1. Maximizing Exposure for Your Non-Profit
SEO Techniques
Maximizing Exposure for Your Non-Profit

2. What is SEO?
Search engine optimization (SEO) is the practice of maximizing the volume or quality of traffic to a website from search engines. The higher a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive.
Natural/Organic SEO vs. Paid SEO
Search engines use robotic crawlers to find what keywords are on your website and where they are located
Optimizing a website primarily involves editing its content and HTML and associated coding to both increase its relevance to specific keywords and to remove barriers to the indexing activities of search engines
Content Management Systems streamline the process

3. Why is SEO important for my organization?
The ultimate goal of a website is to attract internet users, and the vast majority of users find websites by using the major search engines
84% of Google users never get past the first page of natural search results
SEO campaigns have a much higher return on investment than other traditional internet marketing techniques
SEO can make the content of your web pages more relevant, and more easily read by search engines and their crawling and indexing software

4. SEO Ingredients Keyword Research Website Optimization Link Building
Keeping Content Fresh
Analytics

5. Keyword Research
Knowing the search terms (or “keywords”) your potential visitors are searching for is crucial to attracting them to your site. To make it to the top of the list of Google results you must know what terms are most likely to be searched for.
Start by brainstorming
What is your goal?
Check the popularity of your choices using an online keyword database
Yahoo’s keyword tool -
Google Keyword Research Tool - 
WordTracker –
Keyword Discovery –
Narrow down your list to a few keywords including your organization's name, location, and your main subject area 

6. Google’s Keyword Usage Tool

7. Website Optimization
Once you have decided on your keywords, you must know how to apply them to your website.  Website optimization is the process of modifying your website to include your selected keywords in the content and HTML code of the website.
Include meta-title and meta-description; limit the title to about 70 characters and 2-3 keyword phrases, and description to 170 characters
Do not use Flash, animation or “splash” pages with images and little or no text content
Use one or more explanatory headings on each page. ex. "<h1>Nonprofit Tools</h1>
Give images relevant names (communitycenterfront.jpg instead of image1.jpg) and use descriptive “alt” text for images
Create navigation text links using keywords (not “click here” but "click here to become a graphic design volunteer”)
Be sure that every single page on your website is linked from your navigation structure, so that no pages are “orphaned”
Google Website Optimizer

8. Link Building
Link building is the process of getting other websites to link to yours, which generates direct traffic while increasing your search engine rankings.
Ask supporters to link to your site from their blogs, personal pages
Write articles or other content on websites which contain links back to your website
Participate in relevant online discussions
Write media (press) releases and submit them to distribution and syndication services
Submit your website to web directories
The Open Directory (DMOZ.org)
Yahoo (dir.yahoo.com)
Best of the Web (
While link building is a legitimate SEO strategy, it can be abused

9. Keeping Content Fresh
Dynamic websites with fresh content are consistently more successful than those which remain static. Search engines recognize this, and websites which are constantly growing by adding fresh content achieve higher rankings than those which remain outdated.
Give your website a periodic check up to remove old and stale information
If you don’t already have one, include a blog on your site
Weekly showcases and other ways to freshen content (maintaining an active and update calendar)
Bringing it home - post dynamic content to your homepage (maybe a box that contains a weekly sponsor highlight or a poll)

10. Analytics
SEO is about your visibility level or ranking on a search engine. This directly relates to your website traffic a way to evaluate the impact of your efforts.
Google Analytics - Free with Gmail/Google account. Embed a tracking code on your site, then setup customized reports for referrals, visitors, conversion
Who is visiting your site? 
New vs Repeat Visitors 
Increase or decrease over time
Landing Pages
Keywords Searched 
Referral Source
Page Views vs Visits vs Hits
Use with Adwords - information can be used to increase ROI by tracking cost and conversion data as well

13. Pay-Per-Click/Search Engine Marketing
SEM: Search Engine Marketing
Using text ads to draw in visitors who search related phrases.
Google Adwords - Nonprofits eligible for Google Grant, to be used for your SEM efforts 

14. Google Adwords/Google Grant
Google Adwords (for your SEM): create and manage text ads set to appear on Google searches.
Google Grant: Offered to nonprofits for use with Google Adwords
Create ads or campaigns
Designate which search phrase will prompt your ad to appear 
Each click goes towards your $10,000 spending limit
Manage multiple ad campaigns 
Track results

15. When will I see results?    
Achieving a favorable ranking in the major search engines is a gradual process
You may see some tangible results within days, but typically it takes between 1 to 3 months to see a positive return on investment
SEO is a long-term strategy
Keywords matter! Knowing the search terms or keywords your potential visitors are searching for is crucial to attracting them to your site. Your choice of keywords can determine the success or failure of your SEO campaign. Simply using the "most searched" keywords may not deliver visitors interested in your site
Review your site on Spidertest.com, Google Webmaster Tools

16. SEO at Grassroots.org
Grassroots.org's members (nonprofits from US, Canada and Africa) are  eligible for free SEO Consultation with experts from SEO.com.
Hour-long one-on-one consultation
Introduction to basics of SEO
Professional knowledge
Answers and explanations
SEO Forum -

17. Questions?