In today’s digital age, the success of a non-profit organization hinges on its online presence. While your mission and message are crucial, they can only impact if they reach the right audience. That’s where SEO comes into play. By optimizing your website and content for search engines, you can increase visibility and drive more donations and engagement from supporters who are passionate about your cause. This article will explore seven powerful SEO strategies designed specifically for non-profits. These tactics will help you connect with potential donors, amplify your impact, and turn your digital platform into a catalyst for change.
7 SEO Strategies That Drive Donations and Engagement
1. Set up your site for Technical SEO
The first thing to do is ensure your website’s technical basics are in order. Technical SEO is the way of optimizing the backend features of your site to make it accessible to search engines.
Think of technical SEO as the foundation for every other SEO strategy. It requires fixing issues like crawling and indexing problems, robot.txt, slow loading times, and annoying pop-ups that give users a bad experience. Whether you’re running a business or a nonprofit, these issues can happen to anyone.
When optimizing your website for technical SEO, you should keep the following in mind:
- Speed is an acknowledged ranking factor by Google. So, pay attention to the page speed. You can use tools like Page Speed Insight and GT Metrix to diagnose and solve your site speed problem.
- Optimize your website for speed with Core Web vitals in mind. According to Erin Wofman,
- Mobile-friendliness is a ranking signal for Google’s algorithms. You’ll want to make sure it’s set up in a way that’s easy for people to use. You know, like making sure the design is nice and tidy, everything’s in the right place, and it’s simple to navigate around. You can use the Google Mobile-Friendly Test to ensure your site is mobile-friendly. Also, reduce the amount of pop-ups, pop-ups on mobiles can be challenging when reading.
- Other technical issues like robots.txt, noindex tags, broken links, and structured data can be tricky to handle on your own. You might need to bring in a Technical SEO Expert, especially one with experience in the nonprofit sector.
2. Perform Keyword Research
Keyword research is a vital SEO strategy that helps you attract your target audience to your blog or website using specific phrases or words. In our case, we’re aiming to reach donors, so we need to find keywords that resonate with them.
Below, I outlined a few tips:
- Focus on Long-tail rather than Short-tailed keywords. Long-tail keywords are more specific and typically less competitive than short-tail keywords. They help you target a niche audience, which often leads to higher conversion rates. Source
- Example of Long tail keywords for non-profit includes,” best animal rescue charities to donate”, “top-rated children’s hospitals accepting donations”, “local food bank donation drop-off locations”, “16 ways you can stand against rape culture” etc
- Target statistical-related charity keywords. Why should you go after these keywords? The reason is they can bring organic donor traffic to your website. For example, the keyword “Cancer Epidermic in Nigeria 2022 ” is something people might search for. If your nonprofit provides useful tips and resources on this topic, it can attract potential donors. You can use tools like Moz, Semrush, or Ahrefs to find these keywords.
After finding the keywords appropriate for your content, put them in strategic places, like the page URL, the page title, the content description, the body, and the heading of the content.
3. Leverage Local SEO
Local SEO helps your nonprofit show up online to people nearby. It’s important for nonprofits with a physical location that serves specific communities.
When people search for your NGO with a location-specific keyword(country, state, etc), your NGO can appear in the local map pack. For example, if I search “NGOs near me” on Google, I’ll see local listings pop up. This happens because those NGOs have focused on a local SEO strategy using their Google Business Profile like this.
A Google Business Profile lets you collect reviews, add images and videos, and keep your information updated. You can also add FAQs with answers for users to see. All of this helps your organization show up and can increase your chances of attracting donors.
4. Optimize for On-page Features
Aside from optimizing for local SEO, another strategy that can drive donors to your site is on-page optimization. On-page optimization means using what’s on your blog to get more traffic and engagement. Here, you focus on features like internal links, title tags, and Heading tags.
A bonus tip is to encourage user-generated content like Reviews on your site.
Why is this important?
Well, Reviews can show that your site and content are trustworthy. They’re also important signals for Google in local search results. You can start by encouraging volunteers and benefactors to leave a review. Here is a good example of what I mean.
5. Optimize for Off-page Features
As the name suggests, these are actions taken outside your website to boost its ranking and relevance. Off-page optimization mainly involves getting backlinks and improving your online presence by creating high-quality content that bloggers, journalists, or experts in the nonprofit field will reference. Backlinks are links from one website to another, often used to refer to similar content.
Backlink is one of Google’s ranking factors. Here are some tips to improve your backlinks:
- According to Niel Patel,
- Build broken links: Find backlinks on relevant sites that don’t work properly and convince the creator to link to your content. Tools for this include Semrush, Google Search Console, and Ahrefs.
- Reach out: Contact other nonprofit websites and provide reasons why they should link to your content. You can also write a guest blog for them and get links in return.
- Analyze competitors: Look at competitors’ websites to see which content attracts the most backlinks and create something similar. Tools like Semrush can help with this.
- Respond to journalist requests: Journalists might link to your content if you provide expert commentary for their articles.
6. Content Marketing
Content marketing is a broad subject, but in terms of SEO, it involves using strategies to attract, engage, and retain donors or supporters through content like articles, videos, podcasts, and newsletters. These strategies help create awareness, boost brand reputation, build a reliable community, and educate and inspire donors to take action.
Strategies used in content marketing include:
- Digital PR: This involves using PR techniques to gain backlinks to your site, which helps earn authoritative links at scale. Examples include working with well-known influencers, community outreach, and having important donors as podcast guests.
- Social Media: While social media might not directly impact Google’s visibility, it creates more awareness and attention. Strategies include posting shareable content, building a social media community, and maintaining daily feeds.
- Content Schedules: Creating a content schedule for both your website and social media pages is crucial. It shows consistency and dedication to your community. Tools like Buffer, and Hootsuite, can help with scheduling content.
7. Leverage on Topic Clusters
Topic Cluster establishes your organization as an expert in your niche. Topic clustering involves creating a main content (the pillar blog page) and then adding related subtopics. Think of the pillar page as the big topic, and the subtopics as the details.
For example, if the main topic is “Charity and Donation,” the subtopics could be “How to Run a Charity Event Successfully,” “Things You Need to Know Before Hosting a Charity Event,” “Online Techniques to Attract Donations for a Charity Event,” and “Charity Ideas for Upcoming Organizations.”
When you create these clusters, make sure to include internal links back to the pillar page. This strategy boosts your website’s ranking for competitive keywords, improves site structure, and makes it easier for donors to find relevant content quickly.
Maximizing your non-profit’s impact through effective SEO strategies is essential in today’s competitive digital landscape. By focusing on keyword research, optimizing your website for mobile users, creating high-quality and engaging content, and leveraging local SEO, you can significantly increase your visibility and attract more potential donors. Utilizing social media, securing backlinks from reputable sources, and monitoring your SEO performance with analytics tools are also crucial steps in driving both donations and engagement.
Remember, SEO is not a one-time effort but an ongoing process that requires consistent attention and adaptation to stay ahead of the curve. As you implement these seven strategies, you’ll not only improve your search engine rankings but also build a stronger connection with your audience, making it easier for them to find and support your cause.
Ultimately, these SEO techniques will help your non-profit organization thrive by reaching more people who are eager to contribute to your mission. With a well-optimized online presence, your organization can maximize its impact, ensuring that your message resonates far and wide, and driving the donations and engagement you need to make a meaningful difference in the world.
