Creating an effective web presence for your nonprofit allows you to connect with people who are looking to get involved with your cause. When people are searching for topics related to your business, you want to be front and center where they can easily find you. With a clean, easy-to-navigate, search engine-optimized website, a cross-platform presence, and regularly updated social media accounts, your nonprofit casts a wide net and reaches out to the largest audience.
Build Your Website
A good website is the foundation of a strong web presence. In the 21st century, clean and simple design is essential. Your site should be uncluttered and easy to read, with the most important elements positioned to draw visitors’ eyes to them.
Search engine optimization is key. Use the Google keyword tool to identify long-tail keywords with decent search volume and low to moderate competition, and incorporate these phrases in natural-sounding ways throughout your website text.
Update your website regularly to maintain high search engine rankings. Google penalizes stale content. Add a blog to your website and post weekly content to ensure that Google’s spiders always have fresh content to index.
Establish a Cross-Platform Presence
People no longer surf the web exclusively on desktop or laptop computers. In fact, depending on the nature of your website and your target audience, anywhere from 40 to 80% of your traffic might come from mobile devices, either smartphones or tablets.
As a nonprofit, your business should be especially conscious of mobile users. Younger people are often the ones who get involved with causes championed by nonprofits, and this audience is also more likely to rely on mobile devices to go online.
Optimize your website to capture these visitors and present your content to them in an easy-to-read fashion. Most up-to-date website builders can optimize your page for mobile screens; take advantage of this function, because mobile represents a huge traffic source that your nonprofit doesn’t want to miss out on. A mobile-friendly website also gets higher search engine result rankings than a website that is only optimized to function on a desktop computer.
Be Social
Social media represents another platform where you can reach out to thousands of potential customers and donors and tell them about your nonprofit. Don’t just set up accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn and hope your target audience finds you. Optimize your social media pages to connect with your audience, and take some initiative to reach out to them.
For example, run targeted Facebook ads to a particular demographic that your research has indicated is most receptive to your message. Add hashtags to your Twitter posts to connect with people searching for specific topics. Check out the trending terms each day and try to identify one or two that relate to your nonprofit’s mission. On Instagram, find influencers in your niche who have big audiences; follow them and try to network with them.
References & Resources
sba.gov
smallbusiness.chron.com
pcmag.com
adwords.google.com
facebook.com
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