By now you’ve likely heard from a bunch of people that having an up-to-date website is necessary to move your nonprofit forward and inspire your future supporters. You probably realize that having a user friendly, visually appealing design allows your website to work at its best.

You know that it needs to look good. But you don’t know what that looks like.

This post features an example of a nonprofit with a stunning website and points out what we can learn from it.

Dadaab Stories

www.dadaabstories.org

The Dadaab Stories website is a project of FilmAid, a nonprofit organization that uses film to document and build awareness of refugee camps and communities affected by disaster. The Dadaab Stories website shares stories from the half a million refugees of the Kenyan Dadaab camp. We know this because it is literally the biggest thing we see on the homepage and therefore the first.

If You Want Me to See It, Make It Big

On the homepage, decide what you want your viewer to know right away and give that element its due attention. Don’t be shy when it comes to giving your key message prominence. Everything else will have its time in the spotlight later on.

Use Multimedia, Also Make It Big

Type laid out on top of photography has been established as a favorite practice of web designers. This is because, if well done, it’s practically foolproof. Nothing grabs a user’s eye like a compelling image (or in this case a moving one). Try using photography as a background to give your content a little visual boost.

I will warn you that using large multimedia can hurt the load time of your page. Studies have shown that extra seconds (and even milliseconds) of load time can frustrate your users and cause them to abandon your site. If you want to incorporate large multimedia, prepare to spend a good amount of time getting the file sizes down and optimizing your load time.

If you need a bit of help to determine how fast your website is loading, we have a blog post with some tools that can help.

Give Your Navigation Breathing Room

The navigation on the Dadaab Stories website has tons of space and is very user friendly. The light colors allow you to ignore the header when engaged with the page content but easily return to it when you need it. Also note how nicely that “donate” button stands out when it has lots of room.

What You Can Do on Your Nonprofit’s Website

The Dadaab Stories website does a great job at getting the user to read and engage with its content. It does this in a few ways that you can easily use on your own site:

• make your home page message big
• use (awesome) multimedia
• consider laying type over your large images for a visual boost
• design the navigation to be spacious and user friendly

What Now?

This site is chock-full of design inspiration as well as some incredible stories from Kenyan refugees. I recommend taking some time to explore the site yourself and see what you notice. If you like something else about the Dadaab Stories design, I’d love to hear your observations in the comment section below.

Related Reads

4 Nonprofits Using Their Website Header to Inspire

Using Video for Your Nonprofit: Benefits and Drawbacks

One Question That Leads to Happier Website Visitors

3 Tips for a Better Donate Button on Your Website

6 Nonprofit-Specific Web Content Tips

Your website can be a huge asset when it comes to your nonprofit’s volunteer efforts.  But when using your website to boost support from potential volunteers, there’s a whole lot to consider.

I was really excited to present on the topic at the 8th Annual Volunteer Symposium put on by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services.  Throughout this session we talked about how you can use your nonprofit’s website to boost volunteerism, drive potential volunteers to your website and measure your site’s impact.

Here’s a quick overview:

Your Website’s Role in Volunteer Efforts

Starts at slide 4

We cover three primary ways your website can help with your volunteer efforts.

Improving Volunteer Satisfaction

Starts at slide 9

Improving volunteer satisfaction can help with retention and help cultivate ongoing relationships.  Here we go over four tips for using your website to improve volunteer satisfaction.

Driving Potential Volunteers

Starts at slide 16

Your website won’t do your nonprofit much good if no one visits it.  Here we discuss a few ways you can drive more potential volunteers to your website.

Measuring Your Website’s Impact

Starts at slide 22

If you aren’t measuring your website, there’s really no way to know if it’s actually helping your organization do more good in the communities you serve.  In this portion we cover a couple of key metrics to track when it comes to volunteerism as well as some other info worth watching.

I know it can be hard to fill in the gaps when just looking through slides, so if you have any questions I’d love to hear from you in the comments below.

Related Reads

Measuring “Website Success” for Big Time Impact

3 Ways Your Nonprofit Website Can Boost Your Volunteer Efforts

How to Maintain Relationships with Volunteers Using the Internet

How to Get More People To Your Events With Social Media

The above photo is from a trip we took to document the recovery efforts following the 2011 tornado in Joplin, MO.  If you’re interested, please read stories about the incredible volunteers that flocked to Joplin after the tornado.

The whole point of making a website is for it to help your organization in some tangible way.  Whether that’s connecting with volunteers, boosting fundraising or educating your community, your website should help you do more good.

But without website measurement there’s no way to know if your website is actually helping your organization serve your community.

We were just fortunate enough to present at the 2013 Spectrum Conference put on by the Community Service Public Relations Council on this very topic.  Hope you find it helpful.

Here’s the broad overview of what you’ll find in the slide deck below:

The Importance of Website Measurement

Starts at slide 4

We discuss the reasons website measurement is so fundamentally important and provide a few tips on making your data more meaningful to your organization.

Defining “Website Success”

Starts at slide 7

We highlight a step-by-step process to identify concrete website goals and distinguish between Success and Supporting Metrics.

Best Practices for Configuring Analytics

Starts at slide 21

We walk through some important things to remember when installing and configuring your analytics tool on your website.

Google Analytics Features That Matter

Starts at slide 33

We briefly highlight some incredible features within Google Analytics that are worth investigating to draw more meaningful conclusions from your website data.

We know that’s a ton to cover, so if you have any questions please feel free to reach out.  Or post your questions and comments below.  We’d love to hear from you.

Related Reads

Nonprofit Website Analytics: Measuring What Matters

Defining Website Success Before You Start Building

The Foundations of a Great Nonprofit Website

5 Questions Your Nonprofit Should Answer Before Taking Bids for a New Website

The Role of Hope in the Nonprofit Website

Image courtesy of Scott Akerman, Flickr

Many nonprofits rely heavily on volunteers.  For some, “rely heavily” is a significant understatement.

But recruiting and managing a legion of volunteers can be quite an undertaking.  Sure it’s worthwhile, but coordinating this effort is a lot to juggle.

Many nonprofits underutilize their websites when it comes to managing their volunteer efforts.  There are a wide variety of ways your website can help boost the efficiency and effectiveness of the way your nonprofit handles volunteers.

Here are three such ways.

1. Getting Visitors Interested in Volunteering

Your website is the perfect place to cultivate a potential volunteer’s interest in getting involved with your organization.  It’s your job to make them believe they can make a difference through your nonprofit.

When it comes to the types of content you share, consider the following:

Impact of Past Volunteers.  Share the impact your volunteers have had in the past.  Showing what past volunteers have been able to accomplish will help build faith you can repeat it in the future.

Stories from Past Volunteers.  Share thoughts directly from the mouths of your volunteers.  These will serve as a sort of testimonial, helping to instill confidence in potential volunteers that they should get involved.

Photos and Videos.  Effectively leveraging emotion can help you connect with website visitors in a profound way.  Use photos and videos whenever possible to help create this emotional connection.

2.  Signing Visitors Up to Volunteer

Allowing website visitors to actually sign up to volunteer through your website can help your nonprofit in multiple ways.  Not only will it increase the likelihood a visitor will sign up since it’s less work than printing an application or sending an email, it’ll also prevent potentially interested volunteers from getting lost in a pile of papers or crowded inbox.

When utilizing your website to sign up volunteers, consider focusing on the following:

Easy Signup Process.  You’ll want to make your signup process as easy as possible.  Only ask for personal information you absolutely need.  The more you ask for, the less likely a visitor is to complete the process.  Also, test your signup form in all major browsers to make sure it displays and works properly for all your visitors.

All Relevant Logistical Info.  Make sure your volunteers know what to expect from an event.  Tell them everything they need to know, including:

• Date and time (start and end)
• Location
• Activities to expect to do on site
• Proper attire
• Any items they should bring
• Rain plan

Impact of the Volunteer Opportunity.  Tell your visitors why this particular volunteer opportunity is worthwhile.  Explain the impact they’ll be having in the community.  They’re signing up to make a difference.  Make sure they know they’re doing just that.

Multimedia from Past Events.  If you’ve done this same volunteer event in the past, show volunteers what to expect using photos and videos.  Such multimedia can help build an emotional connection while making volunteers more comfortable signing up since they know what to expect.

Person to Ask Questions. Provide the contact info for a specific person in your nonprofit.  Having a point person can help convince those website visitors deciding if they should get involved to do so.

3.  Maintaining Relationships with Past Volunteers

Getting new volunteers is great.  Maintaining the passion and support of past volunteers is even better.

Keeping past volunteers engaged will not only prevent you from being short of helping hands, but it also increases the likelihood they’ll get further involved.  Perhaps they’ll take on a leadership role and lead a volunteer event.  Or maybe they’ll recruit some friends to volunteer in the future.  Maybe they’ll even start supporting your organization in other ways, such as becoming a donor or raising awareness for your cause.

When looking to maintain relationships with volunteers, consider the following:

Ongoing Appreciation of Volunteer Efforts.  Share your appreciation for your volunteers.  And not only right after they’ve given their time or during Volunteer Appreciation Week.  Write blog posts about how much volunteers mean to your nonprofit.  Dedicate pages of your website to recognizing outstanding contributions made by your volunteers.  Your volunteers probably mean a great deal to you.  Make sure they know it.

Demonstrate Volunteer Impact.  We’ve already discussed the importance of demonstrating your volunteers’ impact.  Instead of relegating such sentiments to an occasional email newsletter, dedicate blog posts and web pages to discussing the impact your volunteers are having in the community you serve.  Reminding your volunteers how much good they’re doing may prompt them to come on back to do some more.

Post Information Volunteers Will Find Interesting.  Don’t be the kind of nonprofit that’s always asking for support and never offering anything in return.  If all you do is ask for help your supporters may very well tune you out.  Instead, write blog posts and share articles your volunteers will find interesting.  Write about topics related to your mission.  Doing so can stoke the passion of your volunteers.

Your website can be a valuable tool when it comes to cultivating new volunteers, informing current volunteers and staying connected with past volunteers.

How are you using your website when it comes to promoting volunteerism?  Is there anything you think your nonprofit could be better at?  I’d love to hear what you have to say in the comments below.

Related Reads

The Role of Hope in the Nonprofit Website

3 Websites to Help you Find Volunteer Opportunities

The Impact of Small Moment Storytelling on Website Content

11 Simple Suggestions for a Better Donation Form

Image courtesy of Feed My Starving Children, Flickr

You’ve likely heard plenty of times how beneficial a blog can be.  But you’ve also probably experienced, or at least caught wind of how significant an undertaking starting a blog can be.

It’s no lie that launching and maintaining a blog can take a lot of time and energy.  But it can also boost the effectiveness of your website in a wide variety of ways.

Here are some of the most significant benefits your nonprofit can gain from including a blog on your website.

Establish Your Authority

It’s important you establish your organization as an authority in your field.  Doing so will build credibility, helping you to develop trust with website visitors.

A blog is a great way to establish your authority.  You can write articles on all facets of your organization’s interests, showing you have a wide breadth of knowledge when it comes to the work you do.

Connect with Potential Supporters

Forming connections with potential supporters increases the likelihood they’ll ultimately decide to support your nonprofit.  But every visitor is different, which makes connecting with them a pretty daunting task.

A blog is wonderful because it allows you to take a variety of approaches when it comes to connecting.  Here are a few potential types of content that may appeal to different visitors on your nonprofit’s website:

• Informational articles aimed at those interested in your cause
• Emotional stories about the impact you’re having in the world
• Data showcasing your nonprofit’s effectiveness
• First person accounts from donors and volunteers on why they support you
• Analysis of the problem your organization is tackling
• Photos or videos paired with text detailing any relevant backstory
• Recaps of past events
• Links to helpful resources

These are just a few of the ways you can potentially leverage your blog to appeal to a wide variety of website visitors.

Maintain Relationships with Past Supporters

Many nonprofits make it a priority to maintain relationships with past supporters.  A blog is a perfect place to facilitate this effort.

Ask past supporters to write guest posts outlining why they support your organization.  If done well, such posts can be a great way to engage your supporters.  Not only will the folks you ask feel appreciated by the opportunity, but it’s also likely they’ll share their post with others, helping to raise awareness of your nonprofit.

Doing so also sends a message to your supporters that you value their voice as a member of your community.  Showing you care about what your supporters have to say can go a long way.

Build Trust by Sharing Your Impact

We talk about the importance of effectively sharing your nonprofit’s impact often.  But that’s because it’s just that important.  Sharing your impact helps build trust among website visitors.  It shows your organization is a solution to the problem you’re addressing.  It makes your work seem important and valuable, increasing the likelihood visitors will lend their support.

A blog is an excellent way to show your impact.  Share videos.  Share photos.  Share stories from the community.  Share the benefits of a specific program or event.

Even if your organization does work on the other side of the world, you can show visitors the impact you’re having.  Sharing this type of information helps make your impact more concrete for visitors.  And when a visitor can easily picture how their involvement will benefit the world, they’re far more likely to help out in some way.

Distribute Information to Your Community

Some nonprofits use their websites as a vehicle to share information with the community.  A blog can be a great way to do just that.

Write articles aimed squarely at the community you serve.  This will look different based on your nonprofit’s mission.  For a nonprofit aimed at boosting childhood literacy, maybe it’s a post on educational resources.  For an organization working to raise money for medical research, it could be a review of a clinical trial or new drug.  For a nonprofit dedicated to combating obesity, perhaps it’s a healthy recipe for an upcoming holiday.

A blog can become a valuable resource when it comes to disseminating information to the community you serve.

Drive More Traffic from Search Engines

A blog can have tremendous benefits when it comes to search engine optimization.  While the technical details behind this benefit could easily fill a post all its own, it’s important to recognize a blog can help your nonprofit drive more traffic to your site from search engines.

The main reason is because a blog allows you to write very specific posts that likely wouldn’t warrant their own pages on your website.  By writing about a wide variety of topics related to your mission, you are creating a wealth of content for search engines to find and show in search results.  This increases the likelihood that a web surfer will find your website.

Blogs also allow you to produce fresh content, which visitors and search engines love.  It helps keep your website from becoming stale.

Create Content for Sharing on Social Media

Blog content is also highly shareable.  By producing posts your audience will find useful, you increase the likelihood visitors will share your content via social media.

And more social sharing means more traffic to your website, which will raise awareness and help to ultimately bring new supporters into your community.

Provide Visitors an Opportunity to Engage by Commenting

Website engagement is a good thing.  When a visitor takes an action to engage on your website (such as signing up for a newsletter, submitting a contact form or sharing via social media) it means they’re interested in what you’re doing.

Commenting on your blog is an additional way a website visitor can engage with your organization.  Comments can also spark interesting conversations about the topics you cover.

As a quick note, make sure you respond to commenters on your blog.  You never know when a commenter that has a good experience will become an impassioned supporter of your cause.

Give People a Reason to Check Your Website

Chances are you’d like visitors to come back to your website periodically.  A repeat visit demonstrates a certain level of interest in your nonprofit and keeps your organization top of mind.

A blog is a great way to drive visitors back to your nonprofit’s website.  New, interesting content will give visitors a reason to come back to your site time and time again.

Does your nonprofit have a blog?  Do you have any benefits to add to this list?  I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Related Reads

7 Questions to Ask When Starting a Nonprofit Blog

Should Your Nonprofit Start a Blog? – Benefits and Drawbacks

Making Blog Categories More Useful

6 Nonprofit-Specific Web Content Tips

Ask Supporters to Blog for Your Nonprofit

Image courtesy of Brenda Gottsabend, Flickr

We talk to a lot of nonprofits about websites (which makes sense given what we do).  And from time to time we hear organizations say something to this effect:

“We don’t want our website to be too good.  We want people to know we need their donations.”

On the surface this reasoning seems to make sense.  Donors don’t want to give to an organization that’s flush with cash.  They’d much rather support a cause that needs their help.  After all, these donors want to make a difference.

But that’s just it.  They want to make a difference.  And having a subpar website is not an effective way to demonstrate the difference they can make.

Before jumping in too deep, I want to acknowledge I’m definitely biased in that I make websites for nonprofits for a living.  But there’s a reason I do this all day, every day:

I think this stuff is so incredibly important.

I’ve seen the impact an effective, thoughtful web presence can have on an organization and the good in the world that can flow from it.  So yes, I’m most certainly biased.  But that doesn’t necessarily make me wrong.

Donor Motivation

While it varies for each individual donor, there are a variety of reasons that can lead a donor to support your cause:

• They’ve been personally impacted by your cause
• They believe in the work you’re doing
• They’re emotionally moved
• They want to support a friend who’s fundraising for your cause
• They’re passionate today, for a fleeting moment, about your cause
• They’ve been passionate about battling for your cause for decades
• They believe your organization is well run
• They know someone that loves your nonprofit

And, regardless of their motivation, they’re convinced your organization is an effective way for them to be a part of the solution.  Appearing needy is not the only reason a donor will give.

Need is Only Half the Equation

In fact, there’s no shortage of needy organizations.  There are mouths that need feeding.  Kids that need educating.  Animals that need rescuing.  Water glasses that need filling.  Environments that need protecting.  People that need defending.

It’s easy to find organizations that are in need.  Need is only half of the equation when we decide to give.  You certainly have to establish the need through your website, but you also have to instill confidence that you can address this need.  You must establish yourself as a solution.  And having a lackluster website doesn’t do it.

Think about some of the huge nonprofits out there.  A lot of these organizations have awesome websites and still raise a ton of money each year.  Organizations like the American Red Cross, the World Wildlife Fund, and charity: water clearly don’t shy away from having great websites.  All three are using their websites to showcase impact and inspire visitors to get involved.

People want to support an organization they believe will make a difference in the world.  No one wants to throw money into an organization that’s going to squander it.  A strong web presence can help establish trust and authority.  Such sentiments can go a long way with your prospective donors.

What do you think?  Should a nonprofit intentionally weaken their online presence to help establish their neediness?  I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Related Reads

5 Questions to Ask to Improve Every Page of Your Nonprofit’s Website

The Role of Hope in the Nonprofit Website

4 Nonprofits Using Their Website Header to Inspire

The Foundations of a Great Nonprofit Website

Getting Online Donors to Care Today and Into the Future

Image courtesy of Kenny Louie, Flickr

Data is everywhere these days.  It’s common (depending on your social circles I suppose) to hear folks debating the proper use of data or hammering home the importance of website analytics.

This surge in popularity is well deserved.  Data is a crucial component of measuring website success. But with the growth in accessibility to data comes the need to sift through increasingly complex quantities of it.  As the sea of data consistently grows, it’s becoming easier to get caught up in the current of your nonprofit’s data and end up veering off course.

Just because you can measure something doesn’t mean you should care about doing so.  If you pour your energy into everything that’s measurable you’ll never actually get anything done.

Instead, determine what metrics matter and focus on getting really good at measuring them.

Knowing What to Focus On

The specific metrics you use to gauge success will vary based on your website goals.  But with many nonprofits these will often include financial goals (such as donations made through the website) and community outreach goals (such as volunteer signups or support requests).

Think of those metrics that you’d go home smiling about if they improved.  Or the ones that would keep you up at night if they worsened.  These are the ones you’ll want to focus on tracking.  These are the ones that should become your primary focus.

Knowing What Not to Focus On

Just as important as figuring out the right data to track is knowing which data not to focus on.

Many organizations place a lot of weight on website visits.  But visits have little value in and of themselves.  If your website visits went down 70% but your online donations went up 300% how would you feel?  Probably pretty excited.  What if your visits went up 300% but donations fell 70%?  Probably not quite as thrilled.

There’s nothing wrong with tracking a wide variety of website metrics.  But tracking and focusing on are two different things.

You’ll likely track a lot of data that doesn’t have inherent value in and of itself.  But if you spend time focusing on a piece of data, make sure you can justify its importance.  If it doesn’t have intrinsic value make sure you can explain how it supports something that does.

Let’s use Pages per Visit as an example.  The number of pages a user visits on your website has little value in its own right.  But if you calculate that a person who visits at least five pages on your website is 30% more likely to donate to your nonprofit, it starts to matter a whole lot more.

Questions to Ask Yourself When Determining What to Focus On

When figuring out what data to pay attention to, there are a few questions that can be helpful:

• If this piece of data goes up, does it (by itself) help your organization better fulfill your mission?
• If it doesn’t help you better support your mission, can you find a correlation between it and a metric that does help you fulfill your mission?
• If this metric went down by 70% this month, would it be cause for alarm?
• If this metric improved by 300% this month, would it be cause for a celebration?
• Would you be willing to sacrifice in other areas to see this area improve?

If you answered “YES” to all (or almost all) of these questions, you’re likely on to a pretty important piece of data.

If you answered “NO” to most of these questions, or had to think about it pretty hard to come up with a “YES,” you’re probably facing a secondary piece of data.  As discussed above, some secondary data is still helpful to track, but don’t hang your hat too firmly on it.  Its main function is to serve as a support for your primary metrics that truly matter.

Data Folks You Should Follow

If you’re into the world of nonprofit data, I’d recommend you follow these three.  They’re all pretty awesome:

Lucy Bernholz – Lucy talks a lot about the role that “big data” can (and should) play in the social space, today and into the future.

Beth Kanter – Beth focuses on the way nonprofits can be “data informed” and utilize social media in a measureable, calculated way.

K.D. Paine – K.D. focuses on measurement across industries as it relates to brand image, public relations and engagement.

Do you have any folks to add to this list?  Or any thoughts on how nonprofits should be approaching website analytics?  Maybe a story about how data has worked for your organization?  I’m always happy to discuss data (yeah, I know how cool that makes me sound) so get to it in the comments below.

Related Reads

Website Data Most Nonprofits Should Be Tracking

Defining Website Success Before You Start Building

Website Goals: Why They Matter and How to Set Helpful Ones

Using Advanced Segments in Google Analytics

Image courtesy of Gavin Brogan, Flickr

Twitter can be tough.  Maybe you’ve been there before, crafting what you knew would be the perfect Tweet sure to throw your followers into a retweeting frenzy, only to have it go seemingly unnoticed.  Keep your head up – it’s happened to us all.

Getting followers can be just as illusive.  There are a wide variety of things you can do to promote follower growth.  But that’s not what this post is all about.  This post is about keeping those followers you already have.

The last thing you want to do is woo new followers only to annoy them into quickly leaving you behind.  Here are five ways you can avoid doing just that.

1.  Focus on Offering Value to Your Followers

It’s important to remember your Twitter followers are tracking you in order to gain some value from the content you share.  Sure, they’re likely interested in your mission and organization as a whole.  But if you bug them with pure self-promotion, there’s a good chance they’re going to stop following you.

Instead, focus on sharing mostly information they’re going to find interesting.  Make sure it relates to your cause in some way, but it need not be about your organization.  Share relevant news or interesting blog posts related to your mission.

If you do so, you can still sprinkle in a healthy dose of info about yourself without being annoying.

A couple of great examples:

2.  Reframe Your Self-Promotional Tweets

Sometimes you’ll want to promote yourself.  Whether it’s the good you’re doing in the community, an upcoming event or a fundraising campaign, social media can be a great way to spread the word.

But mix up the way you promote yourself.  Don’t always tell your followers “Hey, we have something for you to do!  Please do it!!”  Change it up a little.

An example will help illustrate this point.  Here are a few ways you could promote an upcoming event:

• Talk about how excited you are for the event
• Share what people can expect if they attend the event
• Tell your followers how much it means to you and your community that so many people are signing up for the event
• Discuss the impact the event will have
• Thank individual people for signing up
• Thank individual people for helping to promote the event or spreading the word via social media

By reframing some of your self-promotion you can avoid seeming as if you’re always asking your followers for things.  And that can go a long way.

A couple of great examples:

3.  Remind Followers Why They Support You

Twitter can be a great tool to remind your followers why they love your organization.  Instead of just plugging how they can help, remind them of the amazing things you’re doing in the world.

Share quotes and photos from the communities you serve.  Share short videos using Twitter’s Vine app.  Link to posts on your blog that highlight stories of success.  Simply put, share some of the things that make you awesome.

A couple of great examples:

4.  Share Content From Others

I used to teach Kindergarten, so I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had conversations about sharing as an indication you care about others.  But it’s just as true on Twitter as it is on the playground.

Retweet content that others share.  And not only the content that talks directly about your nonprofit.  Share content from others that’s related to your mission but doesn’t mention your organization.  Share content from your partner organizations.  Share relevant news from a variety of sources.

After all, sharing should be a priority long after you graduate to the first grade.

A great example:

5.  Space Out Your Tweets

Most of your followers like you.  But I’d wager most of them don’t like you enough to be repeatedly bombarded by strings of your Tweets.  Instead of blasting a ton of Tweets at your followers, space them out over the course of the day.

You can use a variety of applications like TweetDeck, HootSuite or Buffer to schedule posts.  That way you can avoid annoying your followers by clogging their streams with your content.  But, as a quick aside, don’t simply blast the same messages to all of your social accounts.  If people follow your various accounts (such as Facebook and Twitter) getting the exact same content in multiple places is pretty annoying too.

What annoys you on Twitter?  Any tips you’d like to add to help nonprofits avoid annoying their followers?  I’d love to hear from you in the comments.

Related Reads

Figuring Out Who to Follow on Twitter

Nonprofit Social Media: Defining “Success” For Your Nonprofit

How to Maintain Relationships with Donors Using the Internet

Overcoming the Fear of Feedback

Effectively Using Twitter Lists to Get More Out of Twitter

Image courtesy of Rosaura Ochoa, Flickr

If you’re anything like the majority of nonprofits out there, you’re likely trying to find new, creative and fruitful ways to raise money.  It’s no mystery that fundraising is a pretty important part of an organization’s ability to do good in their community.

It’s also well known that fundraising is tough.

Combating Inertia

It’s not that people dislike your cause or have a distaste for your organization.  You’re merely battling one of the most formidable forces on the planet: inertia.

Inertia is “the tendency of an object to resist any change in its motion” (as eloquently defined by Wikipedia).  People are simply living their lives.  Your organization may come into and out of their routine intermittently, piquing their interest for a moment before being lost in a sea of tasks, deadlines and commitments.

These people don’t dislike you.  They simply don’t think about you.

It’s your job to change that.

One way to combat inertia is to find a way to make your fundraising campaign (and your organization) personally relevant to your potential donors’ lives.  Some of the most effective campaigns are those we can’t stop thinking about.  They stick with us.  They seem relevant, and as a result, they begin to counteract the inertia of our daily lives.

A Fundraising Example from St. Louis Public Radio

One of my favorite recent examples of a personalized fundraising campaign came during the spring pledge drive for St. Louis Public Radio (our local NPR affiliate).  If you’ve listened to NPR for any length of time, you’ve likely hit a pledge drive or two.

Now I knew it was time for me to renew my membership.  And I fully intended to.  But as the pledge drive wore on, I still hadn’t “found the time” (because three minutes is so tough to come by).  In the height of my own inertia keeping me from donating, I heard an appeal that made me smile and led me to find that time to renew.

The voices on the radio started talking about “driveway moments.”  This simple phrase intrigued me.  They went on to describe driveway moments as those times you’re listening to NPR in your car, and upon arriving wherever you’re going, you don’t turn the radio off.  You sit, hooked to a story, waiting to hear how it all turns out.

I can’t count how many times that’s happened to me.  I do it all the time.  And here is St. Louis Public Radio calling me out.  It made me smile.  It made me think about how often I do the very thing they’re mentioning.  It made me walk inside and pledge.  And ultimately it led me to write this blog post.

Personalize your nonprofit’s fundraising message.  You don’t have to have access to broadcast media to make it happen.  You can do it through your website.  Or social media.  Or your newsletter.  However, you reach out to your community, make it personal.  Make it relevant to their lives.

Personalization may just be that powerful combatant you need in your quest to overcome inertia.

Have you ever been moved by a nonprofit that tailored their message to your life?  Or have you found yourself thinking about a nonprofit’s message during your daily routine?  Tell me about it in the comments.

Related Reads

Getting Online Donors to Care Today and Into the Future

6 Nonprofit-Specific Web Content Tips

11 Simple Suggestions for a Better Donation Form

Reframing Fundraising as the Beginning of the Story

4 Ways to Write Better Fundraising Appeals

Image courtesy of DonkeyHotey, Flickr

We think trust is pretty important when it comes to running an effective nonprofit website.  In fact, we think it’s so important we wrote up a whole article for GuideStar all about trust.

The post not only details a few reasons trust is so key, but also provides a list of suggestions to help develop trust with your website visitors.

Below is an excerpt from the post.

Using Your Nonprofit’s Website to Build Trust with Visitors

Trust is more than closing your eyes, stiffening your body and slowly falling backwards into a fabric of interwoven arms. Trust often comes from a process of slow cultivation, carefully built through the development of a meaningful relationship.

It’s much easier to build a sense of trust when we get to know someone well. We learn they’re true to their word and grounded in principles we find admirable. It often takes us multiple interactions and prolonged discussion to realize we can truly trust another person.

Unfortunately, when it comes to your website visitors, an abundance of time and multiple interactions are luxuries you can’t bank on.

But there are many ways you can use your nonprofit’s website to build trust with your visitors. And as it turns out, building trust is crucial to your nonprofit ultimately achieving website success.

Why Trust Matters

Trust is a necessary precondition to inspire website visitors to take action on your behalf. If a visitor can’t trust your organization, the chances of them sending in a donation, signing up to volunteer, or even filling out your contact form drop substantially.

Some studies have looked directly at the role trust plays in prompting action. According to one study on Millennials (age 20-35), 84% said they would be “somewhat or very likely to donate to organizations that they can fully trust.” Alternatively, 90% said they would stop giving to a nonprofit “if they did not trust the organization.”

In another study on high-income donors, 51% of respondents said they either somewhat or strongly agreed their fear that “the charity will sell, rent or exchange” their email is a reason not to give online. Such fears come from a lack of trust.

Another study on donor motivations found that both individual donors and financial advisors listed “financials” as the most important piece of information when deciding whether or not to make a donation. For both groups, info on the “effectiveness” of an organization was listed as second most important. Both types of information, if easy to find and effectively presented, can help engender a sense of trust.

Such findings aren’t shocking. It stands to reason that trust is important when it comes to any nonprofit’s website.

How Your Nonprofit Can Build Trust Using Your Website

Your nonprofit’s website can be a tool that helps you cultivate a trusting relationship with your visitors, ultimately increasing the likelihood they’ll support your cause in some way.

The following are meant to be options, not simply a checklist.  Mix and match them to fit your specific situation and appeal to your audience.

Make financial data easy to find.  As mentioned above, many visitors will want to see your financials before giving you money.  Make this information easy for them to find.  If they have to hunt for it, chances are they’ll leave without getting involved.

Make reaching out easy.  Make it simple for a website visitor to get in touch with someone if they’re interested in lending support.  Provide staff member names and targeted phone numbers whenever you can.  Make sure you give visitors multiple ways to reach out so they can choose the method that makes them most comfortable.

Read the Whole Post

There’s more where that came from.  If you want to read the rest of the post, head on over to GuideStar.

Related Reads

Getting Online Donors to Care Today and Into the Future

4 Pages Your Nonprofit Website Should Include

Image courtesy of Terry Johnson, Flickr