Technical SEO For Nonprofits: A Complete Guide

The process of optimizing a website for search engines based on technical factors such as website performance, mobile friendliness, security, and more is known as technical SEO, as the name suggests. Each search engine optimization strategy must include technical SEO because it guarantees that search engines can easily crawl, index, and understand your website.

Like any other website, nonprofit organizations' websites require the implementation of technical SEO tactics to increase their visibility and connect with their intended audience.

Tips For Nonprofit Companies To Improve Website Visibility

In this guide, we will discuss technical SEO strategies that nonprofit organizations can implement to improve their website's visibility and achieve their goals.

Conduct a Technical SEO Audit

Doing a technical SEO audit is essential before applying any technical SEO strategies to find any technical problems that might be impairing the performance of your website. An analysis of your website's technical components, including its speed, mobile friendliness, security, and other factors, is part of a technical SEO audit.

SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Google Search Console are just a few of the many tools that can be used to conduct a technical SEO audit. You can find technical problems like broken links, duplicate content, and more with the use of these tools.

Improve Website Speed

One important factor in search engine rankings is website speed. According to Google, page loading time affects rankings, and slow websites can provide users with a bad experience. The following tactics can help nonprofit organizations speed up their websites −

• Minimizing image sizes

• Enabling browser caching

• Minimizing HTTP requests

• Minimizing CSS and JavaScript files

• Compressing website files

Optimize For Mobile

Your website must be mobile-friendly given the popularity of mobile devices. Websites that are not mobile-friendly can provide users with a bad experience because Google has made mobile-friendliness a ranking consideration. The following measures can be used by nonprofit organizations to make their websites mobile-friendly −

• Implementing a responsive design

• Enabling AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages)

• Optimizing images for mobile devices

• Minimizing page load time

Ensure Website Security

For nonprofit organizations, website security is essential since they manage sensitive data like donor information, volunteer personal information, and much more. You may protect your website and raise its search engine results by putting SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and other website security measures into effect.

Implement Schema Markup

You can use the code known as schema markup to improve search engines' comprehension of your website's content. Applying schema markup can aid search engines in presenting rich snippets, such as star ratings, reviews, and much more, and will increase your website's exposure in search engine results pages (SERPs).

For events, articles, and much more, nonprofit organizations can use schema markup to increase their visibility in search engine results in pages.

Optimize URLs

Optimizing URLs is an important aspect of technical SEO. Nonprofit organizations can optimize their URLs by implementing the following strategies −

• Using descriptive and relevant keywords

• Removing unnecessary words

• Using hyphens to separate words

• Keeping URLs short

Implement XML Sitemap

The pages on your website are listed in a file called an XML sitemap. Creating an XML sitemap might make it easier for search engines to crawl and index your website. With tools like Yoast SEO or Google XML Sitemaps, nonprofit organizations can build an XML sitemap.

Fix Broken Links

Broken links can detract from the user experience on your website and lower it in search engine results. With the aid of programs like Broken Link Checker or SEMrush, nonprofit organizations may fix broken links.

Optimize Website Structure

It can be easier for search engines to crawl and index your website if it has a clear structure, which could lead to higher search engine rankings. By using the following tactics, nonprofit organizations can optimize the structure of their websites −

• Using a clear hierarchy of pages and categories

• Including breadcrumbs on all pages

• Using descriptive anchor text for internal links

• Using header tags (H1, H2, H3, etc.) to structure content

Implement Canonical Tags

HTML canonical tags let search engines know which version of a page is the main version. Canonical tags can be used to avoid concerns with duplicate content and raise your website's search engine rankings.

Use Alt Text For Images

To help Google understand the content of an image, you can add an alt text description to the image. Using alt text for photos can increase the search engine visibility.

Implement Pagination

Pagination is the process of dividing content into pages. Implementing pagination can improve your website's user experience and help search engines to crawl and index your website better. Nonprofit organizations can implement pagination by using tools such as rel=” next” and rel=” prev”.

Use HTTPS

Using HTTPS (Hypertext Transfer Protocol Secure) can help protect your website from security threats and improve your search engine rankings. Nonprofit organizations can implement HTTPS by purchasing an SSL certificate and enabling HTTPS on their website.

Monitor Website Performance

Monitoring your website's performance is crucial for identifying responsible technical issues. Nonprofit organizations can monitor their website's performance by using tools such as GA and Google Search Console.

Conclusion

Technical SEO can be a daunting task for nonprofits who may not have the resources or the technical understanding. However, sometimes it's a necessary component for successful online marketing and fundraising campaigns. Fortunately, you can easily identify and properly address areas of SEO that need improvement. Monitoring your organic search rankings with Google Search Console is an important way to measure progress in this area.