ARTICLE
Start Every New Year By Doing This To Your Nonprofit Website
The new year brings a lot of work for fundraisers. Gift acknowledgements, campaign planning, budgeting, new appeals and lots of new digital tools and channels to explore.
As if you weren’t busy enough, there’s no one small task that all nonprofits should take care of every January.
Update the copyright year in your footer
Yes, this should be your #1 digital task at the start of the new year. It may sound silly, but the little bar of content at the very bottom of your website is more important than you think, especially if you want to generate a lot of online donations.
Donors won’t give to a website they don’t trust
The trustability of a website is the most important factor in the consumer’s mind when it comes to make a transaction, whether it be an email signup, purchase or donation. Users want to know that their information will be safe and secure.
If your website says “Copyright 2012” it will look out of date.
Does this mean the security of the site might also be out of date? Does this mean that the organization is no longer active or solvent?
It might seem like a small detail, but it can cause doubt to creep into a donor’s mind. And in today’s climate of Internet privacy and security, you need to appear rock-solid.
So take care of that footer
If you’re a little more technical or have someone at your disposal who is, you can insert a few lines of code that will automatically update every year. Check out http://updateyourfooter.com/ for a few code options.
If you aren’t technical but do have access to your website, be sure to update the date manually. Set yourself a mental reminder to do so in the first days of January every year.
While you’re there, be sure to add the following to your footer if you don’t already have it:
- Contact information (address, phone number, contact email)
- Links to your privacy policy and security statement (adds more to trust for online donors)
- Social media buttons
- Links to popular pages (gives users quick access to homepage, donate page, contact page, sitemap, etc.)
- Email list subscribe form
- “Safe and secure” or SLL security badge
I really like the Alzheimer’s Association website footer. It has everything listed above with a clean layout.
Even though it’s at the bottom of your site, don’t ignore the power of your footer. Users will see it when they’ve finished reading a page, and some may scroll to it immediately to quickly find information. So keep it updated!
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