I recently came across an excellent analysis & recommendations on the Google Conversion Room Blog.

These recommendations are just as relevant to nonprofits as they are to anyone else, and offer a great checklist to review your own website against.

There is a clear trend in web design toward less cluttered, more open and clean-looking websites, based on recent study results on readability and taking action.

In a nutshell, people skim websites, and take just a few seconds to decide whether to stay and navigate through a website, or whether to go somewhere else.  If your site is too cluttered and too difficult to decode, you run the risk of losing your visitor who simply doesn’t want to take the time figuring it out.  You also run a greater risk– of alienating someone who genuinely wants to help out your organization, but can’t easily figure out how to donate, volunteer, or get involved in some other way.  If you make it too difficult they get discouraged and leave.

The tips offered by Google basically boil down to the following for nonprofits:

  1. Use large, prominent call to action buttons
  2. Visually support the calls to action with your design
  3. Clearly communicate the benefits of taking action
  4. Eliminate clutter that competes with your call to action
  5. Clearly prioritize the calls to action for your visitor
  6. Repeat your call to action
  7. Test usability and make it as easy as possible to take action

Read the full article to learn more!

 

Posted by Elizabeth Beachy, Upleaf Co-Founder