We all know that search engine optimization, or SEO, is essential for businesses. But did you know these internet marketing techniques can also help boost advocacy campaigns?
At NisonCo, we have extensive experience in both activism and SEO services. We’ve helped countless clients make an impact with their advocacy campaigns through the careful use of SEO techniques, and we’ve leveraged these SEO strategies for our own activism, too. Here are our top SEO tips for nonprofits and advocacy organizations considering incorporating SEO into their next campaign.
3 Ways SEO Can Benefit Advocacy Campaigns
Just like SEO can boost a business in myriad ways, these strategies can also help advocacy campaigns on several fronts.
1. Make Your Movement Easier to Find
First and foremost, SEO can make your organization more visible. Internet marketing strategies like SEO will help push your website further up in your targeted search rankings, making it more likely that browsers will click on your site.
The top result on any given Google results page gets, on average, about a 40% click-through rate (CTR). A well-researched, actionable keyword strategy and careful website design can provide an incredible boost to the number of people who become involved in your movement through your website.
2. Target Your Ideal Activists
SEO can make your website and organization easier for the general public to find. You can also leverage it to narrow in and find individuals who are ready and willing to contribute to your cause.
By using high-intent, precise keywords, you can make it easier for like-minded individuals to find your website. Targeting groups of people interested in your cause and predisposed to activism will help you garner more interaction from potential volunteers and donors.
3. Keep Your Campaign’s Messaging Consistent
A happy offshoot of a well-structured SEO strategy is that it can also help you maintain consistent language and overall messaging. Keywords help your SEO ranking and can also help you create a unified brand identity.
Clear and consistent use of SEO keywords establishes familiarity and brand association with your audience over time. This ensures that your chosen words and phrases become synonymous with your brand.
The 4 Most Important Internet Marketing Strategies for Advocacy Campaigns
Now that you know how SEO can help your campaign, let’s move on to the specific SEO strategies you must include when leveraging internet marketing for your advocacy group or nonprofit.
We’ve compiled a list of DIY SEO tips for nonprofits if you want to try it on your own. However, to establish a firm foundation, we always recommend consulting with an SEO firm with experience in the nonprofit and advocacy sectors, like NisonCo.
1. Publish Meaningful, Optimized Content
One of the best ways to keep your website relevant and continuously tweak your targeted keywords is to post optimized content like blogs and articles regularly.
Use SEO best practices in your blogs to boost your advocacy website’s SEO ranking and domain authority. These benefits compound when you post regularly, too; we suggest posting at least a few times a month.
Additionally, the content you publish should be valuable to readers. Advocacy organizations have plentiful information to share about their cause and their work. You can leverage this in your optimized blog posts. Articles, editorials, and blogs that use researched keywords are an excellent way to inform readers about your movement, convince them why your work is necessary, and spread your message.
2. Polish Your Advocacy Website’s Technical SEO Data
SEO isn’t just about what your website visitors can see. The technical side of SEO, like your site’s tags and meta descriptions, also dramatically impacts your rank. It can be easy to forget about these aspects of SEO, especially since they aren’t immediately apparent, but having a well-structured site and robust technical SEO can make the difference in where your website ranks on search engines.
Working with an internet marketing and SEO firm on the technical side of your SEO strategy can be especially beneficial, as these details can quickly get complicated. NisonCo offers both complete SEO packages and hourly SEO services, whether you want our help on an entire SEO overhaul or just need a little assistance getting your website’s structure and back-end data in order.
3. Don’t Neglect Your Advocacy Organization’s Offsite SEO
Offsite internet marketing, or SEO techniques implemented on websites other than your domain, can also be incredibly helpful in boosting your advocacy campaign’s visibility. Offsite SEO techniques can help you increase your domain authority and meet people where they are.
You should start refining your organization’s offsite SEO strategy by polishing your social media presence on the platforms you decide will be most valuable to your cause. Each platform will help you reach a slightly different demographic; researching your ideal consumer and their habits will help you clarify which platforms to focus on. We recommend LinkedIn to all our clients — especially advocacy organizations — because it will allow you to connect with people in your industry and provide valuable information for potential investors.
4. Pair SEO with PR for Advocacy Groups
Consider pairing internet marketing services with public relations to take your SEO strategy to the next level and help your organization shine. PR and SEO work exceptionally well in tandem and can give your advocacy campaign an even more significant boost than either strategy alone.
Both media and internet marketing help get your name out there and raise your organization’s profile. PR will help boost your brand legitimacy, and SEO will help make your organization easier to find.
SEO can even help your PR content shine; adding keywords to press releases, interviews, or media features can increase that content’s ranking.
An Advocacy SEO and PR Firm Can Help Your Movement Succeed
When combining PR and SEO, it’s a good idea to work with a firm with experience in both specializations. NisonCo has been helping advocacy companies with PR for over ten years and providing SEO services for nearly that long. With our background in advocacy, we understand what it takes to run a successful activism campaign and would be honored to help your organization make a difference.
Contact NisonCo today for a free SEO audit or more information about our PR and SEO services. We look forward to working with you.