 What we're gonna talk about is WordPress for nonprofits, website best practices, collecting donations, increasing exposure online. If that's not what you want to listen to, there's plenty of other sessions going on. A little bit about me, just up front, that is me. I've been in the IT industry in 2007, actually published my first post in 2008 because it terrified me to actually let anybody else see it for the first year, which I'm sure if anybody's a blogger understands when that published button happens it's a little panic at first. The soul-sucking key solutions came about which officially got formed in September of 2016 so we just celebrated our use my gifts and talents to actually make the world a better place instead of corporations money. It's primarily small businesses, nonprofits, that are doing good locally and globally. Design for nonprofits, if anybody has actually worked with a nonprofit, you know they kind of have a little different expectation from their designer. The regular donations versus necessarily selling products, which is where WordPress comes into play because WordPress itself is a nonprofit, that's actually a CMS that we built for nonprofits to actually collect data and get information for donations to actually get to have an email base where they can actually things of that nature to where they can share their engagement and their engagement happens to be. There are some recommended plugins that I use for most of our sites, which obviously whenever you start taking money online you're concerned about security. Whenever you start working on things like global nonprofits that are in different countries you need to start worrying about spam bots more than even in the United States because they're out there and they're out there furious especially when you start working with countries. For example I've worked with a couple of nonprofits ones in Thailand, one's in Haiti, one's in India and those have a different audience than what you're used to here in the United States and so you want to make sure that you protect it. With things like Jetpack, ask me for spam, make sure that you use a SSL. Obviously Google is pushing everybody to an SSL but SSL whenever you want to try to take payments you want to make sure that it's secure. Donation options, there's plenty of them out there. The ones that I've actually had experience with are Give, WooCommerce, Charitable and obviously PayPal has their own version which I don't usually turn people to PayPal because it kicks people off of their sites to make payment instead of actually keeping them engaged on the site like the other ones so I'd actually say to you either Give or WooCommerce are my personal preferences as well as opt-ins which is things like privy, opt-in monster, bloom depending on which theme and which framework that you're working off of. For example Bloom works real well with Divi but it doesn't necessarily play nice with every other application and that's where you actually utilize those to actually get email addresses so that you can send out email campaigns. This time of year obviously everybody's going to be scrambling for email campaigns because we got Giving Tuesday coming up and if you don't have an email list you're kind of left sitting dead in the water. Another thing that you need to concern yourself when it comes to design for nonprofits is you have to tell their story a little differently and it doesn't really matter which industry that you're in but animals, orphans, human trafficking, environmental, religious, arts and education, health care, global injustices, they each have a story to tell and it's your job as a designer to tell that story. Sometimes that means that you actually you're sharing pictures, video from that particular whether for example if there's an orphanage that you're actually sharing information about those people. Other times you have to be a little more protective on what you share due to security reasons but you have to figure out a way to actually engage the reader to open their wallet and a lot of nonprofits are a little very guarded on how much they share because they're afraid of that it's going to put them at risk or they're going to be harassed and so you have to be careful and that's where content writing comes into play obviously as well as you want to make sure that it is something that draws an emotion and empathy with your audience because everybody knows when they see a commercial with a dog and a cage you know what you want to do. I mean it draws you in and it's a reason why it draws you in because it is tugging on your tear ducts and it makes you want to actually do something for them and the same thing comes with design where you want to make sure that you've got testimonies and you've actually got personal stories not just very generalized content that nobody's actually going to attach to. Theme choices and I know there are so many out there that it's hard to decide which ones you want to use but theme choices do matter because some are actually built better to actually include donate buttons in the proper space spaces as well unless of course you're using a builder which gives you a little bit more leeway or you're strictly a developer where you can put code in your own place some themes just are not built for payment options they're they're not paid made that way they're not built for attractive buttons and so you have to take that into consideration as well as implementing things that makes me want to feel sorry for whatever that happens to be there's a reason why I used to cat. The next thing you want to take into line is colors because colors when in any type of design matter and the mat that there was actually a really great work job just before this one where she went into the color theories and the way that color palettes work as certain ones invoke certain emotions and invoke certain feelings when you're looking at a website and that psychology of colors can cost you dollars up to 90 percent of the first impressions of products can be used based on color alone and obviously you've got the scheme of different logos and there's a reason why organizations like ASPCI use orange because they feel like there's a warm and fuzzy feeling that you're going to get when it comes to the puppies in the kittens and you're going to want to actually open your wallet for them. There's other ones that obviously invoke different emotions and that's one thing you need to work on when you're working with your client too because a lot of times they don't understand that. They don't understand even when it comes to like their logo and things of that nature how the color scheme of their site can actually invoke whether or not they're actually going to open up their wallet and have a better opportunity to get donations and involvement that they're looking for. Gender appeal is another thing if the organization happens to be one that is specifically more gender specific you want to use colors that align somewhat on that palette but you want to exclude anybody by any means but you want that comes into shades and tents and there's actually proven science that's out there that shows that the logos as well as the theme design actually do actually increase engagement depending on what kind of colors and what whether they're bright colors soft colors and palettes and things of that nature to utilize. I will make these slides available later just so you're aware. You can take pictures all day long but I'll put them out there on my site for you. Another thing that you need to do when you're when you're working with your websites is that you actually know your audience. The first thing I do whenever I spend time with any client is I try to figure out who they are before I ever take them on as a client because a lot of times they think they know who their donors are but when you start actually researching and doing your due diligence and you're going to do things such as analytics and things of that nature but you actually need to talk to them you start to figure out who their audience really is who the people are that they truly are trying to reach because many times they don't even know who that happens to be. Does anybody here work with nonprofits? There's a reason why I'm asking this question. Perfect. How would you get to know your audience then but if you were meeting with a nonprofit how would you go about trying to figure out who it is that they serve? Okay. Yes ma'am. Get the right stakeholders in the meeting. Get the right stakeholders in the meeting instead of a lot of times when you talk to somebody's looking for web design for example they never have the right person that you're talking to. Exactly and a lot of people they don't even know. They just know that they get money every year but they haven't even looked to see who their current donors are and a lot of times it'll be where you actually have to get them to go back and do a little bit of research before they can really start a design project because they don't know who their donor base is. It's not as easy as or as intuitive as you would think because everybody donates to different things for different reasons and a lot of times your audience does end up being a bit different as they freak whatever the machine is behind. I apologize I went back. Why don't they donate? Many times it's because solicitation is infrequent. They don't know how it's going to make a difference to them. They never feel wanted or needed. You ever donate to somebody and never get a response back? They receive no personalized appeal. They're just a number to you as far as they're concerned. They gave an unacknowledged gift in the past. This happens all too often that you have people that donate and they only donate once because you never go back to them and ask them to donate again or you never even think for the first donation. This is a big one that I've never really figured out but in speaking with my nonprofits a lot of them seem very hesitant to even ask and how do you raise money if you don't actually ask them to donate. The timing wasn't right. Everybody knows the timing is not going to be necessarily right at that particular time. November and December are big for corporate donations just in case you're working with nonprofits because they're looking to finish off their tax year. But you ask them in the middle of summer they're not going to be so interested because that's not in their radar at that point in time. So campaigns matter. Email campaigns, things on your website and what not. They matter because it's the timing for not only you but for who your audience is. This one drives me a little bad. The organization's mission wasn't compelling or many times it's confusing. You don't really know what it is that they do. And that's where if you're not a content person you get somebody that's a content person to actually work with them and work on getting their value prop in their mission statement and figure out who they really are and how to best verbalize it so that people understand who they are. Reoccurring. That's a trust issue because obviously they whoever designed it didn't do it right or they automatically defaulted you to the wrong one. Yes sir. Well and a lot of people think where they set the minimum donation for 50 or $100 or whatever. Last time I checked $5 adds up many times over than $100 would if you have more people that do it. Too many times. Too many times a year. I get a piece of mail that comes in the mail probably every four to six weeks asking me for money and I never even donated to the organization and it does nothing but infuriate me every time I get it because one I asked you to ask to unsubscribe and yet you keep hitting me up every month or so. Optimizing the design for nonprofits. Every non-profit is different and so are their donors. What that means is the color theme. Search engine optimization whether you're using local SEO or global or you got to really figure out who you're serving and do your SEO to to who that audience is because not everybody's going to be that audience. They have to be mission ready meaning that the you need to have the mission up in front of them where they know front page what what they stand for and that they need to be able to get social because everybody nowadays is on social media and if you're not socializing their website they're missing out on dinner dollars. You can now donate obviously on facebook and other other social medias as well. And most of all which this goes for any site content content content and I say that because I have a non-profit that I'm currently working with I've the last blog post that they have was in 2017 and that was one I wrote for them. And I've reappeared that you tell them you know every so often that you need to write he's like I don't know what to write about something just I mean put content out there that has to do with your your organization or you can pay me to do it one of the other. But a lot of people they think that you know once they create a site they're done and but there has to be ongoing engagement. Prime example look at most of the non-profits that are out there their sites are 10 years old because they haven't really done anything because they feel like they don't have to. And storytelling this this comes to the content part where content is king or queen all depending on who's actually creating it and who the audience is. Stories sell and donors get. The more stories and the more personal you can get the more people are going to be feel compelled to actually open up and donate to you. And the more that you share the more that they will get because if you're not engaging they're not going to be engaging with you if you're not sharing about why their dollars matter they're not going to be compelled to actually donate to you. And I say you meaning your client of course. And there are some do's and don'ts and best practice for the best practices of design. Like anything else we got the do's. Got to make sure that it's easy to navigate because if it's not easy to navigate they're gone. And that of course goes for any website. Use pictures. Pictures are truly do I mean they're they're worth a thousand words all day long. And pictures of whatever the organization is and whether it's the volunteers working at the organization or the organization itself. Something that actually tells a story about what they do. You make sure that you optimize the site for speed because people have a trust issue with slow loading sites. They're not going to want to donate to a site that loads slow. And you have to have a clear call to action. Make sure that they understand what it is that you're asking them to donate to and why. And you have to make sure that's a visible film. And keep it simple. I mean many websites out there nowadays especially when it comes to non-profit they are so all over the place that it's too busy that they you don't really understand what it is that they do or what they want from you. So the simpler that you can keep it the better. And obviously you want to make sure that you secure it because if it's not secure um if it doesn't have that little green light on the google bar they're they're not going to donate to you more than likely. And last but not least for do it the do is mobilize. If your site is not mobile friendly that's where people go for anything nowadays. They see a commercial they see an ad or whatever they're going to go on their phone before they go to their laptop. And so you got to make sure that they can actually not only see the site but they can do the donation on mobile. Along with the do is you got the don'ts. Don't hide the donate button. A lot of times it'll be buried on a second page or it'll be buried at the bottom. Make sure that it's above the fold in the menu top bar where they can see it and and it's the first thing that they see where it's visible. Do not self play audio and video. I know that was a trend for a while. It was a ridiculous trend but most people do not like to get blasted with audio or video. It doesn't matter what it is when they first pop up on a website. Bless you. Don't bury the story meaning to put it on front page. If you have a recent testimony from a kid or from a from an experience with working with a child or whatever make sure that it's at the front and center. Make sure that they can see what it is that you're doing. You can have you know other content throughout the website but make sure that you have something compelling on the front page that actually increases them encourages engagement. Don't forget to ask again. Don't forget to ask and that means you can ask in multiple places not only above the fold on the top bar but you know ask midstream. Ask at the bottom but don't make that button move. A lot of times people make buttons move and where you scroll and the button goes with you. A lot of times people find that quite annoying and they won't be apt to actually engage with you. And don't be scared to ask because without asking you're not going to get and do not use big picture files that are going to because that'll actually slow your site down as well as people will bounce off if it's if it's loading slow. And most of all when it comes to a non-profit do not beg. And I say that because I actually worked with a non-profit and every Christmas they started talking about how they were going to have to euthanize their dogs because the shelter was going to close if they didn't get enough donations. That kind of fear doesn't increase donations by any means. And say you want you want to make sure that you're not begging for donations. There's actually a company where I'm from I'm from Jacksonville Florida if you I did not share that earlier. And they are really great in A.B. testing and they've done a lot of research as far as what works and what doesn't work what increases engagement. For example long form versus short firm for that came thought. If you go short form you'll generally you'll increase your engagement by 155 percent meaning the shorter the post the better for audience attention span. If you make fields in an opt-in optional instead of required that they show that increases by 275 percent. Now obviously you're going to need to capture some data but making where they have to put in their name their email address their address their phone number all that as a required field will not necessarily get them to actually fill out the form because they feel like you're actually taking too much from them especially if it's just simply an opt-in for an email opt-in. Reduction of eye friction increased with 135 percent meaning when they're scrolling down the page there's not something that's distracting them from scrolling down the page or reading left to right there's it's a clean design you'll end up with a increase of 135 percent. This is big for donors the less steps the better. A lot of times which paypal I use them as an example earlier if you have to bounce off of something and come back to it they're not going to donate generally. If you have to go to this page and then go to this page and then a lot then actually send your information and start make it a one page thing make it where they can check out and do their donation in one spot you'll be you'll have an increase on average of 166 percent of engagement adding simple call to action buttons up front you get an increase of 246 percent if you put it up there in front in the menu area where they can see it you'll see a significant increase. I did provide the name of the company which is Neclab I said besides will be available and they actually have an email subscription for that is really good for designers and developers that where they do a lot of business and ab testing what not it's really great and there's no cost to any of it which is which is all all the better. Whenever you are doing design obviously when it put in analytics analytics matters even more so when you're starting to get into the non-profit sector because it gets back to knowing who you serve knowing who the demographic is that you're actually attracting and not only that but where are they coming from are they are they local are they are they overseas because that can determine how you start doing campaigns and things of that nature heat mapping also comes in I use Crazy Egg as an example heat mapping will actually show you what people do on your site and they will show you what buttons what things what where do they actually go when they were through your site it is a paid subscription but it is pretty cool as far as the the information that it can provide for you email marketing a lot of nonprofits do very poorly at that where they may do an op-dem but they never follow up on that op-dem and so they just got an email address but they never did and there's no campaign use use those as a designer help design you know your email campaigns for your clients where use a blog post as a campaign use a testimonial as a campaign and where you're starting to actually engage the people that donated to you by sharing their story through emails because they're not necessarily going to always come back to your website unless you bring their attention to your website funnel you can use lead generation for that you can have auto responders you can have things of that nature as well as utilizing lead pages if you have a certain type of campaign for a certain time period that you want to utilize there's really a lot that you that goes along with nonprofit design but obviously utilize them in any type of design you get a little more specific in certain areas when it comes to nonprofits one thing about nonprofits that I found is your client is the nonprofit not you a lot of times they say they don't have the money or they expect it to be free because you advertise yourself as being a freelancer well the last time I checked freelancers freelancing is not free by any means and so you have to be able to charge for it and and charge accordingly a lot of times they make it seem like they don't have the budget well there's grants and other ways that they can get that budget if you actually set the expectation up front versus just giving away your work and when you work with a not with one nonprofit make sure that you have a plan set the expectations up front as far as the level of your engagement whether it's truly just you're you're doing the design and that's it or you're planning on maintaining and doing campaigns social media and things of that nature afterwards and I said make sure to charge them and charge them according it doesn't mean you have to charge them the same but just charge them accordingly and most of all when it comes to NPS is you have a heart because a lot of times they just want somebody to listen to them and to be able to transfer their story in a way online that they don't know how to do and if you truly have it the heart for them it'll show in your design bless you some final thoughts use a simple website go there such as jibby elementary beaver and seem to be that butan bird thing that I'm have mixed feelings about um have a strong visual identity make sure that their logo is apparent make sure it's up front and where they can see it um as well as if there's financial charts anything that picture make sure it's optimized for mobile devices prioritize your online donation forms build local content that makes donors donate make user engagement a priority a priority you have any questions yes sir that's a slippery slope um and and I say that because every every organization is different on how much they allocate um do you know what their budget is being mature volunteer I was afraid to say that um gotcha um I would imagine that they're probably not spending much more than that but I mean like I said every organization is different and depends on where they align their priorities um and and good for you for giving away your services but you may want to start charging yes obviously know who they serve um their story is is important um and I think most of all having all the stakeholders is not necessarily involved in the initial conversation but involved up front there's a lot of times and this goes to any design but especially when it comes to non-profits they have to go through a board and that and then a lot of times the boards don't agree or have a clue no offense um of what is involved and therefore they without actually being involved in the conversation they can't have an intelligent commerce um discussion about it and have a budget in mind because even though as a designer I may say it costs it's going to cost you x amount of dollars but without having at least the conversation of budget I mean most designers well I can't say I can't speak for most as a designer that works with non-profits I generally will adjust somewhat um depending on it um and have a vision have the vision where you want to go that's the that's the biggest thing because a lot of times they come in and say I need a new website but they don't know what that means have ideas have you know samples of things that you like things that you don't like that that kind of stuff um have a color scheme if you have that certain things like you know even simple stuff like fonts if there's a certain one that you like I may tell you you're not you're not right about it but right right exactly and see that's that's perfect because a lot of times they don't even know who their brand is to even have brand guidelines um and the more information that you can bring up front to me is will make the process a lot easier especially on going I had a question over there and I'll come back to you yes ma'am um well I think the biggest thing in the mid and for me at misconception is those small donations add up if you can get the engagement um because granted they may not add up to $50,000 donation in one year but the reciprocal effect is you may get $25,000 every year for the next 10 years when you only got $150,000 for one year because it's it's it's the long game because you have to really gain the donor's trust and the more you gain their trust the more they start to donate and it may be where they're only donating you know $10 a year whatever um also do you have reoccurring donations implemented um that's helpful because a lot of times they'll sign up for it and forget about it which is a blessing because it's just something you can count on every month or every year whichever the case may be um and the biggest thing I would think is also being able to look in at the numbers and see how much the website truly is generating um and do a comparison versus the the large and see if you can actually justify your campaigns that way yes ma'am run well and and I and I say that and I've even had that in the for-profit sector where they're like well I want you to do half of it now and then I'll do the rest of it whenever I start getting money I you can't run a business like that um and unfortunately nonprofits are businesses whether they realize it or not and you have to you have to I mean it's obviously whatever you're willing to work with but I would I would run I have one time time for one more question I have not personally had experience with that but I'm intrigued