"There is no greater marketing program for nonprofit organizations than the Google Ad Grants program."Michael J Kowal President & CEO Gateway Marketing

What is Google Ad Grants?Google Ad Grants is an in-kind grant of $10,000 per month to nonprofit organizations to advertise on Google. To qualify, an organization must be a registered 501(C)3 status (or similar registration for international organizations) and must have a website to promote. Google Ad Grants is available in over 50 countries and has more than 35,000 nonprofit organizations currently participating.

One of the benefits to the program is a relatively simple application process (which we will discuss) that typically takes anywhere from 1-3 weeks from start to finish.

Why your organization should participate?With over 3.5 billion monthly searches, Google is the place most people go to for information. With this program, your organization will be able to show your advertisement at the top of Google searches driving more visitors to your website to learn about what you do.

We've helped nonprofits generate thousands of new weekly visitors to their websites using this program... Could your organization benefit from that type of visibility?

Google Ad Grants Basics....................Keys To Success................................Marketing Ideas.................................How To Apply For Ad Grants...............Common Questions...........................

12-45-6

78

Table of Contents:

Google Ad Grants BasicsSince many nonprofit organizations have never heard about Google Ad Grants, we'll begin with the basics. There are currently over 1.5 million nonprofits in the United States and less than 35,000 worldwide have registered for this amazing program!

However, those that are taking advantage of the program and managing it properly, are experiencing tremendous results.

When we speak with nonprofit organizations who are managing the program themselves, often we find that they are not fully maximizing the $10,000 per month in advertising allocation. In fact, Google indicated that the average monthly spend for nonprofit organizations was between just $300-$400 per month! That's over $9,500 per month in unused marketing budget!

Why does this happen? Quite frankly because most people running the program for the organizations have never optimized a Google advertising campaign before... But don't worry, we're here to help.

Keep reading this guide and you'll learn some key features of the program and some best practices you can implement today... If you decide you'd rather hire a professional Google marketer to manage the program for you, we will put our marketing team to work for your organization and help you get the most out of this wonderful program.

Keys To SuccessThe December 2017 Product Updates

There quite possibly has been no greater impact to the Ad Grants program since its inception than the updates Google made in December of 2017. Some of the changes were a welcome sight, others not so much. Let's look at two of the biggest changes and how they impact you.

Elimination of the $2 bid ruleIf you are not familiar with the way Google used to allow nonprofit organizations to bid on keywords, let's explain...

When you select what keyword phrases you want your advertisement to show for, you will select a maximum dollar amount (bid) you are willing to pay. Prior to December 2017, Google limited the amount a nonprofit participating in the Ad Grants program could bid to only $2 per click, making it difficult to generate meaningful website traffic as many keywords cost well above that amount. Fortunately, the December 2017 update eliminated the cap and now allows all Ad Grants participants to bid any amount they choose for clicks on their advertisement. When participating in the Ad Grants program, Google will simply deduct any advertisement charges on your Adwords account from your $10,000 monthly allotment of marketing funds.

Ultimately, the amount that you will pay for a click to your website will vary depending on a number of factors including, how many other entities are bidding on the same keywords, your target location, time of day the ad is shown and a number of other factors... If your maximum bid is high enough for your keyword phrase, Google will show your advertisement. If your maximum bid falls below what Google can get others to pay, your advertisement will not be shown.

If you ever wondered what other companies or organizations are paying every time you click on one of those ads on a Google search, take the keyword phrase "Chicago Personal Injury Attorney" as an example. To have an advertisement show up for this keyword phrase, it will cost over $125 per click on most days! Why so expensive? It's because there are so many personal injury attorneys in the Chicago area that want prospects to call them first. While a keyword phrase like "Barber Shop By Me" might only charge $1 per click because it's not as competitive of a phrase. Now it's safe to say your organization will more than likely will be on the lower end of the spectrum with your bid strategies and in fact it's not uncommon for many of the organizations we work with to range between $1.50 -$10 per click, depending on the competitive landscape.

The 5% Click-Through RateWhile the removal of the $2 cap was a tremendous benefit to the changes Google implemented in 2017, the new 5% click-through rate (CTR) rule is by far one of the most restrictive and difficult to attain for many nonprofits who choose to manage the program in-house. The new rule mandates that if you do not average a 5% click-through rate on your keywords for two consecutive months, Google will suspend your participation in the Ad Grants program (they are enforcing this rule).

If you're not familiar with what a "click-through rate" is, let's start there. Suppose you have an advertisement that is displayed 100 times a day but only generates 2 clicks per day to your website... This would be an example of a 2% click-through rate. So in this example, you must have your advertisement be clicked by at least 5 people for every 100 times its shown for a particular keyword phrase.

If you have never optimized a keyword strategy on Google before, this is not an easy task to accomplish... Is it doable, of course it is, it just takes a lot of work to ensure you don't fall below the 5% threshold. How do you do this? You must be in your account daily looking at which keyword phrases are working and which ones are not and quickly adjusting the ones that are underperforming. Gone are the days where a nonprofit could simply enter in 100 keyword phrases and if they get a 1% average click-through amongst all of them they'd be happy. Google is strictly enforcing this rule and is suspending accounts for failure to comply. To be reinstated a nonprofit must demonstrate how they are going to lift their CTR to above 5% moving forward amongst other requirements.

Moral of the story here is if you have never optimized an Adwords campaign with Google, it's highly recommended you engage the services of an agency that specializes in this line of work... $120,000 a year in marketing funds is just too valuable to your organization to risk losing.

Make Your Ad RelevantNow that we've talked a little about the rules of the Ad Grants program, let's talk about functionality... Google has something called a "Quality Score" that rates how good / relevant your advertisements are to the keywords your targeting. If you really want to question if artificial intelligence is really that intelligent, look no further than the "Quality Score"...

It's not uncommon for a perfectly well written advertisement that is getting a tremendous click-through rate to show a low Quality Score... Why you ask? The honest answer is I have no clue and neither does any other Google expert I've talked to. We've seen advertisements getting over 5% click-through rates, for completely relevant keyword phrases score 3 or lower in some cases (on a scale of 1-10). So even though an ad seems to be working great, the artificial intelligence algorithms somehow don't like the ads...

Why is this important? For a couple reasons... First and foremost, Google looks at the Quality Score to help determine if it will display your advertisement for the keywords you want. If you have a low Quality Score (typically 3 or under) your advertisement may not show as often as you want, or in some cases not show at all. Also, Google considers a Quality Score of 1 or 2 to be a violation of their Google Ad Grants terms and policies, thus potentially causing you to be suspended from the program!

The second reason this is so important is that it can affect the amount you pay for a click. Remember in the last section we discussed a number of factors that go into the cost of a click on your advertisement... The higher your Quality Score, the lower you will pay for a click to your website... This is done because Google wants to make sure that the end user (the one searching for information) is being show information that they are seeking. Google built itself as being the most relevant and accurate search engine out there because it displays information people are seeking. The Quality Score helps its algorithms determine which advertisements are relevant and which are not, even if those scores aren't always that accurate.

Bottom line... While you might have a great advertisement that is generating great click-through rates you still need to be mindful of your Quality Score and adjust your advertisements over time to improve the score. If you can't seem to get that score up we recommend trial and error or as we techies call it... A/B testing...

Understand Your GoalsWhen we initially talk to nonprofit organizations about the program, we like to get a feel for what your goals are when starting Ad Grants. Some organizations seek to simply have more traffic to their website to promote their missions, others are searching for donors, others want to build their email list. Whatever your objectives of the program are, it is important that before you begin, you determine what outcomes are you expecting that will make the program a success.

Determining upfront what you are looking to get out of the program will do a couple things for you. First it will help you with the design of the campaigns and help identify various keywords to target that will help you attain your goal. Secondly, as you progress with your advertising, you'll be able to determine if your intended conversions are meeting their goals. In many cases, you may be getting plenty of traffic from the keywords you are marketing to, but the onpage conversions are low. This could tell you that you need to make some changes to your website to help boost your goals.

In the next section we'll talk a little more about some ideas on how to generate meaningful returns while participating in the program, but moral of the story here is knowing what you want out of the program upfront will help you determine if it's working for you and what changes you need to make to be successful.

A Couple Marketing IdeasPromoting your mission is often one of the first objectives we hear from nonprofits as their stated goal in participating in the Ad Grants program. While this is a very legitimate objective, we like to teach nonprofits how to make the Ad Grants funding stretch further by making some changes to their websites to generate more meaningful returns.

First, take an objective look at your website and ask yourself if the website is modern, mobile friendly and clearly states what your organizations mission is. You may know what you do, but is someone who is visiting your website for the first time easily able to determine what you do? If not, make those changes before launching your program.

Second, are there calls to action on your website? Do you have a newsletter signup form prevalent on your home page? Do you have contact us forms built on each page of your website to make it easy for visitors reach out to you? Have you ever considered installing a live chat feature that is monitored 24/7 by a third party? These are all ideas that you should strongly consider implementing on your website to generate the greatest returns for your advertising.

Finally, have you ever visited a website and the next day you are on Facebook or some other site and you see an advertisement for the website you visited the day before? This is called "remarketing" and is a great way to make the Ad Grants program efforts stretch farther... This is setup by placing a "cookie" on the computer of anyone who visits your website, then as that person visits other websites your banner advertisement is displayed on their computer, reminding them about your organization and its mission. This may sound complicated but it is really pretty easy to implement and is a great way to promote your mission to people you know are interested in what you do.

Don't Propose on the First DateTying back into the previous two sections on goal setting and marketing ideas, a major objective for all nonprofits is generating more donations. There is no question the Ad Grants program can help with this objective, but maybe not in the way you initially think.

Expecting someone to pull out their credit card the first time they visit your website and donate to your organization is like asking someone to marry you after the first date. Is it possible, sure... Sounds crazy, you bet...

We try to set realistic expectations with nonprofit organizations and if generating donations is an objective when using the Ad Grants program we teach you how to do this effectively. Fortunately for you, we're going to tell you now...

As stated earlier, making sure your website is setup properly is the single greatest factor in generating more donations to your organization through the Ad Grants program. These donations more than likely will not come as a direct result of the website traffic generated by the advertisements, but rather from you providing something of value to the visitor first.

What we mean is you need to either provide a monthly newsletter, a downloadable "white paper" about your mission (like the one you are reading now) or something else of perceived value. The objective is two-fold. First, you build credibility and trust from the visitor by providing information about who you are as an organization, what you do and some "feel good" stories about what you have accomplished. Second, by providing this information you require the visitor to enter in their name, email and phone number which provides you the opportunity to drip market to them, sending them periodic information about your organization and mission. It is through this remarketing that you can build trust, respect and ultimately donations from those people visiting your website.

It doesn't happen overnight, but with consistent messaging and interaction with those people who care about your mission, the website visitor will eventually open their wallet to help your cause.

Monetize Your Website On the same line of generating donations, monetizing your website is one of the most overlooked revenue generators for nonprofit organizations.

You need to start thinking about your website as a revenue generating machine, not just some literature you put out there for people to see. In addition to generating lists as we indicated in the last section, we strongly encourage nonprofits to view their websites as real estate that can be purchased.

What do I mean by this? If done right, your Ad Grants program could generate thousands of visitors a month to your website. Don't you think this visibility is valuable? You bet it is and that's where the next idea comes from...

I recommend every nonprofit have a page on their website labeled "Corporate Sponsors" (or something similar) where you can feature businesses that support your organization. On this page you can setup sponsorship levels (Platinum, Gold, Bronze) and each level could be a different monthly dollar amount that the businesses pay you to list their company on your website. You could charge as little as $25 a month or as high as $1,000 a month depending on how good a sales person you are!

To get started, go to your local businesses and tell them about your organization, what your mission is and how you have this great program (Ad Grants) that will help both your organization and their company. We've found that businesses are typically more than willing to help a great cause, especially when they are able to gain some visibility and goodwill.

If you take one thing out of this guide I hope that you will implement this one idea immediately.

How to Apply For Ad GrantsThe application process is relatively easy and consists of three steps. Here they are in exact order of how you must complete them...

Step One Visit www.Techsoup.org and apply to become a member of Techsoup. This is a third party vendor that Google has contracted with that will determine if your organization is a 501(C)3 (a requirement for the program).

At the top right section of their website you'll see a "Join" button. Complete the application and wait to hear back from them that you have been approved with Techsoup. This first step can take up to 1 week, but in many cases it takes less.

Step TwoOnce you have received confirmation that you are approved with Techsoup visit www.Google.com/nonprofits and click on the "Start Now" tab at the top right.

This application will register your organization with Google Nonprofits and is the next step to getting funding for the Ad Grants program. This step can take up to a week, but we find many organizations get approval within a day or two at most.

Step ThreeOnce you have received notification of Google Nonprofit approval you will be granted access to your nonprofit dashboard. From here you will select the "Google Ad Grants" tab and begin the application. This step is a bit more involved and must be completed accurately or they will kick your application back to you. So take your time on this step.You must create an Adwords account and set up your advertisement prior to entering in your Google Adwords ID into this application. Failure to complete your Adwords account will result in a rejection of your account.

Also, as of January 2018 you must have Google Analytics already setup on your website prior to completing step three. Talk to your website developer to get this installed on your website, or if you decide to work with us, we'll complete step three of the application for you and also make sure Google Analytics is properly installed on your website.

Step Three can take up to 10 business days to get approval for Ad Grants, but once completed you will be ready to set up your first advertising campaign!

Common QuestionsQ: Are there any restrictions on who can apply for Ad Grants?

A: All 501c3 organizations are considered eligible to apply for the grant with the exception of governmental agencies & organizations, hospitals & medical groups, schools, academic institutions and universities are not eligible for Google for Nonprofits/Ad Grants but philanthropic arms of education institutions are eligible.

Q: Is Google actually enforcing the 5% click-through rate?

A: Yes, Google is strictly enforcing the mandatory 5% click-through rate for all Adwords accounts. All Ad Grants AdWords accounts must maintain a 5% CTR each month (at the account level, not necessarily each keyword). If the CTR requirement isn't met for 2 consecutive months, your account will be deactivated. You may request to have your account reinstated after bringing your account into compliance which generally means you must bring your CTR back up to 5% for one full week before you reapply (among other requirements).

Q: I have a nonprofit organization that typically only works in a smaller geographic area. Can you show ads to specific locations only?

A: Yes, it is possible to customize the targeting of your AdWords campaign to geographic locations.

Q: Are there any restrictions on what keywords we can target?

A: Yes. Per Google, each ad and keyword in your Ad Grants AdWords account must reflect your organizations primary mission, be relevant to your nonprofit's programs & services, and be specific enough to provide a good experience for the user seeing your ads.

Q: We applied for Google Ad Grants but our application was declined... Can your company help get us approved?

A: Yes, we have helped many nonprofit organizations complete their application and can provide assistance in getting approved for the program as part of our management program.

Q: If we have Gateway Marketing manage our Ad Grants program are your costs covered by the Grant from Google?

A: No, our management fee is not able to be deducted from your Google Ad Grant and must be paid for by your organization. We are confident that our pricing is far less than what it would take to manage the program "in-house" and that our expertise in managing these programs provides your organization with a tremendous marketing resource.

Q: We would like to work with Gateway Marketing and have you setup and manage our Ad Grants program... What are the next steps and what are the commitments?

A: Great! First, our management agreement is a month-to-month contract as we believe our service will make you want to stay a client for years to come. If you're not happy you can cancel at anytime. To get started simply email Michael@GoGatewayMarketing.com or call 877-214-5387.

About our companyGateway Marketing was founded in 2015 and specializes in helping nonprofit organizations with their digital marketing needs. Our specialties include: Management of Google Ad Grants Program, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), website development, content marketing and social media marketing.

We focus on nonprofit organizations because we are confident that we can make a difference in this world by helping these organizations grow. Whether you are looking to increase awareness of your mission, looking for more donors, better engage with supporters or seeking alternative revenue sources; our marketing experts will help your organization identify areas of opportunity and put an action plan in place to grow.