Case study on SEO optimisation: increasing the visibility and effectiveness of a charity fund
Topics: fund to help abandoned animals
Challenges (difficulties at the start):
- Difficulties with website visibility in search results for a non-profit charity in a competitive environment.
- Low indexation and poor promotion on the website builder.
- Problems with indexing on the .foundation domain.
Objective: to increase the visibility and effectiveness of a charitable foundation aimed at helping shelters and abandoned animals in Ukraine.
Region: Europe and the USA.
Work duration:August 2022 – present
1. Migrating to a new domain:
- Fixed problems with redirects and moved the site to .com hosting.
- Databases and HTTPS protocol connected to .com.
- The sitemap.xml file and the robots.txt file have been written.
- Installed the code for Google Tag Manager on the .com website.
- Set up redirect from the old site, control of gluing and indexing
2. Website audit and improvement of indexing:
- The site was audited to identify problems with indexing.
- Technical issues were resolved, in particular, the problem with the HTTPS protocol.
- Website security has been improved.
3. Competitor analysis:
- Meta tags, structure and blog of similar funds in the search engine results are analyzed.
- A further website promotion strategy was developed.
4. Semantic core and tag updates:
- Work on updating the semantic core.
- Focus on relevant queries
- Optimization for the keywords “helping homeless pets” and “helping ukrainian shelters”.
- Updating tags based on the collected queries in the semantic core.
5. Credentials and information about the author:
- Added the Author element in the page code to increase authority.
- Distribution of articles among three authors with unique expertise.
- Created separate pages for each author with additional information.
6. Optimization and development of text content:
- Regularly filling the blog with interesting and informative content.
- The process of continuous optimization of texts adapted to the key queries and needs of the audience.
- Promoting the growth of the site’s authority through regular updates and expansion of the blog.
The client is a charitable foundation dedicated to helping pet shelters in Ukraine. The Foundation seeks to provide treatment, vaccination, and nutrition to stray animals in shelters affected by the war. The foundation’s goal is to improve the quality of life and ensure a better future for animals in difficult circumstances.
The problem the foundation came to us with arose at the stage of launching and optimizing their website. Starting with the development of the site on the builder, the foundation faced difficulties with indexing and effective promotion on this platform. Also, the domain was located in the .foundation domain zone, which further complicated the situation with indexing. Only 2 pages from the .com domain (the first registration) were visible in the search results, and the .foundation domain pages were not indexed.
Our objective was to search engine optimization and improve traffic to the foundation’s website, as well as draw attention to helping animal shelters through SEO website promotion.
Migrating to a new domain
To solve the indexing problem, it was decided to move the site to a more powerful and flexible platform – WordPress, which provides more opportunities for website optimization and SEO.
First of all, the redirect problems were fixed and the entire site was transferred to a new .com domain. This process included the installation of databases and the HTTPS protocol to ensure security and data encryption. The website optimization also included prescribing the necessary files, such as sitemap.xml and robots.txt, to improve indexing in search engines.
To track and analyze traffic, we installed the code for Google Tag Manager, which allowed us to obtain detailed data on user behavior on the website. An effective redirect from the old .foundation domain was set up to ensure that users and search engines could seamlessly transition to the .com domain.
Website audit and improvement of indexing
The second key stage of the search engine optimization of the foundation’s website was to analyze and improve the indexing process. Starting with a thorough audit of the site, we identified and resolved technical issues, such as incorrect display of the 404 page, that were hindering effective indexing in search engines.
An important step was to resolve problems with the HTTPS protocol, which affected the perception of the site by search engines. Thanks to systematic work on the implementation and optimization of content, we have improved the indexing of new pages and ensured their faster appearance in search results.
Competitor analysis
Understanding the competitive environment is an important step in SEO optimization and promotion of any project in a competitive niche. We thoroughly analyzed competitors’ strategies, paying attention to their meta tags, website structure, and blogging approaches.
This analysis provided us with important insights on how to effectively interact with the audience and increase online authority. Based on this information, we developed a promotion strategy.
Semantic core and tag updates
While systematically improving the promotion strategy, our team paid special attention to the semantic core of the site. Our goal was to collect and refine relevant queries to identify keywords and phrases that interact with the target audience as accurately as possible. A special focus was given to the queries “helping homeless pets” and “helping ukrainian shelters” to accurately reflect the main activities of the foundation and express its commitment to helping stray animals and shelters for abandoned dogs and cats.
In August, we updated the tags based on the semantic core analysis. Based on this, we focused our efforts on optimizing for queries that not only have a high potential for attracting an audience but are also highly competitive.
Implemented SEO solutions:
Website development on WordPress
Technical support of the site
Creation of a promotion strategy
Collecting the semantic core of the niche
Optimization of meta tags
Optimization of loading speed
Technical SEO optimization
Optimization of text content
Monitoring and analysis of results
Promotion to the western market
Authoritativeness and author information of the articles
Taking into account updates, trends and improvements in Google’s search engine algorithms, we paid special attention to the issue of authority and increasing audience trust. By adding the Author element to the page code, we created a special space to display the expertise and individual contributions of three unique authors.
Each author has his or her own unique expertise, which allows us to expand the horizons of the information presented and demonstrate the expertise of the foundation’s team. In addition, each article on the site now has an author, ensuring transparency and identification when publishing content.
Optimization and development of text content
With a focus on expanding and improving textual content, we have developed a systematic plan to create interesting and informative material. Every month, the foundation’s website publishes articles for the blog, which cover various aspects of the foundation’s activities, animal stories, care tips, and more.
In addition to writing new content, we also thoroughly optimize existing blog pages by reviewing and updating textual content, adding relevant keywords, and improving the structure to ensure even more effective influence on the search engine algorithm.
The SEO optimization process included keyword analysis and work on adapting texts to relevant queries. The structure of the texts was also brought to a new level, ensuring easier perception and retention of users’ attention.
To ensure the effectiveness of our optimization measures, we systematically (monthly) monitor the website’s position in search engine results. This approach allows us not only to determine the dynamics of growth, but also to respond promptly and improve our strategy to maximize the impact and improve the visibility of the fund.
Conclusion:
Summarizing the work done, we can say that the transition to a new domain, the introduction of authority elements, the development of a semantic core, and the constant optimization of content have contributed to effective changes in the promotion of the charity’s website. It is important to note that the work on optimization and development is ongoing, and we continue to actively implement new strategies to achieve our goals of helping pet shelters in Ukraine.We sincerely thank U-Hearts Foundation for their trust!
Results:
As of November 2023:
- Rapid increase in organic traffic, currently 27.5% of traffic is organic
- 30 keywords in the TOP-10 for the US search results
- 17 keywords in the TOP-20 for the US search results
