What is a Website Funnel and Why is it Important for Nonprofit Marketing?
Your nonprofit has a story, but unless you market it successfully, your message will fail to break through. If you can’t get your message out, you’ll find it difficult to obtain donations and volunteers. One aspect of successfully marketing for nonprofits is to harness the power of a website funnel.
What is a website funnel?
A website funnel—also called a marketing or conversion funnel—is a series of pages and sources that seamlessly work together to guide your visitor to the desired action, creating a conversion.
What is a conversion?
A conversion is simply meeting the goal you want your site to achieve, whether that’s signing up for an email newsletter or making a donation. It’s very important that you decide what counts as a conversion before you begin your marketing efforts.
How does a website funnel work?
A website funnel is comprised of four main parts:
- Awareness: The visitor is aware of your organization or your website. This may be through a search engine, advertisement or social media page. The visitor arrives at your website.
- Interest: As the visitor continues through the website, they show interest in your organization as you guide them where you want them to go.
- Engagement: The visitor engages with your content. This may be by watching a video, reading a story, or examining pictures.
- Action: The visitor takes action.
How can your nonprofit use the power of this funnel?
There are three basic ways your nonprofit can leverage the power of the funnel:
1. When the reader is engaged, capture their email address
You can capture their address by asking them to sign up for your newsletter or to receive a free download of a white paper or other document outlining the importance of your cause.
Once you have the email address, you can develop a relationship with your visitor that will make them more likely to volunteer or donate.
2. Encourage them to share their experience on social.
Often, your donors or volunteers can be your best cheerleaders. Provide easy links to encourage them to share information about your organization on social media channels. When they donate, provide a link where they can share the news with friends on Facebook.
3. Foster a relationship.
While your initial purpose of the funnel may be to secure a donation, it also introduces visitors to your story. Therefore, it’s important for them to remain engaged even after they’ve left your page. By going through the funnel, they’ve already shown that they are invested in you. Continue to develop that relationship!
Proclaim has expertise in marketing for nonprofits
Those who strive to make the world better have a special place in the hearts and minds of those of us at Proclaim Interactive. We’ve won several awards for our work with nonprofits, and we were recently honored by the Carolinas Healthcare Public Relations and Marketing Society for creating the website for Lower Cape Fear Hospice. In addition, we also received a gold service industry award for our logo for another nonprofit, Harbor Church.
Amplifying your message is vital to the health and future of your nonprofit organization. Contact us and we’ll show you how you can leverage good design and solid messaging to harness the power of your website funnel.
Since its inception in 2000, Proclaim Interactive has combined excellence in design and think-out-of- the-box digital marketing to become one of the most award-winning firms in the region. Proclaim Interactive provides website design, social media management, SEO and general marketing services designed to amplify clients’ messages. For more information call 910.795.4143.
