Today I get to introduce you to Steven Shattuck, Vice President of Marketing at Bloomerang, the exciting new donor relationship management software that makes it easy to focus on donor retention. I’be been getting to know him over the last few months an love his knowledge of technology and marketing. Better still, he’s a great guy. I’ve asked him to share what he’d recommend for your nonprofit blog. You’ll love it. You can reach Steven on Twitter @StevenShattuck.
3 Changes You Should Make To Your Nonprofit Blog Right Now
by Steven Shattuck, VP of Marketing at Bloomerang
Nonprofits who have implemented a blog to their website are able to deliver fresh content to their donors, volunteers and patrons. It’s also a great way to tell the story of your organization through a variety of authors and perspectives. However, if are you blogging regularly but aren’t seeing a significant return-on-investment in the form of website traffic, donations or awareness, you might want to consider making the following changes:
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Stop Writing About Your Organization
While it’s okay to post news and information about your organization, or promote events and upcoming campaigns, this kind of content should not dominate your blog. Instead, strive to present your nonprofit blog as an educational resource for those who are stakeholders in the arena in which your organization operates. For example, if your nonprofit serves those suffering from Alzheimer’s and their caregivers, why not share helpful information that can empower? Caregiver support tips, new research findings and prevention advice will be far more valuable than content that promotes your organization. Your content should provide value – and once it does, your website will become a frequent destination.
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Include Strong Calls-to-Action
With the credibility and traffic increases brought on through educational (rather than promotional) content on blog comes the need to capitalize on all those visits. The best way to ensure that a reader does not leave your website after finishing a blog post is to insert relevant calls-to-action throughout the page. A CTA can look like an embedded link to another page or blog post in the article they are reading, or perhaps a banner image at the bottom of the article, or a donation form in the sidebar. It’s critical that you give the reader something to do once they have finished reading your blog post.
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Set Up Google Authorship
Google Authorship is a mechanism that allows Google to tie an author profile – in this case, a Google+ profile – to a blog post. You may have noticed headshot photos appearing in search results. This indicates that a blog author has established Google Authorship:
Some research shows that these search results get more clicks than results without an author photo. Google Authorship is also believed to be a prerequisite to AuthorRank – a future Google ranking factor that will benefit bloggers with established authorship, and punish those who remain anonymous. Setting this up is fairly simple and straightforward. You can find instructions here.
What changes are you making?
If you’re already invested in contributing to your nonprofit’s blog, implement these three changes and let us know if you see results!
