Above is a screen shot from Forbes.com. Check out the #1 most searched for item on the site. I find the word “charities” interesting as it is used interchangeably with the word “nonprofit” here in the US. I decided to take a look at a Google Trends comparison between the two terms. Check it out:
I’ve marked up the interesting peaks for the word “charities”. The first two arrows point to the 2004 tsunami and Hurricane Katrina disasters. The other arrows point to the seasonal peaks in giving every year. Clearly, that’s what we’re seeing when Forbes shows “charities” as its #1 search term.
For extra credit, I ran this Google Trends search and limited it so that it only covered searches in the US. You’ll find that there is an even more stark comparison between the two terms during times of disaster.
The lesson is: Yes, you are a nonprofit but use the word charity if you’re the kind of nonprofit that is sought after during disasters.
The news business however prefers to use the term nonprofit over charities. There are many more news items with the word “nonprofit” in it than there are items with the word “charities”.
In the last four years, search volumes for both terms have steadily dropped while the number of news items about nonprofits and charities have risen. I think this is attributable to the general economic downturn we’ve been seeing but it may also be that people are looking to particular web sites and simply using old bookmarks when they seek out charities.
If that second thesis is true, nonprofits that don’t have significant web presences are going to see diminishing returns as users start to home in on their preferred web sites when their need to contribute to charities rises. It’s hard to tell without more data than just a Google Trends chart but it’s certainly something to see if it holds in the future. All we really need is an economic recovery (not likely right now, I know) so we can see if the decrease in search volume continues. I’d love to hear your comments.
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[...] 4, 2008 From Non-Profit Tech Blog… Are you a “nonprofit” or a “charity”? Allen Benamer examines the frequency of the search terms “nonprofit” and [...]
Its quite possible people have found their online homes for charity. It used to be really difficult to find charities because there were not a lot of centralized sites for them, and the organizations themselves were not seo-optimized. Now that you can get your charity fix at sites like DoSomething, Change.org and our site, Causecast.org, you don’t have to surfing around looking for charities, you know where to go. All of these sites (and more) have done a pretty good job getting the word out to the converted, and converting the newbies.
Causecast.org was created in part because of the difficulty of finding good organizations online. Searching for ‘charity’ was just not very effective.
I’d LIKE to think that people are starting to home in on their charity of choice over the Web. That would imply that the best advice for nonprofits would be to improve their online strategies or get crushed in the stampede to consolidate Web traffic under a few large nonprofit sites on the Web. On the other hand, we’ve seen a lot of economic turmoil in the last couple of years as wages have stagnated. That might imply that people are less able to donate thus are less likely to search.
We would have to wait until the economy improves. When it does improve, we can watch how the search traffic plays itself out. If search traffic goes up by say more than two standard deviations, it’s probably the economy that’s causing it. If it doesn’t, then we can more safely say that people are starting to find their charities online. I wish Google Trends data stretched back into the 90s. That would allow us to do a good economy vs bad economy comparison.
Keep in mind, when doing SEO (search engine optimization) and SEM (search engine marketing) for your organization, be sure to use all hyphenate/non-hyphenate versions of the word “nonprofit” (nonprofit, non-profit and non profit; non-profit organization, nonprofit organization, non profit organization). The more savvy search engines might recognize the searchers intent and serve all versions, but don’t risk it. Simply use all variations in your metatags, keywords, and content tags. Copy, paste, refine. Giddy up!
Tyme
Multimedia Specialist
http://www.TymeForChange.org
I love this article and have forwarded it to my colleagues at Kids Korps. It’s great to see this insight into the minds of the audience we are all seeking to emote through our missions.
In this time of quick answers and instant gratification, I am glad the internet has provided a global bulletin board to make our causes known, not only through our websites but also the social media saturation of Facebooks, Change.org, Myspace, LinkedIn, and so many more.
Marie Daniels
Director of MarCom
http://www.kidskorps.org
You might also be overlooking the fact the word “charities” is used more in the UK, Europe, and other parts of the world. Other terms like “not-for-profit” are also more common outside the US. The world is a big place.
Actually Samantha, you’re right about the world being a big place but I was pretty careful to makes sure that the article covered both US and international audiences. Google Trends normally defaults to a global audience and a screenshot of those results are available in the article above. The heights of the peaks and troughs are more muted in the global sample but both the international and US audiences closely correlate on this word.
[...] excellent December 2008 post from the Nonprofit Tech Blog discusses online search trends for the two terms, with some surprising results. But aside from disasters, what topics are most commonly associated [...]
Think Samantha has highlighted a good point about the name for the charitable sector varies from country to country. In the UK, charity and variations of are favoured. I think a charities/organisation's choice of generic tag has a big impact on how it is perceived by donors, funders etc.
http://www.marketingforcharity.co.uk/2009/09/17/w...
[...] Are you a "nonprofit" or a "charity"? See what Google users think | Non-Profit T… I tend to use the words nonprofit and charity interchangeable, but prefer nonprofit. In this fascinating Google News analysis, Allan Benamer shows that donors use the two words differently. (tags: philanthropy) [...]
[...] words carefully when it comes to describing yourself. According to Sean Stannard-Stockton’s blog post in Nonprofit Tech Blog, it could make the difference in how donors perceive [...]