As a nonprofit, you’re used to doing more with less. So how can you maximize the effectiveness of your website and overall marketing strategy? Since our team has designed custom websites for several Wisconsin-based nonprofits, we thought we’d share their thoughts with you directly!
Advice From Nonprofits To Help You Market Better
1. Focus On Mission Visibility
It’s great when people know your name. But brand visibility can only get you so far. As a nonprofit, it is critical that people understand what you do and why you do it. This makes it much easier to transition someone from being “generally interested” to actually making a donation or becoming a volunteer.
How To Make Your Mission Clear On Your Website
Your website plays a critical role in showcasing your organization’s mission. Be sure to:
- Include a clear value statement on your homepage.
- Guide people to learn more with clear calls-to-action and an easy-to-use menu.
- Incorporate images and videos of your organization in action.
2. Share Success Stories
Just as testimonials provide valuable social proof for B2B and B2C brands, success stories play a critical role for nonprofits. Not only does this content provide further support for the value you provide, but it is also an opportunity to provide keyword-rich content on your website. This is great when it comes to organically boosting your visibility in online searches!
“In nonprofit marketing, storytelling is king! Leverage your most important marketing asset – your website – to feature inspiring success stories, powerful videos, moving photos and endearing testimonials from those who benefit or are positively impacted by your mission. At Special Olympics Wisconsin, we shine the light on our incredible athletes who, every day, demonstrate their abilities and gifts to the world.”– Vice President of Marketing & Communications @ SOWI
“Sharing stories from those who have been touched by our services helps others know what they can and should expect from Agrace’s care. Being able to add these testimonials to our website, quickly and easily has been a valuable feature.” – Marketing Specialist @ Agrace
Turn Success Stories Into Reviews
Be sure to remember to ask anyone that has had a positive experience with your organization to also leave a Google review. Unlike a written or spoken testimonial, they will need to post this themselves via your Google My Business listing.
3. Easy-To-Use (And Find!) Donation Form
The Executive Director of The Academy for Surgical Coaching talked about how important it is to have a visible and user-friendly donation area on your website. Here are some tips for making it safe and easy for website visitors to donate:
a) Leverage clear calls-to-action throughout your website.
b) Make sure your website has a security certificate so that visitors browse in HTTPS (encrypted).
c) Never store sensitive information directly on your website and instead use a third-party payment processing tool.
d) Use accessibility best practices to keep your form easy to fill out.
4. Mutually-Beneficial Collaboration
Relationships are at the heart of any nonprofit. Fostering partnerships with other organizations and businesses will open the door for influential collaborations.
“As awareness of our program is growing, we’re finding that more and more people are discovering our website. Partners that we never even knew existed are reaching out to us because they find our website and hit the contact button. A local medical device manufacturer recently reached out to set up a collaborative photoshoot of our surgeons using their products. We now have tons of high-quality images we can leverage for our marketing collateral.” – Executive Director @ The Academy for Surgical Coaching
Leveraging collaboration as a communication tool will help you expand your reach without straining your existing resources. The opportunities are endless when it comes to what these collaborative relationships might look like. Check out this video interview with Dan from DLC, where we discuss the potential impact collaboration has for anyone’s marketing efforts:
Dan works with brands to deliver high-traction, shareable content!
5. Generate More Website Traffic With Google Ads
Google Ads allow organizations to pay their way to the top of Google search results. Typically, businesses pay for each click on their ad. Google has a great program focused on supporting nonprofits, giving you access to FREE digital ads! The team over at Get Found Madison are pros when it comes to setting up Google Ad Grants and helping manage ongoing campaigns.
“The Google Ad Grants program at its core is the ability to harness the power of Google Ads for free.
If you are eligible, and set up your ad grants account correctly, you’ll be able to use $10,000 per month in grant money (more than many small businesses have to work with over a whole year) to generate leads, sales, or awareness.
If you are a nonprofit and don’t take advantage of Google Ad Grants, you are leaving thousands of free ad dollars to advance your cause on the table. The money you save on ad spend can even be put toward a crack team of marketers that drive results for your free campaigns. It’s a no-brainer.” – Get Found Madison Team
Maximizing Google Ad Campaign Results
Should you decide to leverage Google Ads, it’s important that the content you’re directing people to aligns closely with your campaign messaging. Having an easy-to-edit website with a variety of landing page options will help your team share produce the most relevant content possible.
Does Your Website Empower Your Organization?
Don’t hesitate to connect with our fully in-house team of website experts! We work with a variety of nonprofits in the Madison, WI area and would love to help you do your best work too.