I am helping out a local non-profit group to get their messages out. What's best way to get promote the site? Consider they have very limited budget and really can't afford for expensive campaigns. Any suggestions?
Sometimes local newpapers will place free ads for non-profits, might be worth a try. Other than that, it might help if we knew what type of non-profit site you have, but online free press releases, link exchanges, submitting to search engines, directories, etc.
Also, Myspace has quite a number of philanthropic groups, and tho not as many, squidoo would also be a good source of free leads.
Try Free Classifieds Ads sites like Craigslist, OzfreeOnline, and Gumtree. I can also make a Website review for you if you like.
I agree, Free Classifieds is one of the best way to promote the site. especially the OzFreeOnline; one of the most user friendly site. They don't require people who are interested to promote the site or sell something.
Worth of mouth. This simple advertising technique is priceless. Focus on ways for members or people who believe in and would want to share the "message" with others. Then focus on ways to get those people to want to spread the "message".
It's the same with for-profit sites... identify your target market, identify how you can give them what they want... use the website to assist in delivering that. Likely, they could be similar to a small business not in real want of seo or ppc traffic, just wanting a smart website to point supporters to. Depends on how agressive they are in their sector. If they only need a brochure website, make sure they rank for their organisation's name. If they want to pull in significant traffic based on keywords related to their industry to increase awareness of an issue use seo. If you want to have a look at what we do online with our non-profit www.homeless.org.au is the domain. Whatever their goal, realise non-profits involved in the same cause in the same geographic location are keen to work together and support eachother. There is a lot of cooperation the world over between non-profits because depending on the issue we care firstly about the cause we serve. So if you are after links... other websites in the industry would usually be entirely open to linking. There is a lot of politics in the industry so get instruction from the client on that. Another design consideration is to segment your market. How many audience segments does the website serve and how do you mesh them together? For example, service users, donors, students, other service providers, john q... whose needs does the website serve and how do you do it concurrently? It's different to every non-profit group.
To do well in SEO.. yeah it costs by buying good links and hiring an SEO expert Maybe you can get an SEO volunteer to help you out with your non-profit site!
theer may be some seo agents that are willing to do some work for you, but you may need to barter some arrangement.