These days your potential donors and supporters need to be able to find out about what you offer by finding your information online.  If they can’t, they will either give up or choose to support other not for profit organisations. So how can you be sure your current website is promoting your NFP to it best advantage?

Sign Number One:

Your site appears cluttered.

Internet uses commonly spend no more than three seconds per page finding what they are looking for. That is not long to scan for contact information, or make a selection from a menu. There is no need to cram all the information about your NFP on the home page. In fact, if you do, people landing there are more likely to click away immediately rather than take time to read it.

Sign Number Two:

Your site is slow to load.

Sites that are slow to load see no love in today’s fast-click environment. NFPs who use free hosts are often unaware of the effect their host’s advertising has on their business. Common culprits are outdated flash animations or irrelevant (potentially irritating) soundtracks that do nothing but date your site, and, by extension, your NFP.

At the same time, make sure your site is mobile friendly. Sure, not everyone has internet on their phones yet, but they will.

Sign Number Three:

Your site cannot be “liked” or “shared”.

Love it or loathe it, social media is here to stay. You might as well use it to your advantage. Giving visitors the capability to share or like your NFP or the content you create is the ultimate gesture in web 2.0 friendliness. And it will definitely pay you back, generating more traffic to your page, and business to your NFP.

With these points in mind, try to look at your current site through the eyes of a first time visitor. If you have three, two or even one of these strikes against you, a new site is probably the way to go.