SEO – search engine optimization – is the practice of improving, and promoting a website in order to increase the number of visitors the site receives from search engines. The majority of traffic to your organization or library website may come from the three major search engines - Google, Yahoo, and Bing. In this free webinar with Whole Whale, learn some basic SEO tips for beginners to help your organization's site and content rank higher and be found more consistently, helping you grow your reach and supporters. There are over 200 factors that translate in the the Google Search algorithm that handles over 1 trillion searches each day. This session gives a simple history of how we got here and the basics of the algorithm. We cover the main topics and key terms you should know, as well as the guiding principles of the system. This overview will help your team start to decode the nice versus necessary elements of SEO your organization can use to increase organic traffic. Takeaways: -- Keyword research -- Link-building basics to increase traffic -- Understanding the on-page and off-page principles of the algorithm

1. SEO for Beginners: Simple Steps for Nonprofits and Libraries
With George Weiner, Whole Whale
November 29, 2016

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Presenters
Becky Wiegand
Webinar Program Manager
TechSoup
George Weiner
Founder and CEO
Whole Whale
Assisting with chat: Julie Leary, Whole Whale and
Susan Hope Bard, TechSoup

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Objectives
1. Understand basic principles of search engine optimization
2. Learn some best practices for keyword research and use
3. Get basics on link-building to increase your site traffic
4. Gain insight on what matters on-page an off-page for SEO

6. 6
About TechSoup

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The Need Is Global – And So Are We
• TechSoup’s mission is to build a dynamic bridge that enables civil society organizations and social
change agents around the world to gain effective access to the resources they need to design and
implement solutions for a more equitable planet.
Countries Served TechSoup Partner Location NetSquared Local Group
Where are you on the map?

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www.TechSoup.Global

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Our Impact
Together, we build a stronger, more resilient civil society.
$5.4B
in technology products
and grants employed
by NGOs for the
greater good
35
languages used to
provide education
and support
100+
corporate and
foundation partners
connected with the
causes and
communities they
care about
6.2M
annual visits to
our websites
600,000
newsletter
subscribers
empowered with
actionable
knowledge
79%
of NGOs have improved
organizational efficiency
with TechSoup Global's
resource offering*
*Source: survey conducted among TechSoup members in 2013

10. SEO for Beginners: Simple Steps for
Nonprofits & Libraries

11. Contents
●Part 1: How it works
●Part 2: The SEO Process
o Keywords
o Content
o Links

12. Poll Time
What are you looking to take away the most?
●Where to start with SEO
●Choosing keywords
●Understanding what content to create
●How to build links
●Other

13. Part 1: How it works

14. What is SEO?
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) –
the practice of improving and
promoting a website in order to
increase the number of visitors the site
receives from search engines.
Basically, it’s about ranking higher in
the search engine results for keywords
related to your site.
Ads
Results

15. What Google Search is doing
●Organizing the world’s information
●Helping you find what you’re looking for
●Monetizing (& taking over the world)
Narrow AI
Fast, Accessible, Relevant Results

16. My Brief and Selective History
● Human (Dawn of time - 1994)
● Crawling Spiders/bots (1994)
● Google PageRank (1998)
○ Spammers mess with links
○ Google responds
● Social starts to factor in (2009)
○ Spammers create content farms
● Speed + Device begin to factor into search
● Google responds (Panda 2011) to focus on quality content
○ Spammers build link farms
● Google responds (Penguin 2012)
● Knowledge Graph (2012)
○ Spam links…
● Hummingbird (2013)

17. Don’t Mess With Google
If history has taught us anything…

18. Smarter Search

19. Smarter Mobile Search
1 Trillion daily searches, 50% mobile/tablet.
Searches by maternity and new parents - Think With Google

20. PageRank

21. Links are Votes

22. Two buckets of SEO
● Content + Keywords
● Site Structure
○ HTML tags (H1,H2,
Alt,title)
○ Speed
○ Mobile responsive
○ Video + Image tagging
● Links!
● <a href=”#”>Anchor text</a>
● Domain authority
● Social reputation
On-Page Off-Page
And 200+ other factors!

23. Ranking

24. Part 2: The Process

25. SEO Process

26. SEO Process

27. SEO Process: Keywords

28. SEO Process: Keywords

29. Research Tools
Goal: How does your audience talk about the topic?
Tools
● Search Auto-Complete
● Google.com/trends
● Google Ad Planner
o Similarweb.com
o Keyword ideas
● Google Search Console
● MOZ.com/content
● Thinkwithgoogle.com/mar
keters-almanac/
● Youtube.com/trending

30. Curse of Knowledge

31. Keyword Volume - Google.com/Trends

32. Keyword Volume Ad Planner

33. Google AdWords Grants!
●$10k per month for Google AdWords
●Eligible 501c(3) Google.com/nonprofits
●Use or lose
●Playing with the house’s money!
Google AdWords Grant Course
Code: WEBINAR (50% off)
WholeWhale.com/University

34. ●Short vs Long-tail
●Relevance
●Phrasing
Keyword Research

35. Understand the searches that touch your term
and the volume of interest.
Auto-Complete for Long-tail

36. Understand the searches that touch your term and the
volume of interest.
Auto-Complete Ideas

37. YouTube.com

38. Phrasing
Keyword Research

39. Understand the way people drill down on searches
Long tails

40. Google Search Console

41. Competition: Ispionage.com

42. SEO Process: Content

43. SEO Process

44. ● Fills a perennial need
● Answers a unique question
● Serves as a timeless reference
● References other authorities
● Seasonally effected/relevant
● The page of a book you’d dogear
● Designed to hook users from
search
Evergreen Content

45. List Example
Highly shared & indexed by Google,
lead to increased traffic, that lead to
+3k users to other pages.

46. The Content Funnel
Capture Engage Convert
Content marketing:
create content that
captures organic traffic,
drives referrals and
social shares to reach
new audiences
Create content that helps
people learn about your
programs and helps
them picture themselves
as part of the solution
Design conversion
pages that drive
users to take
meaningful actions
like signing up for
programs

47. Capture, Engage, Convert

48. Convert
● Build Calls-To-Action
● Consider Pop-ups
● A/B test

49. SEO Growth 2012-2016
0 poets
340,000
poets

50. Funnel to Goal

51. MOZ.com/content/search

52. Copywriting
Goals: People judge an article by its title first.
Tools
● Hubspot.com/blog-topic-generator
● Headlines.sharethrough.com
● Think With Google Almanac

53. Hubspot

54. headlines.Sharethrough

55. headlines.Sharethrough

56. Titles that hook
Titles and Meta descriptions are why people click.

57. Spectrums vs Selling out

58. Be Mary Poppins - not Idiocracy

59. Poll Time
I believe that increasing organic traffic through SEO would
help my organization:
●A lot!
●Somewhat
●A little
●Not at all

60. SEO Process: Link Building

61. SEO Process

62. Link Building Process
●Discovery
o Choose the content
o Choose the target
 Blogs, Communities
 Competition - ispionage.com + Similarweb.com
 Resource lists
 Social Influencers
 Partnerships
●Outreach
●Execute on your list + Learn

63. Link Building Outreach
● 1:1 Outreach
●Broadcast new content
o Social, PR, Email blast
●Pay to play
o Paid social/search ads around target content
o (Google AdWords Grants!)

64. Shareability

65. Execute
●Build a spreadsheet with keyword, content and targets to
build links
●Track progress

66. Analyze - Google Search
● Analyze who is linking
●Build the partnership
●Look for similar sites

67. Poll Time
I am most excited about getting to work on:
●Playing with the cool website tools
●Doing our keyword research
●Writing some awesome content
●Rewatching this… I have a lot to do

68. WW Resources
● WholeWhale.com/University (code: webinar)
●Wholewhale.com/seo

69. 69
Questions?

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Upcoming Webinars and Events
• 12/8: PS 103: Adobe Photoshop Tools and Filters for Nonprofits
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