For a nonprofit, getting more traffic to your website is key. Whether you’re trying to raise money or just increase awareness of your cause, SEO can help you get there. The good news is that SEO is easier than ever before. You don’t need to be an SEO wizard: You just need some know-how, a few simple strategies, and some perseverance.
SEO is a long-term strategy.
So what is SEO? Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of improving your website’s visibility in search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. It’s a lot more than just creating a page on your site with keywords and links. There are many different factors that go into getting higher rankings and more traffic from search engines. If you’re looking for an overnight cure to your website’s low traffic, SEO isn’t it. It’s a complex process that requires patience and perseverance—and the understanding that it takes time to see results. But the more you know about SEO, the faster you’ll see results.
SEO isn’t just about keywords and links.
When people talk about search engine optimization (SEO), they often focus on keywords and links as the two main components of the strategy. But there are many other elements at play in modern search engine algorithms—including social media engagement, quality content creation and even voice search!
If you want to be successful, you need to ensure that your SEO strategy accounts for all these factors. The good news is that there are many tools and resources available today that can help you do just that.
Find ways to “work the room” when it comes to SEO
Search engines want to show users the best content available. This means that, when you’re writing content, you should be thinking about what keywords will help people find your site.
While there are countless ways to use these keywords in your site’s copy and code, it’s important not to overuse them. If a search engine finds that you have too many instances of the same keyword in one piece of content (or even just around a certain page), it may think that you’re trying too hard and flag your site for spamming—and that could negatively impact how well people find your website through searches.
That said, it’s still important to include relevant keywords throughout all areas of your site so that search engines can crawl them easily and index them appropriately—even if they aren’t being overused!
Write for your audience, not Google’s spiders
The first and most important thing you can do to optimize your nonprofit’s SEO strategy is to write for people, not search engines. Writing for people means taking the time to actually think about who you’re writing for, what they want and need from your content, and how they will use it. It also means being honest with yourself about what your readers are looking for when they visit a website like yours (which is probably something very different than what you intended).
Consider this: when was the last time you searched Google? Sure, maybe we all do it once in a while but have you ever considered why? Where does this behavior come from? Why did we decide as humans that sitting at home and clicking around on our computers was preferable to going out in public? Well… probably because we didn’t have much else available! And even if there were other options available then—like going outside or spending time with friends—we still had no way of knowing if there was anything interesting happening unless someone told us about it first because there wasn’t any internet yet… so we started talking more than ever before so that everyone would know what fun things were happening locally too.”
Create a great user experience
Make sure your website is mobile-friendly. You can check with Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test tool. If you’re using an older CMS, we recommend updating it because most of them are not mobile-friendly. This is a good way to make sure your website looks good on all devices.
Make sure your website is secure – have an SSL certificate and be careful of where you host the site (i.e., don’t use an unsecured server).
Make sure your images are high-resolution and optimized for the web. This will help users load faster and reduce data usage. Use a CDN to speed up the delivery of your website’s content. They’re especially helpful if you are using a lot of images and videos on your site. Make sure your site loads quickly by optimizing images, reducing the number of plugins you use (if any), compressing CSS files, etc. Ensure that the page loads quickly by only loading the necessary elements on the page and optimizing images, code, etc., before publishing it on social media or any other platform where users will view it in real-time (e.g., Instagram stories).
Create content that will stand the test of time
Your content should be relevant to your audience. You can’t expect people to read an article about a subject they don’t care about! So, create content that is relevant to your audience. If you’re a fashion blogger or a lifestyle blogger, then this means creating content about fashion or lifestyle that resonates with your audience. You can also use tools like Buzzsumo to find out what people are talking about in your industry and write about those topics instead!
Your content should be relevant to your cause. People are drawn to causes that speak directly to them, and if you want people who share your passion for advocacy work, you have to provide them with the information they need right away—on all channels.
Your content should also be useful. If it’s not helpful, why would anyone want to read it? And finally: Your content needs originality and interest value in order for it to stand out from other articles available on the web today (which is almost everything).
Use internal linking to improve SEO and keep users on your site longer
Internal linking is an important part of SEO. When you link your content to other pages on your site, it helps users find what they’re looking for and stay on the website longer, which can drive up conversion rates.
The good news is that internal links don’t need to be complicated! You just need to make sure there are enough of them in places where people will see them.
Internal linking is a way to connect your content. It helps users find what they’re looking for and stay on the website longer, which can drive up conversion rates. The good news is that internal links don’t need to be complicated! You just need to make sure there are enough of them in places where people will see them.
Nonprofit marketers can and should do SEO because their cause is important.
Your nonprofit’s mission is to help people, right? Well, you want more people to know about it. You want more people to be able to access the things your nonprofit does for them. SEO allows nonprofits to reach this goal by helping them get their message out in front of more users across the internet.
New audiences can also be reached through SEO techniques. By focusing on keyword research and creating content that appeals to these keywords, nonprofits are able to attract new visitors who might not have found them otherwise—but still might be interested in what they do or how they help others!
You don’t have to be an SEO wizard to boost your website’s SEO. You just need some know-how, a few simple strategies, and some perseverance. Nonprofit websites are often seen as less important than those for-profit companies. But as we’ve learned from this article, there are more ways than ever before to get your nonprofit website noticed by users—and hopefully donors!
