishment of two of the most significant events in the web industry in Bulgaria, namely the "BG Site" ranking and the International Web Festival in Albena. The events still take place and are of great interest to the professionals in the sector. In 2008, the Association printed a catalogue of the activities of all its members, which was distributed to more than 5,000 companies and organizations. From 2009 onwards, the Association has been conducting the professional Bulgarian Web Awards competition as well.

The opinion of the Bulgarian Web Association is being sought as an independent non-governmental expert. It has been closely working with a number of Bulgarian and international institutions. Furthermore, the Association does not ignore inquiries from individuals on topical issues either. I can give you the example of a procurement related to the development of a web site of Bulgarian tourism, which had raised the spirits due to the amount destined for it, which was 2,000,000 Levs. The popular blogger Boyan Uyrukov had made an inquiry to the Association to which he received a competent reply.

The Association

The Bulgarian Web Association is a voluntary, branch, non-governmental organization formed by private sector companies and aimed at representing and developing the Bulgarian web market. In addition to the events previously mentioned, the Association conducts trainings and seminars for its members in order to optimize the quality of the services offered on the web. The Association strives to provide information, commercial, social and representative benefits to its members – they are presented on the web site of the Association, they receive information about local and international events, special prices for participation in industry events and much more.

Programme 2013

The best way I can introduce the Association to you is through its specific objectives, initiatives and actions. The initiatives and events for this year are:

- the 5^th anniversary edition of the Bulgarian Web Awards competition
- Streams / / Technology Discussions
- Terms and conditions of web sites
- Internship programme

Bulgarian Web Awards

The Bulgarian Web Awards competition was organized by the Bulgarian Web Association for the fifth consecutive year and took place between April and June, 2013. The official award ceremony of the winners will be on 27 June 2013.

The competition is divided into four parts:

- Industry Web Awards
- Media Web Awards
- Professional Web Awards
- Marketing Web Awards

The jury for each group is different and is composed respectively of business and media representatives, and of web professionals. Maria S. Topalova, Director of GRReporter, has been invited to join the jury and will assess the categories of Media Web Awards and Marketing Web Awards. The main objective of the competition is to promote professionalism on the web by encouraging best practices. The competition is actively promoted among media, businesses, government agencies and companies related to the ICT sector.

Streams / / Technology Discussions

Streams / / Technology Discussions is an event organized by professionals in the field of communications and technologies and is addressed to marketing experts and decision makers. The event will be held twice a year - spring and autumn edition. The event consists of three 45- minute panels. Each edition is unique and has a certain theme.

The first edition of Streams / / Technology Discussions was held on 18 October 2012 and the three topics discussed were as follows:

Tools

It is an end in itself to create tools just to "have" a web site, Twitter profile, mobile application, banners, interactive installation, which is not necessary. It is important that each of the communication tools is well understood, so that its existence is dependent on the function and not vice versa.

Culture

New technologies influence both consumer and cultural habits. The proper selection of tools and the information that the brand wants to share are not sufficient for smooth communication; the way of doing this and the tone, which is determined mainly by the audience of this brand, are also important but some universal rules have been imposed as well.

Campaigns

Online campaigns are not just a set of tools used. Behind every campaign, there should be a concept, an interactive story to be told. A campaign web site, Facebook profile or mobile application should not be isolated from "the rest of the Internet." The people should not remain locked in a virtual environment, they must experience something real in order for them to be excited and share something.

Terms and conditions of web sites

This project is part of the joint activities planned between the Bulgarian Web Association and the Commission for Consumer Protection which signed on 5 June 2012 an agreement to work to improve the business practices in the online environment. The first initiative was the creation of a working group to support the Commission for Consumer Protection in adopting the Guidelines of terms and conditions of web sites:

- Web services provision

- Online shops
- Corporate web sites
- Web media

The standardization of the terms and conditions is a very useful initiative because they are of the mandatory elements that must be present on each web site. Often, however, these conditions do not cover all aspects and do not define the rights and obligations of both parties - the consumer and the service provider.

You can download the Guidelines of terms and conditions of web sites here.

Internship programme

The project is part of the association's work programme for 2013. It will integrate young professionals in the web field and will allow the members of the Association to choose their future employees with degrees in the following fields:
- "Computer and Software Engineering"
- "Information Technologies"
- "Computer Science and Engineering"
- "Computer Technology and Applied Programming"
- "Computer Visualization and Multimedia"
- "Design of Online Publications and Web Sites"
- "Multimedia and Computer Graphics"
- "Multimedia and Computer Animation"
- "Journalism"
- "Public Relations"
- "Management of Mass Communications" and similar.

The Bulgarian Web Association has an agreement with three of the largest universities in Bulgaria, namely Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski ", the Technical University of Sofia and New Bulgarian University.

Conclusion

I have tried to briefly introduce the Bulgarian Web Association to you and to present in detail its activities. The names behind it are of proven professionals whose interest is the development and operation in a web environment with clearly set ethical principles and professional standards. The events and activities initiated by the Association are diverse and beneficial not only to its members but to the entire industry. This is one of the reasons why we wanted to present the Association on the pages of GRReporter. The other reason is that we want to promote the Bulgarian Web Awards competition to Bulgarian media abroad, for which we have proposed the creation of a special category. The competition can be best assessed when it is clear who is behind it as well as the ideas and values supported by the organization. We believe that the participation of Bulgarian media abroad in this kind of event will promote their activities in Bulgarian society and in the media industry in particular.