Why your digital fundraising strategy should have a strong SEO focus
Organic search typically drives 53% of site traffic. That's potentially half of your prospective online donors, coming to your site regularly through browsing. But despite its effectiveness, Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) is frequently sidelined by Digital Fundraisers, who often favor more immediate tactics instead.
With less than 10% of charities rating their in-house SEO skillset as being “excellent”, this lack of focus is no surprise. Deeply entrenched in the nonprofit sector, there's a lack of operational specialism in the field of SEO – and that means content plans are rarely driven by the data and insight they really should be.
SEO isn't just a way to grow your site traffic: it's a tangible ROI driver
SEO isn't just something for content teams and webmasters to worry about. It should be a strategic priority among fundraisers, too.
With an estimated 3-year ROI of 750% from SEO, it offers clear financial opportunity. And this extends beyond direct conversion to long-term lead generation, with SEO generated leads having a 758% stronger conversion rate than those acquired through outbound methods (14.6% v 1.7%).
What’s more, it’s the gift that keeps on giving. Unlike paid advertising, which ceases to convert once budget is exhausted, SEO continues to generate organic traffic over time, resulting in a steady stream of potential donors, supporters and income.
And with this year’s M+R benchmarks showing that traditional advertising methods are getting harder by the year to drive ROI from, it’s about time charities start to give SEO the attention it deserves.
How to write an SEO strategy
Getting started with SEO doesn't have to be a costly headache. There's a plethora of SEO tools to help digital marketers get started, from AHrefs to SEMRush. With subscriptions costing less than £100, the cost is less about cost, and more about time and investment
The best SEO tools can only get you so far – they may be able to suggest key SEO optimizations, such as metadata and broken links, they cannot read between the lines or shape a tailored SEO strategy.
At the heart of every ROI positive SEO roadmap there's a data-driven content plan, that considers three golden factors:
Potential: the total volume of searches a keyword or phrase represents if an organization successfully ranks for it
Intent: the quality of the search term and the predicted intent of the user who is searching it
Competition: the extent of challenge to rank for the term, also known as “keyword difficulty”
The first step is typically to conduct deep keyword research, using these factors, to shape a priority keyword list to rank on.
It would be more sensible for a climate change charity to consider “best climate change charity” than “donate”, for example: while the latter may have high volumes, the chance of ranking is very low while the former is relevant, more targeted and achievable.
Once the research is done, the mission to rank begins – with data-driven content plans at the heart of everything. Not only is this the fun bit from a creative perspective, it’s also the bit that’s clearly measurable – with teams able to track how their position is changing over time and the impact increasing traffic is ultimately having on the bottom-line.
The power of a good SEO agency partner
A good SEO agency partner, that truly gets SEO, can be invaluable: streamlining the process and ensuring focus is going where it’s going to have the most impact.
Not all optimizations are created equal: a custom 404 page will have a lower SEO influence than a keyword-heavy title tag, while engaging and mobile-friendly experiences will have more sway than making font sizes accessible.
At Moral Media, our SEO consultants don't make false promises or churn out strategies that are too fluffy to go anywhere; we shape bespoke and tangible action plans for our clients, that make an impact and demonstrably add value. If you'd like to get started on your SEO journey, drop us a line.
