Tom Hapgood and I met today with a local nonprofit for whom we’re building a website. Tom had planned a nice featured content element on the homepage that would pull their blog posts onto the front page.
They had some qualms. “I don’t know about the dates,” one said. “I don’t know if we can update often enough to show the dates.” He’s right. There’s nothing like having people see that your last news update was eight months ago to make your website seem shabby.
“We don’t have anyone dedicated to that,” the other agreed. We could see him running through the options in his mind, rejecting each department head as a likely blogger.
I assured them that clients who decided they could keep up their blogs in house nearly always fail. I can go around right now and look at the most recent blog post for each company this year that has told me they were going to take care of their own blogs — my last post is still the most recent one, sometimes with a follow up from the company saying, “Sorry we haven’t posted lately! We’re making changes!”
And indeed, a blog that doesn’t get updated regularly is not as effective as one that gets fresh new content every day or at least every week.
But as we continued talking, the clients were excitedly telling us about new grants, photos of checks being presented by donors, special fund raisers, success stories among their clientele, heartwarming tales to share with donors — it sounded to me as though they really needed a blog.
So here’s their situation:
- They have an organization that relies on donors and community support.
- They have great stories to tell prospective donors, with photos.
- They’re getting a great new website that can tell their stories very positively.
- They don’t have anyone on staff to tell those stories regularly.
Check “The Value of Blogging” for the math that ought to tell this organization that the end of this story should not be, “So they won’t have a blog.”
Blogs increase traffic to a site by 55% to 88%. Leads may be increased by as much as 67%, depending on the blog’s age and frequency of posting. Heartwarming stories that show the value of their program to the community will almost certainly increase the number and size of the donations they receive by more than the cost of hiring a blogger.
If you’re in a similar position, think about it.
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