Hey Nonprofits- Is Your Website the Problem?

7 Tips to Make Your Nonprofit Website Shine Online

Donor fatigue is a real thing. Many of us have been on the donor side wondering what nonprofit to donate to or which one is a "legit" organization vs. a total rip off.

Trust me, I've been right there too. In fact, I've been on all sides of this triangle. As a donor wondering who should get my hard earned money. As a funder wondering if we gave money to an organization that is actually a real organization doing real work for real people. As a nonprofit fundraising professional wondering how the heck to get more money into the organization to do more work for the people in need of our services.

This continual cycle of needing to build trust, make information transparent and easily accessible, and continually demonstrating impact isn't just a donor issue. More importantly, it's a client issue as well.

Making Info Easily Accessible Breaks Barriers for Clients

I think the more important part of this equation is the people who receive services from a nonprofit. Eliminating barriers to accessing your services promotes equity and helps more clients benefit from the good things your organization does.

When I think about nonprofit websites, the most important audience are the beneficiaries of the services and programs the organization offers. How do people know if they qualify for your help? Do you clearly tell them how/where/when to access your help?

There are so many barriers to accessing help, the last thing you want to do is create another barrier by having a horrible website with poor quality information.

Up Your Website Game with These 7 Tips

The truth is, any impact-driven business will have similar issues conveying who they are and what they do to multiple audiences. While a nonprofit might be worried about clients, donors and volunteers. A social business might be concerned about customers, clients for their impact work, and partnerships.

These 7 tips apply to most of us who have some sort of online presence and website so I'll drop the main ones here for everyone, if you want more head over to read the full blog post.

#1 Nonprofit Websites Help You Build Loyalty and Trust

The main purpose of your website is to convey your impact and build trust with three of your most important audiences-?existing donors, volunteers, and clients.

You might have realized your website isn’t getting many visitors or you can’t convert visitors to donors or clients. You likely found this article because you were looking for ways to increase your website traffic and improve your online presence as an organization.?

A secondary purpose for your website to fulfill is building trust with?potential?supporters and clients. Unfortunately, a recent study found that only 56% of Americans trust nonprofit organizations. That’s down 3% since 2020. At the same time, 1/3 of nonprofit organizations face financial hardship that will cause them to close within 2 years due to the effects of the pandemic.?

Using your website to build trust amongst existing and potential supporters will contribute to the?sustainability?of your organization.?

#2 Know Who’s Coming to Your Nonprofit’s Website?

Creating donor, volunteer, and client avatars will help you build your website. Having avatars for the top visitors to your website guides the specific pages you create to engage each group.?

If you don’t know who’s coming to your nonprofit’s website, you can use analytics from other platforms to tell you who might be interested. Here are three concrete ways to know who is coming (or potentially coming) to your website.?

• Social media followers- If you have social media channels check your demographics in your analytics on each platform.
• Google Analytics and Google Search Console referral sources- You can get insights into your website visitors through each of these tools.
• Current supporters and clients- Your current supporters and clients are likely similar groups of people to your potential website visitors.

#3 Why Do Charities and Nonprofit Organizations Use .org vs. .com?

Your website is a vehicle to generate donations. That means your website must demonstrate that you're a legit organization that can keep financial information safe. Simply using a .org URL for your website is not enough to convey that your organization is trustworthy and legit.?

Are all .org websites a nonprofit organization??

Definitely not. Anyone can create a .org website by purchasing a domain name.?

.org stands for organization. Nonprofits typically use .org to demonstrate they are a nonprofit organization. That doesn’t mean that they’re the only ones with a .org. There is no way to prevent a business or another type of entity from purchasing a .org website.?

#4 Free vs. Paid Nonprofit Websites

Nonprofits often can access free websites or websites built on fundraising platforms that are specific for nonprofits. Depending on how you built your free website, you might only have access to certain features or have a limited amount of information that you can put into a website.?Most of the major website building platforms offer a template for nonprofit websites, even though you might have to pay for their service.

#5 What should a Nonprofit Website Include?

There are some essential parts of every website that your nonprofit needs to include as well. These tips will help you create an engaging and thorough website.

• Home page- Your homepage should be effective at giving the information people need to know to support your organization.
• Cleary Identifiable Mission/Vision and Impact-Your organization’s impact mission must be clearly stated above the fold on your website. That means without scrolling your website visitors must be able to understand your purpose. Likewise, donors and clients want to know your impact. Check out my?Social Impact?Website?Audit?tool below for help demonstrating your impact on your website.
• Donation Page- Optimizing your donation landing page helps your website visitors clearly see why they should donate to you. .?
• Client Services- Your website should describe your clients and reduce barriers to accessing your services.
• Volunteer Information- Volunteer pages should be inspirational and demonstrate the benefit of volunteering with your organization.

#6 Inspirational and Clear Copy

Using an inspirational tone throughout your website will help website visitors connect to your organization’s mission. There has to be a clear link between the organization's mission, the services, the website content, and the copy on your website pages.?

#7 What Makes a Good Nonprofit Website? Ideas to Set You Apart

Strong Visuals-?Remember to use high-quality images.?

• Financial Information- Including your 990 annual filing information on your website shows website visitors you are transparent about your financial status.
• Board and Staff Information-?You should have a Staff or Board page to demonstrate the caliber of people that are part of your organization.
• Easy to Use Navigation-?Your website's navigation is extremely important to guide people to the most important parts of your website.

Need to Re-vamp Your Nonprofit's Website? Download my Social Impact Website Audit Tool!?

Before you touch your website... make sure you know what needs to be changed. Get the tool I designed to help my clients improve their websites quickly and easily. The?Social Impact & Nonprofit Website Audit?will help you determine what needs to be changed and how to show your impact on your website.?

Want to Know More?

I shared this post previously on my blog:?7 Tips to Make The Best Nonprofit Website and Increase Donations. If your nonprofit website needs a revamp, check the full article for more details on everything shared int his post.

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