Google for Nonprofits Blog: September 2012

Insights into what the world is searching for -- the new Google Trends

Thursday, September 27, 2012

(Cross posted from the Inside Search Blog)

Since we launched Google Trends and Google Insights for Search, we’ve seen millions of people using Trends to keep up with trending interests online, and a range of journalists, businesses and researchers around the world using Insights for Search to compare the popularity of search terms over time and across regions. We have made steady improvements over time, most recently revamping our Hot Searches list to provide richer context for breakout searches.Now we are merging Insights for Search into Google Trends, wrapping it all up in a clean new interface to give you a clearer view of what’s on the world’s mind. The new Google Trends now includes features from both products and makes it easier and more intuitive to dig into the data. We’ve updated the line chart and map using HTML5 based Google Chart Tools so you can now load the page on your mobile devices, visualize the results without scrolling, and get Hot Searches not just for the U.S., but also India, Japan, and Singapore. So, what exactly can you learn about people’s interests from Google Trends? A few of our recent favorites:

[beach] and [snow] are just about inverse throughout the year

West Virginia leads the US in searches for spooky things (play around at the bottom left!)

Interest in [red hot chili peppers] shifted around Europe this summer as the band toured there -- see this time-lapse map:

We’ve seen so many examples of insights gleaned from Trends, from the Oscars to the Super Bowl; from shopping to elections; from our yearly Google Zeitgeist summary to the many we’ve found around the web. Google Trends data can be used to better understand global trends -- identifying health trends such as in flu trends, nowcasting in economics, and studies on the predictability of search trends. And it has been used in many scientific articles across disciplines. There’s so much in this data for journalists, academics, and anybody who’s curious about the world to explore, and we’d love to see what you find. Email us your favorites at trends-stories@google.com.
Posted by Yossi Matias, Senior Engineering Director in Search, Head of Israel R&D Center

Grow Your Gifts: Making the Most of Donor Information

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

In our recent blog posts, we saw how to use AdWords to bring in new donors and learned a few tricks to make emails more effective in attracting donations from people already familiar with your cause. However, monetary donations aren’t the only valuable resources your donors provide — information on personal giving trends can help you understand your community better and turn one-time donors into active and on-going givers.
Today, we’re going to look at a few ways Google Docs and Calendar can help you organize the information you collect when people donate and better use that information going forward. Here are our top three tips:

1. Track more information in Google Spreadsheets: You can use Google Spreadsheets to easily create, share and edit spreadsheets online. Beyond keeping names, addresses and phone numbers of your donors, it’s helpful to track the donation type (one time gift/monthly/yearly), amount given and the date of gift.

According to a tip by Blackbaud, tracking the date of a donor's gift can help provide you with better insights about when your donor is in the mood to give or when it is feasible for them to do so, making it psychologically easier for them to give if you ask for another donation at the same time in future months. Check out the full article here for more information.

2. Use filters to sort your data: With large amounts of information, it can be tricky to organize or segment what you have. Using Google’s Filter feature, you can see a more digestible view of your data by hiding information that you temporarily want to take out of view. Filters are especially useful when you want to organize communications or mailings. You can use this feature on one or multiple columns in your Google Spreadsheet.

So if we want to create a filter for people who donated the first of the month (a likely payday), we would select the column the holds that information, then select Filter from the Tools menu and put a check mark next to all dates that are correspond to the first of the month. Using this filtered data, we can create mailing lists in seconds.

You can also use filters to target volunteers. If you have an event coming up in a specific geographic area, you could filter for the city or zip code your donors live in, then enabling you to email all donors that live in the area of your upcoming event and ask for volunteers or attendees.

To learn more about creating custom filters, check out these instructions.

3. Use shared Calendars to ask on time: Once you know when you want to communicate with different segments of donors, it can be helpful to create events on your calendar to remind you when to send those communications.

If multiple people handle mailings, you can create a new shared calendar. A shared calendar can be viewed and/or edited by anyone who you give access to. By using shared calendars for donor communications, you can create events to remind your team to send out emails, letters, etc. to specific groups or filtered segments. All you’ll need to do is create new calendar, add your events and then share it with your team.

We are excited to see how your donations and organizations grow using these tips and we'd love for you to share any of your donor information best practices with us on our Google+ page. Join us again later this week when we share our favorite bundle of Google Docs templates designed just for non-profits.

Posted by Katie Kellogg, Google for Nonprofits team

Celebrating the spirit of entrepreneurship with the new Google for Entrepreneurs

Monday, September 24, 2012

(Cross posted from the Google Official Blog)
Startups and entrepreneurs have the power to build technologies and creative solutions that transform the world and move us forward. Innovation is happening everywhere: There are approximately 400 million entrepreneurs across 54 countries, and 69 million early-stage entrepreneurs offering new products and services. As Google turns 14 this month, we’re celebrating this creative spirit and officially launching Google for Entrepreneurs, the umbrella for our several dozen programs and partnerships around the world that support startups and entrepreneurs.

Our focus is threefold:

Partnerships with strong organizations that serve entrepreneurs in local communities

Google-led programs to bring our teams and our tools directly to entrepreneurs

Placing relevant Google tools in the hands of startups as they are getting off the ground and ready to scale

We’re already on a roll, with current projects ranging from support for theannual journey of entrepreneurship through India by train, to partnering with a number of accelerator and incubator programs around the world, like iHub in Kenya and Le Camping in France. And, this week, we’re rolling out our newest partnership: teaming up with Women 2.0 to bring their Founder Friday events to more cities. These events bring together current and aspiring female entrepreneurs once a month to connect with mentors and one another to build community. We’re partnering to launch Founder Fridays in Detroit, New Orleans, Sao Paulo and Moscow over the next year.

To celebrate both our birthday and the spirit of entrepreneurship that’s helped get us where we are today, we are hosting our first annual Google for Entrepreneurs Week, which will bring together more than 3,000 entrepreneurs and Googlers around the world. We kicked off over the weekend with a Startup Weekend event hosted at the Google Ventures Startup Lab in Mountain View, Calif., where Bay Area entrepreneurs came together to create their own startups in 54 hours. Over the course of the next week, Googlers in 28 cities across 13 countries will be hosting an event in their communities to bring their passion and expertise to local entrepreneurs. We’re teaming with a number of partners to make this happen, including the Idea Village in New Orleans, Communitechin Waterloo, Tetuan Valley in Wroclaw, the Branson Centre of Entrepreneurshipin Johannesburg and the Council Bluffs Chamber of Commerce in Iowa.

For more on these existing programs and to stay connected on upcoming events, visit google.com/entrepreneurs and follow us on G+.

Posted by Mary Grove, Head of Global Entrepreneurship Outreach

Grow Your Gifts: Two Tips To Make Donation Emails More Effective

Friday, September 21, 2012

We know that using AdWords and Google Search are great ways to bring in new donors, especially those that aren’t familiar with your organization. But, what about engaging people already in your network?

Email donations made up 35% of online giving in 2011, according to the eNonprofit Benchmarks Study by M+R Strategic Services and Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN). In the same study, we also saw the typical non-profit email list grew by 16% from 2010 to 2011. To help you make the most of this growth, we’ve shared a few tips to create more effective donation emails.

1. Tell Your Story: Like we discussed earlier this week, donors want to know their money isn’t being wasted, so show them how you’re using it! Include photos and videos illustrating the impact you in order to engage users.

Gmail allows you insert images inline with your text. Follow these quick steps to add images to your email and showcase the change you’re making.

Or you can link a YouTube video to your email. By using our hyperlink feature in Gmail, you can make your text connect to a web address. In this case, you would connect to one of your YouTube video or channel URLs.

If you’re looking for more ideas, check out our Visual Storytelling series, where we highlighted non-profits using photos, videos and more.

2. Be Social: Individual donors trust their friends and family for information on nonprofits, according to Hope Consulting’s Money For Good II Report. Make sure that you not only have your email list recipients send emails to their friends and family, but also include hyperlinks to Google+, Facebook, Twitter, etc. to build your community.

Next week, we’ll focus on ways to stay organized using Google tools, how to make the most of the donor information you have and share our bundle of Google Docs templates created specifically for non-profits. Posted by Katie Kellogg, Google for Nonprofits team

Grow Your Gift: Three Ways to Optimize Your AdWords Campaigns Today

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Last week in our Grow Your Gifts series, we discussed the growth of online giving and the peak months for donations. Now that we know what to expect and when to expect it, today we’re looking at ways to use Google products and tools to attract donors.

Google AdWords and Google Grants enable you to reach people on Google with relevant ads while they are searching for information. To get your campaigns and ads ready for the giving season, here are three quick changes you can make to your campaigns today:

New Keywords: By adding new keywords to your search campaigns, you can broaden your reach on Google. Create keywords to reach users who are looking to donate to your cause, not just to your organization. For example, a organization focused on nature conservation could add the keywords “environmental donations” and “donate to environmental charity.”

Social Extensions: Fifty-six percent of people are connected to a cause through a family member or close friend, according to Blackbaud’s Raising More Money Online Study. You can create that personal element in your Google campaigns by adding social extensions. Since social extensions show how many people +1’d your Google+ Page, website and ads, people who see your search ad can see how many recommendations you have. Learn how to add social extensions to your AdWords campaigns here.

Sitelinks: When individuals and advisors make giving decisions, they look for data that shows that the organization won’t waste their money, according to the Hope Consulting: Money for Good II Study. You can use sitelinks in your ads to help people more easily find sections of your site that demonstrate how donations are applied. To add sitelinks to your AdWords campaigns, follow these instructions.

Later this week, we’ll explore more ways to reach and engage donors. Until then, we’re excited to see your optimized ads on Google!
Posted by Katie Kellogg, Google for Nonprofits team

Grow Your Gifts: Online Giving Seasonality

Friday, September 14, 2012

For more information on Google Insights for Search, check out this Google and Your Business tutorial to how the world is searching for terms related to your organization.

Join us next week as we share how you can target donors and optimize your existing AdWords campaigns to grow your gifts this season now that you know when to begin.

Posted by Katie Kellogg, Google for Nonprofits team

We know that online giving is growing and that end-of-year donations are a big part of that giving. But, when does “end of year” begin and what does that mean for you?

October, November and December combined bring in most online donations; however, September has become noteworthy. In 2011, 34.8% of online giving happened in October through December according to Blackbaud’s 2011 Online Giving Report. December alone brought in 20.3% of 2011’s online giving. What you may find surprising is that September was 2011’s second largest online giving month with 8.8%, beating both October (7.7%) and November (6.8%).

The nonprofit sector is also seeing the end-of-year season expanding beyond December and into January, with January carrying 5% of of online giving according to the same study. Is your non-profit seeing the same trend?

With Google Insights for Search, you can compare search volume patterns across specific regions, categories, time frames and properties. By entering search queries related to your nonprofit into the tool, you can get an exact of idea of when and how much people are searching.

Let’s take a look at an example. We wanted to see how search volume for the term ‘homeless shelters’ changes throughout the year. In Google Insights for Search, we entered the term ‘homeless shelter’ and filtered for the United States between July 2011 and July 2012. The graph below shows that searches began to rise in September, peaked dramatically in December and then declined into January.
For more information on Google Insights for Search, check out this Google and Your Business tutorial to how the world is searching for terms related to your organization.

Join us next week as we share how you can target donors and optimize your existing AdWords campaigns to grow your gifts this season now that you know when to begin.
Posted by Katie Kellogg, Google for Nonprofits team

Grow Your Gifts: Trends in Online Giving

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

It’s hard to believe fall is almost here and with it the holiday season. While shoppers in many parts of the world begin to look for the next great toys and other memorable gifts, donors are starting to look for non-profits to support with end-of-year charitable gifts.
To help you get ready for the upcoming fundraising season, our team will be sharing tips and best practices on how to use Google tools to plan and organize your fundraising strategy. Check our blog and Google+ page over the next few weeks through our Grow Your Gifts series.
Kicking things off, we’ll take a look at three things to know about online giving as you plan your fundraising strategy:
1. Online giving is growing. While the majority of giving is done offline, mainly through direct mail, the sixth annual eNonprofit Benchmarks Study, released by M+R Strategic Services and Nonprofit Technology Network (NTEN), showed that growth in online giving from 2010 to 2011 was up 20%.
2. New donors and young donors give online. According to Blackbaud’s 2011 donorCentrics Internet & Multichannel Benchmarketing Report, it’s become increasingly common for new donors to give their first gift online. In fact, new donors between the ages of 18 - 64 are more likely to give online than by mail.
3. Online donors give more than offline donors. According to the same Blackbaud report, online donors tend to have higher household incomes than mail-acquired donors. Those online-acquired donors also tend to give much larger gifts and to give more in total revenue each year. And in aggregate, online-acquired donors have much higher cumulative value over the long term than traditional mail-acquired donors.
So now that we know that online giving is on the rise, our next post will explore when people actually start thinking about end-of-year giving.
Posted by Katie Kellogg, Google for Nonprofits team

Telling Your Story Visually: Online Maps

Friday, September 7, 2012

Last week we wrapped up our visual storytelling series on Google+ by sharing ways that online maps can help you tell your organization’s story.

We began by watching this video tutorial from the Google Earth Outreach team about how to create a custom map to embed in your website, create a narrated tour on Google Earth and map spreadsheet data.

Then we looked at this detailed article on how to plan a map project when you’re just getting started with adding them to your site. From defining your goals to acquiring the right talent, this article gives you step-by-step instructions and resources to begin your project.

We saw a great example of telling a story through maps from the Google Maps and Google Crisis Response teams. Check out their map that is tracking the current and projected location of Tropical Storm #Isaac.

Google Maps also shared their experience working with Map Makers across Africa. Learn more about the Map Maker Africa Regional Conference and Google Maps participation here.

We finished our series by joining a Help Desk Hangout on Air. Check out our Google for Nonprofits team discussing visual storytelling examples and engagement strategies in this recording on the Google and Your Business YouTube channel.

We’ve learned some great strategies on how to tell your story through photos, video and online maps. If you’d like to learn more or share your thoughts, make sure to visit our Google+ page.

We can’t wait to see how you use these recommendations to tell your nonprofit’s story!
Posted by Andrea Xu, Google for Nonprofits team

Congratulations to our 2012 Google Online Marketing Challenge Social Impact Award Winners

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

We’re pleased to announce the winners of the 2012 Google Online Marketing Challenge Social Impact Award, an award that recognizes Google Online Marketing Challenge student teams that made an outstanding difference to their nonprofit partners via superb online marketing campaigns. Teams were judged on their impact on and relevance to their nonprofit partner, the success of their advertising campaign, and their overall report presentation. Reports were judged by an independent panel of nonprofit leaders.

Prizes for the winners include:

1st place - $15,000 donation to the nonprofit partner

2nd place - $10,000 donation to the nonprofit partner

3rd place - $5,000 donation to the nonprofit partner

Congratulations to the following winners!

1st Place
1st place is awarded to Alex Zhitnitsky, Oshri Rozenheck and Boris Fridman, who were taught by Professor Sarit Moldovan and worked on behalf of nonprofit partner Perach. Perach is a nonprofit organization based in Israel that matches children from underprivileged backgrounds with student mentors. Through the GOMC Social Impact Award, the team created an online marketing campaign to find and recruit mentors to join the program for the 2012-2013 academic year.

2nd Place
2nd place goes to Ginger Greey, Barbie Bird, Scott MacDonald and Beth Saunders, who were taught by Professor Lyle Wetsch and worked on behalf of nonprofit partner AIESEC Memorial. AIESEC is a youth leadership organization that aims to create global youth leaders by facilitating international student exchanges and internships in over 110 countries. The team’s campaign was designed to increase overall brand awareness by driving traffic to the AIESEC Memorial site for relevant keyword terms.

3rd Place
3rd place is awarded to Rahul Anand, Shruti Dhandhania, Arpit Bramhachari and Avinash Kumar, who were taught by Professor Abhijit Mustafi and worked on behalf of nonprofit partner Teach for India. Teach for India promotes educational equity in India by creating lifelong educational leaders through its two-year teaching fellowship. The GOMC team aimed to increase brand awareness and fellowship applications through its online marketing campaign.

Congratulations to the 2012 GOMC Social Impact Award Winners and their nonprofit partner organizations working to make a difference around the world!

If you’re interested in being involved in next year’s Google Online Marketing Challenge Social Impact Award, stay tuned to our website.

These organizations were funded through the Google Inc. Charitable Giving Fund at the Tides Foundation.

Leslie Hernandez Dinneen, Product Marketing Manager, Google for Nonprofits

For Nonprofits Blog

Insights into what the world is searching for -- the new Google Trends

Grow Your Gifts: Making the Most of Donor Information

Celebrating the spirit of entrepreneurship with the new Google for Entrepreneurs

Grow Your Gifts: Two Tips To Make Donation Emails More Effective

Grow Your Gift: Three Ways to Optimize Your AdWords Campaigns Today

Grow Your Gifts: Online Giving Seasonality

Grow Your Gifts: Trends in Online Giving

Telling Your Story Visually: Online Maps

Congratulations to our 2012 Google Online Marketing Challenge Social Impact Award Winners

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