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[00:00:10.94] spk_0:
Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio big non profit ideas

[00:01:50.94] spk_1:
for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host. Oh, I’m glad you’re with me. I’d grow a gangly own aroma if you unnerved me with the idea that you missed today’s show. A better website. 52 tweaks In 52 weeks, Crystal and Dominique Hernandez revealed lots of small tweaks for your site to increase constituent reach, engagement and actions taken. They promise they reach less than an hour to implement Chris’s from Tuttle Co. And Dominique is with Institute for Policy Studies. This is part of our 20 NTC coverage. Also, keep your shiny new website shiny and new now that you’ve tweaked your way to a better site. How about a maintenance plan to keep it looking great? Get plenty of tips and techniques from Josh Lyman and Samantha Wasserman, both from Great Believer. That’s also part of 20 NTC coverage world about websites today. Non tony take to start the racism conversation were sponsored by wegner-C.P.As guiding you beyond the numbers wegner-C.P.As dot com. But Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund is there complete accounting solution made for nonprofits tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Mountain for a free 60 day trial and by turned to communications, PR and content for nonprofits, your story is their mission. Turn hyphen. Two dot ceo. Here is ah better website. 52 tweaks in 52 weeks. Hello and welcome

[00:02:39.64] spk_2:
to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 20 and T. C. That’s the 2020 non profit technology conference we’re supposed to have been in Baltimore. The conference was canceled, but we’re going ahead. Virtually non profit radio coverage is sponsored by Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund. Is there complete accounting solution made for non profits? Tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Mountain for a free 60 day trial? My guests are, as we kick off, the coverages are first of all, the NTC interviews. My guests are crisp little and Dominique Hernandez Chris is principal at Tunnel Co. And Dominique Hernandez is website administrator for Institute for Policy Studies. Chris Dominique. Welcome.

[00:02:42.24] spk_3:
Thank you so great to be here.

[00:03:03.74] spk_2:
I’m glad the three of us could get together. I know you’re each well and safe. I’m glad to know that as well. Um, we can’t be together in Baltimore, but we can cover the topic just as well. I think virtually 52 tweaks in 52 weeks to a better website. So you’ve got something that lasts. E think you say each of these is like an hour or less, and we can tackle one of them a week. Dominique, is that true?

[00:03:16.04] spk_4:
That is true. Um, gold from a patient is to really keep each of these tips as a bite sized chunk that a busy and oftentimes trap not profit communications professional. 10. Set aside a little bit of time for each week. And when you add all of these together cumulatively you made of you made a big improvement on your site was not a huge time about that.

[00:03:59.28] spk_2:
Okay, Yeah. Your description says we can increase constituent reach and engagement. Um, actions taken. So these air Uh Ah. Audacious, ambitious outcomes. But we can do ah, you know, spend an hour a week doing them so cool or less. Less than an hour a week for some. So why don’t we dive in? Dominique won t kick us off with now. We’re not going to be able to 52 in in Ah, you know, roughly 25 minutes or so. So we need your top. Well, whatever. However, many, maybe 10 or so we’ll get to if we depending. How much? We elaborate. 10 maybe 12 or so. So pick your pick your top ones, and we’ll go here where you got Dominique.

[00:04:22.14] spk_4:
We have picked the couple to talk about as our top save, so I’ll talk about a few of mine. Um, what I mind is to use mobile and technology to help your your feed your mobile feed when they’re accessing your articles on a phone. You might have noticed this when you Google article or when you google with top it. Sometimes the first results will have will be from a new stores, and we’ll have a little lightning bolt left of them. And the lightning bolt means that you saw the framework that helped load Web pages in less than a second and uses 10 times less data than regular Web pages who prioritize your results. Um, and that back close time is really good. First facility is Well, that’s one of mine.

[00:05:06.17] spk_2:
This is called This is called Mobile AMP. A M P

[00:05:09.43] spk_4:
ghoul a mt for accelerated mobile project

[00:05:13.94] spk_2:
Accelerating mobile project. Okay. And where would you find that to install it.

[00:05:24.78] spk_4:
You have to install their framework on your site. You can download it from them and throw it into the code that you can install on your website around your horrible

[00:05:36.11] spk_2:
Okay. Um all right, so just search for Google. Accelerated mobile. Help me.

[00:05:37.53] spk_4:
Accelerated Mobile Project framework

[00:05:39.70] spk_2:
Project Framer. OK, thank you. All right, cool. That sounds That sounds like less than an hour, Much less

[00:05:45.70] spk_4:
it would be. Yes,

[00:05:47.49] spk_3:
it could be. Okay.

[00:05:49.20] spk_4:
You want about these back and forth?

[00:05:51.34] spk_2:
Yeah, Go ahead. Yeah, I will play a little pink bomb. If it gets laborious, I’ll let you know.

[00:07:01.00] spk_3:
Sure. Well, it’s also add that, you know, we do. Estimate is about an hour. But what may take me an hour may take you 15 minutes or 30 minutes, or it may take you two hours. So, um, some, we’re gonna be a bit longer or more difficult for other than others, depending on who you are and your access to different features and functionality in your organization. So I think since Google amp. Is while easy one somewhat a technical one, that’s probably gonna be a website administrator or when programmers that are working on I’m gonna give one. That might be easier for all of us to your lives or even for a communications team, which is using a color checker to figure out whether or not the colors that were used anything on our website are visible. The people with different forms of color blindness or are easy to read for people who have different visual impairments that might make it difficult to see things that are in low contrast colors and distinguish between the maybe text in the front and the background color of the Web page. Okay, so one tool that we suggested that could be used for this is Web aim dot ward, as resource is on a contrast checker. And then there’s also several color blindness checkers that could be easily down vehicle that are completely free to use.

[00:07:17.54] spk_2:
Okay, cool. I’ve got an interview coming up today or tomorrow on total website accessibility. Why you? Why? It’s beneficial for your site to be accessible to those with disabilities special needs, but but it helped improve the sight overall for everyone.

[00:07:44.03] spk_3:
It does when we also remember that you know one in 10 males and have some type of color blindness. And there are multiple types of colorblindness that that influence what they can see and how people see things. And not all. Color blindness is a light, but you know more than 10% of the population as either color blindness or other visual impairments. And so it’s better for all of us. Makes information easier to see you. And we have high contrast and colors representing important information or details. But it’s also going to make our sight completely inaccessible if we don’t check these things.

[00:07:55.32] spk_2:
Yeah, okay. And that was again. There was Web A I am dot org’s right

[00:07:59.64] spk_3:
with aimed at work.

[00:08:02.94] spk_2:
Okay, cool. All right, Dominique, your you know your turn.

[00:08:05.84] spk_4:
Sure. So another one of my favorites on here is to deploy a CBN TDN stands for content delivery network. I’m a developer. So a lot of fun in our technical, but I tried to really bring them down to things that are easy for everyone to access. Um, and what a cdn does is reduce the loading time of your site by actually reducing the physical distance that the information has to travel across wires. So instead of having one copy of your site on a server. Somewhere in the world, there are multiple local copies. And when when they’re pure miles on the wire that that improved the load time of your site they were once really, really expensive and difficult boy and would really require developer help. But as time have done on, they’ve gotten a lot cheaper and often time. Your Web host will have them. We’ll have a package for them. Um, that will cause not that much. Um, not model. Really crazy amount. So one of my tweets is definitely check to see if your host offers a cdn and how much it costs. Definitely worth it again for your time.

[00:09:09.44] spk_2:
Okay? And you’re asking the company that hosts your site?

[00:09:14.04] spk_4:
Yeah,

[00:09:42.04] spk_1:
it’s time for a break. Wegner-C.P.As. The ship is still moving fast. Congress passed the Paycheck Protection Program Flexibility Act. It allows your or GE 24 weeks to spend money on forgivable expenses instead of only eight, and increases the time to pay back what’s not forgivable. It’s all explained at wegner-C.P.As dot com. Click Resource is and Blawg. Now back to a better website. 52 tweaks In 52 weeks.

[00:09:49.73] spk_2:
It’s getting a little monotonous going back and forth, but we’re gonna do maybe two at a time. But go ahead, Chris, you go and you’re gonna be feet up with new Chris, and then we’ll give Dominique to okay, Why don’t you choose

[00:09:57.10] spk_3:
a couple of a couple others that are favorites of mine? One, I think a fairly easy one that we all overlook. And that’s also something we should say here. Dominic and I are not pretending that we’ve done all of this perfectly ourselves. In fact, in developing this resource on developing this presentation way, we’re very clearly used. Examples of sites we work, our that needed. They need work. Uh oh. This is

[00:10:20.32] spk_2:
very humble of the two of you. Thank you.

[00:11:12.74] spk_3:
We’ll just a note like this is a process for all of us. And that’s exactly why we wanted Teoh share this idea of having about our weak we prove improve our website with, instead of just waiting five years, there’s been tons of money redesigning and trying to fix everything at once. And then, of course, falling a little bit short of that goal because there’s always going to be improvements to be made So with that two easy ones that could be done. One is the four for error page uh, for non tech things, you may not know what the 44 pages For everybody else, it is that error page that we see when the Web page we intended to find either be a link search result or something else was not bound. This often happens when websites ah, restructured, updated, redesigned or moves from different platforms and hosts. But it can also happen just because we changed the URL or change the title even of a block post. And so customizing are 44 Page ensures that people who are trying to find the content they couldn’t aren’t just left at a dead end. We can customize that page. You say something that’s a little bit more friendly than four or error and tell the user what’s actually happening and give them tools and actually fixing that error, like searching the internal website for the resource they were looking for, or giving a link to the most commonly used or access resource is where they’re hosted now, or asking the user to do something else. It’s to join you on a different channel or even subscribe and trying to contact you directly to try to find the help that you were looking for.

[00:11:48.05] spk_2:
So you could you could put a search bar on that 404 error page.

[00:11:52.09] spk_3:
You can quite easily. In fact, a lot of the content management systems like Group A. WordPress Jumla. Um, it’s fairly easy to configure this with the internal centric capabilities that already exists.

[00:12:03.88] spk_2:
OK, OK, yeah, that’s true. Now that I’m thinking about it, I have seen some that are much more friendly. You know, we’re sorry you landed here. We can’t find what you’re looking for. I guess I have seen them with a search or right, As you suggest. Maybe you’ll be interested in this other content that is most popular or something like that. Yeah. And the others air just, uh, somewhere. Just bear templates that nobody’s ever looked

[00:12:48.21] spk_3:
like Yeah or Brandon pages that maybe a euro they fought should go somewhere like a ah organization. Uh, orc slash donate. They thought was going to take him to the donation for which it should, if it doesn’t. But there’s all types of reasons that users might be typing in or finding a bad world. So the second tip there are traps that we can make is also utilizing our websites. They’re hosting service’s, depending on what Web post you have. Or if you’re using something like WordPress true, Juma or dribble installing a plug in that will help you easily find those 44 pages. What are the links that people are active thing? That I’m returning the 44 page so that you can create custom redirect X for each of those page pages, either taking them now not to that customized for four cage, but to the specific resource they have meant to find in the first place.

[00:13:18.83] spk_2:
Okay, how do we do this? How do we find all the links that are causing the four forever’s?

[00:13:48.18] spk_3:
Yeah, if you’re armed, any of the major content management system was like WordPress, triple or Jumah. There are plug ins that exists. We use redirect a redirection. Our WordPress often eyes an easy plug in that will tell you what of those four for what pages? What your l’s are returning those four for error messages and will allow you to create a custom, uh, redirect from a specific you world to the new one. Very easy to use. I mean, really this to the states. Less than an hour for sure. Um, just set up andan. Actively. Manage over time.

[00:13:57.14] spk_2:
Okay, cool. Those 404 related. Excellent. Thank you. All right, Dominique.

[00:14:50.89] spk_4:
Sure. So another one of the treats I’d like to talk about is that you can perform a responsiveness review test without having tablets or phones with part of you using developer pool in the major browsers in the major browsers in chrome and Firefox, it’s either control on Windows Air Command on a Mac plus shift. Plus, I brings up a developer pulled interface where you’ll see the website and you’ll see a bunch of code at the bottom of the great place at a CSS if you want to. But along the hop, there’s a bar where you can simulate all different kinds of devices all different. Find the full homes or programs in iPhones going back several generations, some of the more popular android phone tablet sizes, and you can also put in any custom screen resolution screen sizes that you want. You’ll see how your site will render on any of those and anything, anything that might be getting hung up anything that falls off the page, it doesn’t look quite right. You know exactly what? The edit? You actually have have any of the devices? Part of you did do that simulation right there. Building your brother.

[00:15:07.13] spk_2:
Okay. Could you give us those keystrokes one more time, please?

[00:15:10.84] spk_4:
Sure. Its control on the windows or command on a Mac plus ship. Plus I

[00:15:16.84] spk_2:
okay, okay.

[00:15:57.21] spk_4:
And another one, which is more about accessibility That Chris was talking about before with color tracker, um is to try to interact with your website without about their folks that that used what place? Exclusively using keyboard navigation. And you should be able to from the address bar, you should be able to hit a tab key and other keyboard controls to move through every element on the page. Those elements should be highlighted with a little box. And there are right. I see your face right now. Is this something that you don’t think about if you are mouth user all the time, But there folks who don’t use amount and is every element under page accessible to some without using a mouth, I think is a really good thing to check over. You could at least do that check in the hour time frame and then schedule out any improvements that you need to make.

[00:16:16.44] spk_2:
Okay. Yeah. I mean, if we have thousands of pages, isn’t that this is gonna This is gonna be a much longer one, beyond-potential

[00:16:21.04] spk_4:
e. I mean, for a lot of these, I would say focus on your home page and your top traffic pages like coffins analytic. See, with those top traffic pages are you know, what are the top five that really get people eyes on them? Um, if you have paid on your site that gets three visitors a year, it’ll be fine. Don’t worry about it. You know, focus on what really has live on it.

[00:16:40.64] spk_2:
Okay. Okay. Did you give us another one?

[00:16:47.24] spk_4:
I give you another one. Okay. I’m gonna go down in the things

[00:16:48.45] spk_2:
I said to and then I made three e.

[00:16:52.84] spk_4:
I have another one right here. This

[00:16:54.66] spk_3:
one actually is

[00:16:56.56] spk_4:
two for easy. Especially if you’re using WordPress or another constant mounting system at a two factor authentication for your log in screen.

[00:17:05.94] spk_2:
Two factor authentication. Oh, yes. Okay. Yes.

[00:17:09.05] spk_4:
You have Robert for walking folk logging in from different locations. If you’re sharing while giving the developers or other external people just make sure that everyone feeling being really faced when they log in and protector security

[00:17:20.59] spk_2:
is that sort of a spy becoming the standard now? I mean, I get I get that offer from a lot more sites now. Then I did on it Seemed like even just a year ago or so, you know, encouraging me. Teoh, sign up for two factor authentication, whether it’s by email or by text message is that Is that sort of becoming the standard Loggins?

[00:17:41.72] spk_4:
I haven’t. I see. It was standard. A lot of fun with account. Loggins for other website. I haven’t seen it. I would like to see it, but haven’t seen it rising as a standard for your actual admin account to manage the back end of a website. But I do think it’s a smart security move.

[00:17:57.44] spk_3:
Okay, if I can add I mean, we’re seeing websites of nonprofits becoming targets of attack increasingly so over the last four years, a ZX, much as foreign agents or tryingto have corporate websites. It’s They’re also trying to hack non profit websites, and it’s incredibly easy. We’ve heard of nonprofits have had their websites held for ransom, who had them taken over used maliciously. And so I actually have toe not just agree, but kind of reinforce. I think we’re done. Nick is saying that we should all consider two factor authentication of requirement for our jobs and are not profits. If we have access to something like administrative controls of a website, have access to private constituent data. Have access to private donor data. Mads, most of us in our organizations.

[00:18:42.93] spk_2:
Okay, Chris, go ahead. You’re

[00:20:57.34] spk_3:
okay. Two more. Two more. Um, these are actually two of my favorites because it’s something that’s so in a way, very easy. But, um, none of us really do well and myself included. I think we overlook it because it’s what happens after a transaction. So it’s the confirmation page and the acknowledging the emails is there to tweaks confirmation page and acknowledgement emails that people see and receive after they take a major action on our website. Like sign up, subscribe. Donate to us. You think of the confirmation page 100% of people who went to the process and got to your donation page and made a donation. 100% of them are going to see a confirmation page, and about 80% of them are gonna open that acknowledgement email. And yet most of us use that content as another debt. It basically a wall to say thank you. Here’s what you just did. I find it especially funny of acknowledging the emails, and I’ve done some research with various organizations that worked with over the years, looking at large scale amounts of acknowledgement emails that were sent versus newsletters versus appeal letters versus other types of email communications. And while emails, appeals and other newsletters receive anywhere between, like 10 50% open rates, at least 80% of our users are opening the acknowledgement email that tells them what they just did on your website. So can we use that as an opportunity to provide a new engagement for them or a new call to action? But I try to end every engagement opportunity or touch points like a donation with an opportunity for three new touch points to begin, and that could be as easily as watch this video to find out how your body is gonna be abused or the impact you just help us make It can be. Subscribe to our email so you can stay on top of what’s happening next. It could be a tender local event. Follow us on social media. Tweet your support. There’s so many ways that we can keep folks engaged instead of simply saying thank you and goodbye. So that’s two of them. That’s our confirmation page. The page we see after the taken action. What? How can we customize that to make it more engaging and offer more for the donor to do next? And it’s our acknowledge me email, usually an email they received within 24 hours after taking a major action on our website. And Mike Wise also usually gives them tax information or confirmation what they just did, but also an opportunity to ask them to tweet, click, follow, share, watch we do more.

[00:21:14.05] spk_2:
Okay, I was just gonna ask, Are these good places Teoh acquaint people with the social channels for

[00:21:42.95] spk_3:
absolutely campus? Yeah, I would. I would make it a little bit more personal, probably, and customize it more than just follow us. Um, I took one tactic I’ve seen used. That I really appreciate is following it up with a thank you video that maybe is, or an impact video that’s hosted on a social media channel that you can either link to, say, Watch this video and then take them to Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn wherever you want them to be. YouTube had them watch it there so that they’re actually exposed to that. Another candle, your on instead of just sending them back to your website where they just came from.

[00:21:51.57] spk_2:
Okay. Okay. Does that count is two or that was two places to do. The same action

[00:21:57.36] spk_3:
that was to different actions that we contain. Customizing a web page is gonna take about an hour problem.

[00:22:00.94] spk_2:
Okay, um, you want to another one?

[00:23:50.84] spk_3:
Sure. So speaking of calls to action, another one that we want to talk about was effective Calls to action. And there’s been lots of research on this from a lot of different companies. One very famous study is actually from head pub spot. Um, that showed ah, fairly drastic increase in conversions on click throughs. Win the links that in the buttons that were used with the cholera action included more than something like read more or, um, or down or Ah uh, was it click here. That’s the other one. Whenever we have a link on a Web page that says Click here or a button that just says Submit, that’s the other one that could be bothersome. So those are basic called actions and Hub. Spot says that smart to call the actions that are very specific description action oriented can actually increase the conversions by around 42% of the click throughs. This these men not conversions pictures by 42% to those links. So instead of read Mawr, maybe, the link says, register for 52 tweaks. Webinar. It’s descriptive. It’s clear it’s gonna be more action oriented saying, Register, do this. You’re telling them exactly what they want them to do. And it’s also going to be better for search engines because it tells search engines what’s behind that link. It also is better for screen readers because screen readers will read out a link that says, Read more and then they don’t know what MAWR it would divorce about, uh or just says submit, and they don’t know which form are no Web page there actually submitted. So we can be a bit more specific with our buttons instead of submit by saying these, like, register, read more, sign up post to Facebook. So instead of just share post specifically to each channel on a button download, even download the resource.

[00:24:14.27] spk_2:
Okay, Okay. That’s a good one, because there’s But the buttons are so ubiquitous. Um, have to quibble with you about called toe actions. I would I would have said calls to action. Like attorneys general. Yeah, Generals. So I don’t You might want Yes. Just ah, tweak. 53 tweaks in 52 weeks. Um, how many? Go ahead, please.

[00:25:15.24] spk_4:
Sure. So two more for me and these. I will. I will take it out of developer land. Um, and and these These are actually both really quick and easy. These could be done in far less than an hour. So one of them is placing a call to action In your footer, people look at the footer that’s been shown through through heat mapping tools where they met over people. I goes where their mouth is go. So political action and that Twitter, if you can. And if you can embed a form directly getting more and more popular to have a tiny subscribe form in your in your footer that’s just birth last and email stupor. Simple one and then another super simple one is auditing your staff page. Is there anyone left on that half page that doesn’t work the organization anymore? Is that leading to their email address that might help you monitor anymore? Is there anyone who has been hired who’s not all that page and needs to be? I think I when I also consult and when I do what I for naught profit law that time. You know what I’m working on the content with, um, that we like, Oh, they’re seven changes the stat page that we just haven’t made in the last six months. So your view is, get a let out, keep it up to date. It doesn’t take a long time.

[00:26:04.04] spk_2:
No, it’s coming to me to while we’re the three of us are talking Dominique that depending on when I air this, you know, we may still all be working from home. Um, I don’t know for sure, but a good chance. These are the kinds of things that could easily fit on a task list. You know, you could not that we’re working from home and have enormous amounts of free time, but we it seems like the kind of things things we know we could pick our top half a dozen or so that we want that we want to take on of the ones were discussing and and you know where to take them off one a week or once, even one every couple weeks while we’re, you know, most likely still working from home

[00:26:13.35] spk_4:
coolly. And also, I think, what kind of your stressful Sometimes it feel, what they are for everyone right now and which they probably will be for a while. But I feel really easy to have, like, one relatively right. This is why people put shower on their to do list so they can

[00:26:28.07] spk_2:
cough

[00:26:28.36] spk_4:
it off. It’s feel good and create momentum to have something easy that you can do and then check off and move forward.

[00:26:45.58] spk_2:
Okay, this is cool. This is a great one to kick off R and D C coverage with easy, easy fixes. Don’t take long. Um, let’s see who who started because we’re gonna We’re gonna wrap with the next round. So who Christie went

[00:26:52.05] spk_4:
you

[00:26:52.51] spk_2:
used. Okay, Chris, Go ahead. Wraps up.

[00:28:38.64] spk_3:
Well, okay, well, let’s wrap it up with one of them. That should probably actually be first that we haven’t already done these yet. And that’s around setting up Google tag manager. So Google tag manager is the modern future proof version of a tag data that you in bed under website and it allows Google analytics and other code to be embedded on your Web site. So we contract outta around how users are accessing our website where they’re coming from and more information. So most of us by now probably have Google Analytics code on our website already. Hopefully, we’ve already updated, but if we haven’t yet Google tag managers, the new version, because who will analytics code would require tweaking of the code. Every time we wanted to add a new event, an event, it could be something like ensuring that we’re able to track the number of PDS that are downloaded on our website or able to track the percentage of a page that somebody schools on our website. These are things that Go analytics doesn’t track by default, although they can be easily configured with Google tag manager. Over time, we can add new event triggers or new code, even things like Facebook pixel, which is used to attract people from Facebook who are on our website taking actions after seeing an ad or post. All of this is much more manageable, manageable and easier to use. With Google tag manager like Google Analytics, it’s free to set up. I need to be found a tag manager dot google dot com And then we have about five more that if you end up coming in watching the recording of our presentation or downloading the slide, you have access to all of these that includes, like spending an hour one week setting up event tracking to ensure that P, D. EFS and other non native forms of content are actually tracked. When access on their website. Well, like I suggested the scroll on a page, we can track the percentage of school on page, which is incredibly important for organizations that are writing a lot of contents. Blawg Post resource is other educational information.

[00:28:51.06] spk_2:
Where can we find the slides.

[00:29:01.24] spk_3:
So the slides and the recording of this presentation are gonna be available at tuttle dot link slash 52 tweaks total dot link slash 52 tweaks. That’s to U T T L E. You’ll get the slides. You can get a recording of our webinar. You can also subscribe to an email if you like. A drip campaign will send you one email week with one of these tweaks and links to instructions on how to start it.

[00:29:31.84] spk_2:
Oh, cool you and dominate for doing this together we are. Yeah, awesome. All right, that’s that’s fabulous. All right. Thank you very much. Both of you, for ah, kicking off our coverage. It’s Chris Total, principal at Tunnel Co and Dominique Hernandez, website administrator for Institute for Policy Studies. Thanks to both of you. Thanks so much.

[00:29:39.84] spk_5:
Things are just

[00:29:41.34] spk_2:
responsive by Cougar Mountain software. This and TC coverage. Thanks so much for being with our 20 and TC coverage,

[00:31:48.01] spk_1:
we need to take a break. Cougar Mountains software. Their accounting product Denali, is built for non profits from the ground up so that you get an application that supports the way you work that has the features you need and the exemplary support that understands you. They have a free 60 day trial. Check it out on the listener landing page at tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant non Now, time for Tony’s take to start the racism conversation. That’s our latest special episode. If we’re going to have a legitimate national conversation about race, it’s got to start with each of us. We can’t count on somebody else. I used to have a Boy Scout leader who said There is nobody named somebody else. We certainly can’t count on political leadership. They’ll just get dragged along later on after we start things after we create the momentum, it starts with each of us. For every time you’ve seen Gandhi’s be the change you wish to see in the world posted on Twitter and Facebook, this is a moment for you to walk the walk, not merely read the post. There’s 401 year old systemic racism running throughout our country, including throughout the non profit community, including throughout your non profit. Do you want to identify it and deal with it, or do you want to merely read the post and walk by like the officers who stood by while George Floyd was murdered. Like the officers who walked by. Martin Gino laying bleeding in Buffalo. If you want to be the change, you need to start the conversation. That’s where our special episode helps you do. My guest is Case Suarez, executive director of Equity in the Center. It’s out in podcast. If you prefer video, it’s on my YouTube channel in the racism and white privilege playlist that is tony Stick do Now. Time for Keep Your shiny new website shiny and new.

[00:32:21.94] spk_2:
Welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio coverage of 20 and TC. That’s the 2020 non profit technology conference. The conference had to be canceled, unfortunately, but we are continuing virtually with our coverage. Our coverage is sponsored by Cougar Mountain Software. Joining me now are Josh Rheiman and Samantha Wasserman. They are both with great believer. Josh is the founder and president, and Samantha is account manager. Josh Samantha. Welcome.

[00:32:24.44] spk_5:
Thanks. Thank you.

[00:32:44.14] spk_2:
I’m glad we could work this out. It’s good to know that you’re each well and safe both in Brooklyn, New York. I’m glad I’m glad we could get together. Today. Was to We’re, ah, talking about your conference topic, which is Keep your shining new website shiny and new. Um, Josh, why did you start us off? What seems to be the problem? Why did you think that we needed ah, session like this? Put it that way.

[00:32:52.74] spk_5:
Sure. Um, we find that a lot of organizations invest a ton of time and money and energy and their websites, and then they just sort of forget they exist and way like to compare, um, a new website to a new car. A car starts to depreciate a sooner to drive it off the lot. And if the websites not properly attended to the same kidnapping into it. So we like to devise really strategic maintenance plans with organizations we work with to make sure that the value continues to grow over time.

[00:33:22.44] spk_2:
Okay. Maintenance plans. So? Well, we have some time to get into the maintenance planning. Um, you have some tips on keeping it fresh and keeping content fresh. Um, Samantha, Anything you want to add to the beginning of part of this?

[00:33:38.19] spk_6:
I think Josh pretty much summed it up. We know that it could be a lot to manage a website, and we have some ideas for how to keep things interesting and up to date after lunch.

[00:33:47.88] spk_2:
Okay, cool. So why don’t you get us started? What? Uh, what goes into this maintenance plans, Samantha?

[00:34:57.43] spk_6:
Well, we think it’s really important. Teoh identify key people at your organization to keep the website up to date. We know it could be a lot of work for a single staff member to be responsible for all of an organization’s website updates. So we always recommend finding different gatekeepers for different types of content. So whether it’s an HR team being responsible for job postings or development team being responsible for keeping events up to date, it’s really important to try to spread out the responsibility a little bit. Um, it’s also really important toe. Think about keeping content current. So are you updating blawg posts? Are you updating your staff and board list? Users are going to come to your site trying to find up to date information about what’s happening at the organization. So it’s really important wherever possible, that you’re keeping content updated. So even if it’s little things like shifting an image on your home page or promoting a new program just something so that the state feels less stale every time a user visits. That could go a long way in helping things feel dynamic.

[00:35:04.74] spk_2:
What about that blawg, Samantha? It’s it’s that can be daunting. You recommend? I guess, I presume. But I won’t make explicit distributing that around so that different different teams are contributing content to the blocks of the Nobody feels burdened and overwhelmed, but it still stays fresh.

[00:35:50.06] spk_6:
That’s a great question. We hear this a lot, you know, It could be a little bit Don thing to keep, um, up to date with a content production schedule. So there’s a couple of things you can do. You can definitely bring in various collaborators to tell stories from all over the organization or client stories potentially but also think about what you’re going to call that log Block has a certain association in terms of a frequency of posting. Maybe if you come up with a different creative title for your blogged, it’ll help alleviate that pressure a little bit. Andan also tried

[00:36:05.93] spk_2:
What? What? Let me Let me stop you. If you got an example or two of something creative instead of calling it you know, on the main navigation bar tickling our blawg. You got something? Sure, but one

[00:36:07.03] spk_6:
of our Yeah, one of our clients is called Data two X. Um and they came up with a name for their block called the two X tape. Um, so just something a little bit

[00:36:16.73] spk_2:
creatively

[00:36:17.56] spk_6:
on their name. It’s not too different than a blogger, but just, um maybe people don’t associate that with the same weekly update,

[00:36:24.73] spk_2:
wearier more often lower, lower the expectations

[00:36:32.83] spk_6:
exactly. And then also try toe produce content in advance so that if there’s a busier time, you know, maybe it’s grown a virus and you don’t have time for your regularly scheduled programming. You have something in your back pocket that you can go back to something evergreen, um, that you prepared when things are a little bit slower. So it’s always great to kind of load up that content calendar when you have the time.

[00:36:54.44] spk_2:
Yeah, OK. OK, Josh, more, more. You want to add on the this overall maintenance plan?

[00:37:37.72] spk_5:
Sure. I mean, a lot of the things that Samantha is talking about the things that I can talk about also are things that really anybody could do at their organization. You don’t need to be a designer, you don’t need to be a developer. And there are maintenance plans that we construct that are much more Design and development focused, but the plan for this session was to really give people tips and tricks they can put into action immediately. Um, and that could be whether they are, you know, preparing to start a website redesign process that they’re in the midst of one or if they recently completed one. It’s always good to start thinking about ways that they can put these interaction themselves and don’t need to actually hire an outside vendor. And there is a lot of other, um, there a lot of other ideas that we do want to mention. I think a really important thing, though, that you can do either during the processor after is to make the most of your Web vendor. And there’s a lot of things there went. Bender can do it. Prepare your website in a way that makes us effective. This possible. So, for example, every website we do in every website profit every website built nowadays is much more user friendly in terms of being able to make content updates to it. We use WordPress. WordPress is like 40% of the Internet at this point, and we’re presses so nice because we can custom design a cider or whatever Web under your working with custom. Design it, but you can to make edits toe all the pages of your site yourself, whether it’s adding a new team member, duplicating a page for a new campaign or otherwise. So that’s one thing that we always encourage people to make sure their Web vendors are doing to make sure that their site will also be easy to manage. And there are other things. Also, any Web make sure

[00:38:36.74] spk_1:
let’s go through some of these tips and tricks. Yeah, don’t.

[00:38:39.42] spk_5:
All right

[00:38:43.35] spk_2:
way Don’t hold out on us, please. About

[00:40:23.21] spk_5:
yeah, for sure. I mean, there are a lot of other things Any Web vendor should connect your site to. Google Analytics. You should have a tool for search engine optimization and Google ads is something you have the Google ad grant and a really important piece of our process, and everyone thunders process should be to give the organization a training guide that actually shows how to use the back end of your site, whether it’s WordPress or truthful or another content management system. So yes, there should always be a training session where the agency runs the organization through the back end of their site shows not a make updates, every page of the site, and so on and so forth. But the training guide is a nice reminder for someone who may have been in that session but forgot circle pieces but could also be something that’s given to a new staff member when they join so they don’t need to get the whole run down the 30 minute run down for another staff member. They could just take the guide and go off to the races. And on a similar note, we recommend creating something we call a in case of emergency document. And this is just when things go wrong. This is the thing you turn to. So it should have that training guide in it, or a link to the training guide so anybody could make any changes to the site. They need to, for example, with um cove in 19 of somebody in less than they could change the home page to call out their approach to responding to the crisis. They need to be able to log into the site and make that change. So it’s always great to have access to that training guide. But it’s also important that access to your Web vendor. So we always recommend putting contact in both for that web vendor into this incurred in case of emergency document contact didn’t vote for your donation platforms. Other platforms on your side should something break. And suddenly things are not working correctly to make sure that could get fixed as soon as possible. Also, log in credentials. Oh, God.

[00:40:25.97] spk_2:
Um, I was gonna change subject little bit. So did you want us to say finish something about log in credentials?

[00:40:33.08] spk_5:
Yeah, this quickly. I did other things you can put into this document or log in credentials to other platforms on your site. Even contact info for your host. If suddenly your site is down and you have no idea why. Just making sure you have at your disposal information. You need to fix things if they go wrong. Because we always say Internet is is an in perfect place. Google docks goes down. Google doc breaks. So it’s always great to have at your disposal access points to fix things. Hopefully, they don’t go wrong too often when they dio, you should be able to resolve them quickly.

[00:41:14.61] spk_2:
Okay, um, I was gonna take a little digression with you. I’m wondering why you prefer WordPress over Drew Pole or Jumla. Can you, uh you sound like maybe your WordPress evangelist. Do you want toe? Explain why, Why? You prefer WordPress over other ones?

[00:41:20.61] spk_5:
Sure, and I’m sure Samantha want to chime in here. Also, the main thing for us is that we do all of our design completely from scratch. And we do our very best to then build the websites in a way where any client can very easily manage it themselves. And we find the WordPress works the best for that with something like dribble and dribble releases a new version. Um, you often need to make pre wholesale updates to your side if not fully revamp your sight completely. And with WordPress, the updates that are released are are easier to handle. They don’t require widespread changes. So we think that where press works well to make sure the site will still look beautiful. It would be easy to manage and also will work well for years to come given, given its its build set up and also the fact that it is like 35 to 40% of the Internet.

[00:42:06.80] spk_2:
Yeah, Samantha, anything you want to add on, Why WordPress.

[00:42:28.90] spk_6:
It allows us to make our designs as customers. We’d like a CE Josh mentioned. And so it’s kind of the perfect marriage, something that we can give over to our clients once it’s finished and looks amazing. And we do a lot of, um, kind of modular template ties pages. And it allows our clients to mix and match different pieces to meet their needs for new programs or new cook campaigns as they come up.

[00:42:35.30] spk_2:
Okay,

[00:42:35.71] spk_5:
We also find that since WordPress is so popular that when we create a new website for an organization, some of not most of people that we trained to manage that side have dabbled with WordPress or even manage a WordPress site before, So it’s less of a 0 to 60 approach

[00:43:29.42] spk_1:
time for our last break turn to communications relationships. The world runs on them. We all know that turn to is led by former journalists so that you get help building relationships with journalists. Those relationships will help you when you need to be heard. So people know you’re a thought leader in your field and they specialize in working with nonprofits. They’re a turn hyphen two dot ceo we’ve got but loads more time for keep your shiny new website shiny and new. Samantha, let’s go back to

[00:43:40.40] spk_2:
you. Uh, one of the things that you mentioned in there Ah, session description is techniques to allocate different types of updates to different team members. Uh, what can you What can you flush out there for us?

[00:44:07.30] spk_6:
Sure. Well, piggybacking off of the WordPress discussion a little bit, um, within WordPress. And I’m sure in other CMS isas well, there are different levels of access that you can give different users, so this could be really useful. Maybe you have an intern who’s helping you with those block post you don’t want to give them. We’ll publish access on the web site. But you want people to drop something that a supervisor then reviews, or you can give that huge. Our team that I mentioned before access to just the job posts on the website but not full access to the website. So there’s a lot of customization that you can do. Um, and we always think it starts to just get a ZX Many people on board with learning how to update the website is possible. Just toe. Like I said, spread out the responsibility. But also, you know, if someone leaves the organization, you don’t want to be left in a place where you can update your website for several months because the one person with all of that knowledge is no longer available.

[00:44:54.49] spk_2:
So it sounds like you really favor a decentralized approach. Teoh Content Management is there Anybody who maybe shouldn’t be shouldn’t make medic, maybe contributes content, but it doesn’t have the authority to change the site themselves. They really like that.

[00:44:59.09] spk_6:
We try to hide as many settings in our WordPress dashboards as possible. That could lead toe larger site wide or code changes. Uh, but within an organization, it really does depend on the organizational structure. But typically there is kind of one person on the communications team who will really, um, lead the whole process and assigned different responsibilities. But we do find that it could be a really overwhelming task, especially when you first launch to get all the content loaded in. And that’s where we see in our website projects. Um, some of the biggest challenges or holdups timeline wise for our clients. So we do always recommend to try to find several different team members who can emphasise.

[00:45:58.15] spk_2:
Okay, what about keeping supporters engaged? You know, people engaged with your site after, ah, full blown launch. I mean, some of that, for a good part of that is keeping content fresh. I realized that something beyond beyond just that the you can talk about

[00:46:03.72] spk_6:
Absolutely. So it’s like you said, it’s not enough just to keep the site updated. It’s also important to make sure that, um, users continue to find their way to your site. So when the site first launches, of course it’s important to you social media posts and email blasts and Google ads to drive traffic to the site. But this continues to be important even after lunch. In this maintenance period sides, you add new content or pages like upcoming events or a capital campaign. It’s really important to use those tools to drive users back to the website again.

[00:46:36.58] spk_2:
Okay. Okay. Um, Josh is there. Is there anything that would sort of be a trigger for when we need ah, refresh of our site? Maybe it’s not a full blown new site, but at least a refresh or or maybe something more like. Are you listening to what people are saying? People don’t come out and say your site looks dull or you know, your site looks like 2003. But how do you I didn’t know that it may be time for at least a refresh.

[00:47:06.18] spk_5:
Yeah, there’s really two sides of the equation. The first is the visual side and really just asking people to honestly look at their website and feel like if it reflects who they are from a design perspective doesn’t do justice to their mission and their work. And also is the user experience clear? If you send somebody to the site looking to make a donation, can they easily do it? If you send somebody to the site to fill it a volunteer form can they get there without calling the office to find out how to do it? So sometimes an old website doesn’t just look bad, but actually can waste time for staff members who need to explain how to get there and also just not do justice to the current status of their work. That’s the front end to the site, but also back in perspective, like we’re talking about with site management. It’s so important that anybody without coding skills or technical expertise or average non profit staffer could make changes to the site themselves. And we have found that a lot of sites that were revamping they actually are circa 2003 or something around there. And because of that, they look very outdated. They don’t really have relevant programmatic language compared to what the organization does now, and they’re impossible to update. And if they can update it, they can update only small components. And if they can’t have to rely upon 1/3 party who often has to have him enter into a ticketing system, and they could take a couple of days to make a very small change like let’s, say, changing your phone number.

[00:48:44.81] spk_2:
Yeah, okay, Okay, Um, if you have all these people contributing to your site, how do you make sure that things look the same. Feel the same across across all the different pages that they might the different teams air, contributing to consistency. Basically, I’m asking about How do you How do you make sure your site looks consistent throughout?

[00:48:51.77] spk_6:
I think that goes back. Teoh Josh’s point about leaning on your Web thunder and making sure that you have adequate training or training guide, Um, after the site is built but also on the organization side. It’s really important to have that kind of team leader who oversees all website updates, and you kind of be the consistency police or the brand police, you know, make sure that the tone is the same and that the correct templates being used making kind of run point on everything

[00:49:17.97] spk_2:
okay,

[00:50:01.26] spk_5:
Yeah, and piggyback enough that that training guide will have very specific information or shoot ivory specific information. For example, the featured image on your home page measures this this many pixels by this many pixels. So when you replace it with a new photo, it’s not cropped awkwardly. It’s not too small to fit the space that’s really important. But another thing you can get from your webs under is design assets from your website. And if an organization of somebody on staff whose aware of how to use Adobe in design or photo shop or illustrator you can actually request assets for graphics like let’s say, an infographic that talks about how many people you served in 2019. If the organization has that raw file, they can update it for 2020 and that can replace that file on the website. But even if an organization doesn’t have people that air designed savvy with those programs, they can still request all the assets to have them. You know, j pegs of the infographics another graphics used in their sight snake and then use those and other places like, um, like an email blessed to again create that level of consistency like you were talking about across all these different channels.

[00:50:23.30] spk_2:
Yeah. Okay. We still got a few minutes left, Josh. Anything? What happened? We talked about that. You’d like people to know.

[00:50:34.66] spk_5:
Good question. I I think the

[00:50:35.72] spk_2:
okay

[00:51:10.16] spk_5:
ultra. One thing out there. I think a lot of the a lot of the need for Web maintenance comes from relief. Thinking about who you are as an organization on what are the key actions you’re driving. So donations air almost usually number one for all, or eggs. And the visitors, their science, then you need to think about is event registration important? Our email sign ups important. Our volunteer sign ups important because you want to keep your site current with all the content we’re talking about. But you also want to drive people apart to your site where they can take those actions that are so important to keep your organization running. So kind of assessing the real purpose of your site and those key actions you’re driving could help to dictate what kind of maintenance plan you might need.

[00:51:21.39] spk_2:
Okay, How about you, Samantha? Something you’d like to add that we haven’t talked about yet or go more detail or

[00:51:32.86] spk_6:
thanks, Josh pretty much covered it. Um, I think it’s really important toe. Make sure that Yeah, um, realizing that users are going to your website as probably the first place they look for updates about your organization. And so all of the tips that we’ve outlined are really important just to make sure that information is up to do and there’s nothing that screams outdated, like an event being highlighted on the home page that past two months ago. So just being really cognizant of, um, what contents being featured and how often you’re checking back on your site?

[00:52:05.95] spk_5:
Okay, I’ll throw one more thing out there, tony, which is oftentimes it’s very hard for an organization to get funding allocated to a website redesign process because that’s money that could be going elsewhere. Money date on fighting for for years. Um, but what we recommend organizations do is not just fight for the money to cover that website redesign, but also fight for money that could handle maintenance and maintenance in terms of how it’s structured is really a case to case basis you could talk about with your Web vendor, but you’ll wanna have additional funds lying around and ready for use to make sure that your Web vendor can continue to work with you. Because all the things that we’re talking about you can do yourself. There are certain things, like if you want to make a brand new page from scratch or create new graphics or in bed a new piece of functionality, it’s important to have hopefully some budget remaining after the initial Web redesign budget was depleted. To get the full picture and to keep your site growing from, ah, more of a design and development perspective.

[00:53:07.72] spk_2:
Okay. All right, we’re gonna wrap it up there. All right? That’s Josh Rheiman, founder and president of Great Believer and Samantha Wasserman, account manager, A great believer, and both in Brooklyn, New York, where the company is Thanks so much. Thanks for sharing. Just like dozens of tips. Thank you very much.

[00:53:17.05] spk_5:
Thanks, tony.

[00:53:27.01] spk_2:
And all right, stay safe and thank you for being with tony-martignetti. Non profit radio coverage of 20 NTC were sponsored by Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund. Is there complete accounting solution made for nonprofits? Tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Mountain for a free 60 day trial? Thanks so much for being with us

[00:54:23.36] spk_1:
next week. Women of color in Fundraising and Philanthropy A new online community will have the founder back, Yolanda Johnson, plus more interviews from 20 NTC. If you missed any part of today’s show, I beseech you, find it on tony-martignetti dot com were sponsored by wegner-C.P.As guiding you beyond the numbers wegner-C.P.As dot com by Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund. Is there complete accounting solution made for non profits tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Mountain for the free 60 day trial and by turned to communications, PR and content for nonprofits, your story is their mission. Turn hyphen two dot ceo. Our creative

[00:55:02.15] spk_0:
producer is clear. Meyerhoff. Sam Liebowitz Managed Stream shows Social Media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our Web guy on this Music is by Scott Stein be with me next week for non profit radio big non profit ideas for the other 95% Go out and be great talking alternative radio 24 hours a day.