Resources

Promote Your Website

12 Strategies:

1. Get prospects to your website fast with an easy-to-remember, personalized Internet address (URL) like http://www.yourname.org/plannedgiving .
   
   
2. The more links to your site from your organization's website the better. A link on your organization's home page is ideal.
   
   
3. Experiment with different wording of your links. Replace planned giving for example, with a more informative and compelling alternative like creative ways of giving.
   
   
4. Advertise creatively with postcards. The Lawrenceville School, for example, mails teasers like: Did you know there's a charitable way to lock in the gains on your securities and receive above-market fixed income? Visit our website to find out how. Notice the card raises an important question but withholds the answer, instead referring the reader to the website.
   
   
5. Place display ads prominently featuring your URL in publications such as newsletters, alumni magazines, church bulletins, theatre programs, etc. Include a donor testimonial when possible.
   
   
6. Complement these print ads with editorial copy such as feature articles describing your new Internet resources.
   
   
7. Mention your site at planned giving seminars and meetings. These events offer you an opportunity to give attendees hands-on tours and demos of the site. Also, give your planned giving advisory group a demo of the site and its features.
   
   
8. Don't limit yourself to marketing by regular mail alone. Collect email addresses of site-visitors (with their permission) and communicate via the Internet.
   
   
9. Tell callers about your website as part of your voicemail message.
   
   
10. Advertise your site at reunions and other social gatherings.
    
    
11. Display your URL every place you list your name and phone number ...in newsletters, on business cards ...everywhere.
    
    
12. Use your signature line in your email to capture prospects' attention! For example, right above your name at the bottom of your email, insert a compelling question (such as Did you know you could support Oberlin and receive income for life?) that hyperlinks to the appropriate page on your planned giving website!