Online Marketing 101

How to: 1. Connect Prospects to EWG’s Mission2. Turn Prospects into donors using online

tools

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Let’s talk about online activities that influence a prospect

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From Curious Prospect to Donor

1. Make sure they can find you online (natural acquisition)

2. Purchase names of like-minded people (paid acquisition)

3. Make it easy for them to sign up (conversion to list)

4. Convince them to Give (conversion to donor)

Strategically communicate with them Engage them in your story (social media) Make it easy for them to spread the word

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Which Tools to Use at What Stage

Natural Acquisition- Optimized Website

- Social Media Profiles

- Universal Search

Paid Acquisition- Paid media buys

- Paid search ads

- Email List relationships

Conversion to List- Email testing

- Landing Page testing

- Web usability studies

Conversion to Donor- Personalized welcome email series

- Calendar of email messages

- Social Media & offline engagement

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Natural Acquisition

“Being Found” OnlineSearch Engine Ranking 101

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Overview of Search Engines

Why do we care about Search? 91% of internet users use a search engine1

87% of people click on the natural results (vs. paid)

The Big Players Google, Yahoo!, and Live.com Google has 70% of the search marketing share,

accounting for 70.77% of all US searches.2 Each has computer algorithm to rank your pages in the

search results.

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How Search Engines Work

Google, Yahoo!, and Live create their listings automatically. They use “spiders” or “bots” to "crawl" links to web pages1 and add those web pages to their index.

When a human visitor to the engine puts in a keyword phrase, the search engine is focused on serving relevant, fresh content that the engines think is matched to the searcher’s intent.

Keyword Phrases

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It’s not about the keywords You want to be found on.

It’s about the keywords the searcher uses to find you.

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How people search

87% of people click on natural search results

Only 48% even see paid ads Most people search for information, smaller

% for commerce People click on the word in results that

matches their query word1

58% of all queries are three or more words

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How People SearchThe Long Tail of Search:

3% of Excite’s search traffic was 3 keywords – 97% of the rest was in the “long tail”

Amazon.com makes 57% of sales from keywords outside of the “popular” terms.

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How Does a Search Engine “Read” A Page?

Remember…it’s a computer algorithm

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It’s a Translation Problem

The spider reads just text, not images or flash. It also evaluates inbound links to determine relevancy.

A search engine tries figure out what your web page is about through its pieces.

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Search Engines are Computers

A Lost in Translation example:

“My Apple is a lemon”

It could mean your page is about fruit If the words “computer” also appears nearby,

the spider determines that the phrase is about computers.

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Writing Spider Friendly Online Copy

Writing tips for online copy: Use contextual words in proximity to the

keyword phrase Repeat the keyword phrase & variations Use Headers like a table of contents Strategically link to the copy, and use the

keyword phrase in the link text.1

Use alt tags for images, so that spiders can “read” the image

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Every page matters

Search engines don’t see “home” pages Every page is an entry page for searcher Every page needs it’s own inbound link

strategy Conversions from landing pages for

targeted keywords can be improved through testing

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More Details about Google’s Algorithm

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How Google’s Search Results Work

Algorithm has 200+ factors, some weighted more than others. We know about 40 parts of the 200.

In 2007, the Google algorithm changed 9 times per week.

Only 2 web pages are listed for one company, so one company could rank for the first 152 slots, but will only show up in the #1 and #2 spot

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Rankings Don’t Matter

Influenced by: Geo Location (IP)1

Previous searching history Personal search (login to Google account)1

Universal search3 Behavioral search (shopping vs. researching)4

Google Wiki So instead:

Focus on # of visitors and conversions Watch your web analytics

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Questions about Natural Acquisition?

Search Engine Overview

Elements of SEO

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Paid Acquisition

Paid online advertising

Email List buys

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Paid Acquisition

Two Online Methods1. Pay per impression ads

2. Pay Per Click (PPC) –though search engines and Google network

Three Types of Email Buys Purchase of email addresses (JohnKerry.com) Sponsored email Care2.com petitions

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Questions @ Paid Acquisition?

Traditional media buying

Pay Per Click advertising

Email buying

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Conversion to List

Landing Page Testing

Usability Testing

Web Analytics

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Conversion to List

Goal: Make sure that no one who interacts with

your landing pages, or website gets confused or distracted during the sign up process.

Fix this through: Landing Page Testing Web Usability Testing

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Questions @ Conversion to List?

Landing Page testingUsability Testing

Improving web site conversions

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Conversion to Donor

Email welcome series

Calendar of email communications

Social Media & offline integration

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Starting a Conversation that Makes Prospects Want to Donate

via Email

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Conversion to Donor - Email

Converting new names to supporters requires welcome series email

Best Practice for Welcome Series: Action email first, not generic welcome message or ask Match action email to the prospect’s sign on issue Ask for donation within the first week Segment these names for at least 2 weeks before

adding to generic messaging Test message elements to increase conversions (from

line, subject, copy, headers, link text, signer, P.S.) Test landing pages to increase conversions

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Conversion to Donor - Email

Personalize the Message Segment list Ask for preferences in issue, frequency of

message Send them messaging based on preference Personalize based on donor’s info/web activity

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Calendar of Email Communications

Create messaging so that it’s a building conversation

Test individual messages From line, subject line, body content, links, headers, call

to action, signer, P.S.

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Email – Mobile challenges

Unique Challenges with Mobile users: Emails and web pages need to be designed

for mobile use, otherwise renders weird. Mobile traffic is not caught through

traditional web analytic programs because JavaScript is not executed

Additional mobile analytic programs or add-ons are required

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Conversion to Donor

Via Social Media

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Social MediaDefinition: a community that creates a website together by

posting content (no webmaster)Types:

Social networking sites Event Promotion sites Social bookmarking sites Content voting sites Online news aggregators Collaborative directories Video Sharing sites Photo sharing sites Local Search Sites Q& A Sites Niche sites based on interest: Complete directory here.

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Social MediaBest Practices It’s a conversation, not a push medium Engage in communities that have your

demographic Needs regular engagement Great for branding, not for direct fundraising Putting social widgets on web properties

makes sharing easy

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Conversion to Donor – Social Media

Engage Them in Your Story Social media/web 2.0 = Web pages created by all users

without central control

Good for: Listening to better understand supporters (focus group) Spreading the message about mission Building attachment to mission Building closer grassroots relationship among

supporters Having donors help define national issue focus

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Conversion to Donor – Social Media

Enable them to Spread the Word Ask them to forward email Post online content that is easily shareable

To the prospect’s blog, Facebook profile, etc.

Ask them to invite others (to social profile, to petition, etc)

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Conversion to Donor

Via Social Media

Blogging

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Social MediaBlogging Blog - A Website that makes being social easy

All SEO tips apply, blog without promotion is not found

Naturally more searchable Every blog post is a web page More frequently updated Written to encourage communication

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BloggingKeep the Conversation Alive Create an editorial calendar for your posts Start a dialogue with bloggers in your niche Ask someone to guest-post on your blog Thank your readers Participate in the comments on your blog

posts Stumped for Ideas? Brainstorm list here.

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Questions @ Conversion to Donor?

Email welcome series

Calendar of email communications

Social Media & offline integration

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Measuring Overall Success

Monitor how prospects navigate your site to improve conversions Traffic source (email, natural, paid, links from

other content?)1

What do they do when they arrive? How many are converting?2

Is there a drop off in traffic through funnel?3

Keep in mind that web analytics is a trending % process, part science/part art

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Measuring Email Success

Measure success based on: Rates for: delivers, opens, CTR, and landing

page conversions Cost per acquisition/email. Donation average per acquisition/email. Overall number and type of touch point per

donor/activist

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Measuring Social Media Success

Testing & Improving Social Media’s role in conversion Track keyword activity cross social media

platform (online reputation monitoring) Track visitors/subscribers, stickiness, #of

comments, and conversion based on platform, increased traffic to your website.

Calls to action (eye tracking), frequency of use of platform tools (posts, sent emails, etc) cross campaign

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Measuring Blog Success

New vs. returning visitors, length of stay RSS Subscribers Conversation Rate - the Number of Visitor

Comments / Number of Posts Citations – # of people who link to your blog

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Summary

Natural or Paid Acquisition Focus on words, links, analytics and testing

Test Your Sign up Use best practices, consistent messaging, and

test for usability Getting them to Give

Personalize messaging based on prospect’s interests

Coordinated multichannel works best: Email, social media, DM, TM and face-to-face for

donor conversion and evangelism

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Appendix

More info

Additional Learning Resources

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How do you Tackle the SEO Challenge?

Keyword research for each page

Competitive Analysis of site and current online marketing efforts

Analyze your site how each page ranks for each keyword

Repair/Enhance site Submit non-indexed pages Monitor rankings/Analyze reports Fix/develop links & Universal Content Repeat

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Some of the SEO factors we know about

Freshness1 Page Load time2 Complexity of Page Code3

Title Tag4 Meta Description tag5 Meta Keyword tags6

Heading Tags7 Alt attributes8 Links9

Body Text10 Keywords used11 Keywords in file name12

Number of outbound links13 Number of inbound links Internal linking structure14

Keyword proximity to determine meaning

keyword density on page

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Social MediaSocial Networking Sites Facebook - 130M active users

MySpace - 110M active users

Care2 - 1.3M visitors/month

Gather - 874K visitors/month

Parents.com - 1.7M visitors/month

Babycenter.com - 4.1M visitors/month

Livescience.com - 1.9M visitors/month

RightHealth.com - 7.4M visitors/month

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Social MediaEvent Promotion Sites Meetup.com -1.9M visitors/month

Eventful.com – 535K visitors/month Citysearch.com – 8.6M visitors/month

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Social MediaSocial Bookmarking StumbleUpon – 1M visitors/month

Del.ico.us – 362K visitors/month

Mixx – 2.2M visitors/month

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Social MediaOnline News Aggregators Digg.com - 11.4M visors/month Reddit.com – 1.3M visitors/month Technorati – 2.5M visitors/month Propeller - 1.5M visitors/month

Newsvine - 1.2M visitors/month Fark - 1.9M visitors/month

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Social MediaCollaborative Directories Wikipedia – 75M visitors/month

Dmoz.org – 2M visitors/month

Zimbio.com1 - 2.1M visitors/month Squidoo pages2 - 3.8M visitors/month

Ning.com3 – 5.9M visitors/month

Craigslist – 21M visitors/month

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Social MediaVideo & Photo Sharing SitesVideo YouTube – 71.4M visitors/month Yahoo Video – 1.8M visitors/month Google Video – 6.9M visitors/month

Facebook2

Photos Flickr3 – 23.9M visitors/month PhotoBucket – 36M visitors/month

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Web Analytics Terms 101

1. Unique visitors, not “hits” Hits – Measures every element that loads when a visitor request

a page (images, javascript, the html itself). A visitor requesting a page with 30 elements would register as 30 hits!

This is an inflated # you shouldn’t measure.

2. Bounce rate – Measured in two ways: % of visitors who see just one page on your site, or % visitors who stay on the site for a small amount of time (usually

five seconds or less). Your homepage bounce rate should be 30% or less

3. Conversions – the # of visitors that did what you wanted them to do when they were on your website

For example: donate, download a .pdf, sign up for a newsletter Industry standard conversion rate is 8-10%

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Additional Tools

Analyzing your competition: SEO for Firefox SeoMoz’s Tools Compete.com

Picking keywords: SEO Book’s Keyword Tool

Understanding how the Engines see yrou site: Google Webmaster Tools Yahoo Site Explorer Live Search Webmaster Central

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Learn More – Search Marketing

My blog: Search Marketing for Nonprofits Blog: http://Searchmarketingfornonprofits.wordpress.com

How Search Engines work: http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2168031

The expert on linking strategies: http://www.ericward.com/

SEOMoz http://www.seomoz.com

Bruce Clay’s blog http://www.bruceclay.com

Search Engine Optimization: An Hour a Day (book) http://www.yourseoplan.com/

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Learn More – Web Analytics

How web analytics is like using Evite for a holiday party

Occam’s Razor by Avinash Kaushik

Web Analytics Demystified (book) http://www.webanalyticsdemystified.com/

Google Analytics 2.0 (book)

Web Analytics: An Hour A Day (book)

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Learn More – Social Media

Social Media Today http://www.socialmediatoday.com

The Original Signal – Web 2.0 blog http://www.originalsignal.com/

Social Media 101 http://www.slideshare.net/joannapena/social-media-101-creating-

conversations-in-social-circles/

Groundswell (book) http://www.forrester.com/Groundswell

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Questions?

Katherine Watier

Watier Creative

Nonprofit Search Marketing Consultant

301-793-6121

katherine@watier.org