Special Archives - Dot Org Web Works

Nonprofit Versus For-profit Websites

January 12, 2023/in Special, How-to/by webguy

Nonprofit Versus For-profit Websites: what’s the difference?

When a website, be it nonprofit or for-profit, is well thought out and branded, it will have a far better chance to exude the entity’s product and, or mission instantly than a website that is not. Moreover, it should appeal to the viewer’s sensibilities and be very user-friendly. In other words, the “user experience” (UE/UX) is vital for any website to compete in today’s WWW marketplace.

As for the website’s primary reason for being (most will think it’s always about revenue generation), this is where the two entities start to deviate.

For commercial endeavors, the main goal is nearly always to make money, and that’s a given. But for the nonprofit sector, the answer is a bit more complicated.

For the nonprofit, success is not calculated as mere profit (though raising money is undoubtedly a significant priority if it wishes to survive) but rather how well it fulfills its overall mission. Therefore, the product, be it a widget or a social service, has to be sold to someone and generate revenue.

Where the Split Occurs

The for-profit website targets the product buyer—who is almost always (save for gift cards) the product’s end-user. So when creating your website for the commercial sector, you are communicating to one audience: the buyer/user.

The nonprofit website, however, generally addresses two audiences—often split equally. One message is for the product buyer (the donor of the product or service), and the other is for the product user (the people in need of the product or service—the client). And this sort of split-branding can be a challenge.

In both instances, the product needs to be well promoted as necessary to the buyer and of good value—be it a widget for oneself or a critical service to another. For the for-profit, this singular focus makes creating the web presence relatively streamlined.

But what about the nonprofit’s end user—the client? Their user experience will not be buyer’s satisfaction or even return on social investment (ROsI), but on when, where, and how to obtain the product/service and how quickly they can access it. (This client priority, by the way, is also essential to the buyer/funder who considers the overall user experience for clients as a reasonable ROsI.)

ROsI

The ROsI continues beyond the product/service level for the funder or even how well the website offers equal space for donors and clients. The funder tends to look at multiple factors:

Desktop/laptop viewing first: Can they view the website well on their desktop/laptop as well as a mobile device? (Since donors tend to use desktops/laptops more than mobile devices when considering their involvement in an organization, good content is vital.)
Is the website engaging without a look of wastefulness? I.E., not too flashy and overly trendy, yet attractive?
How are the clients (recipients of their intended support) perceived? Will particular content direction (images and descriptions) turn off the donor—or, perhaps, the client? (For the donor, the pitch often shows the worst-case scenario, where when you’re addressing the client, optimism and non-judgment is critical.)
What is the call to action other than the donation request? The sign-up form or invitation to an event allows the donor to feel like a more significant part of the organization’s community than just another income stream.
How has the website prioritized its giving, be it donations or volunteering time?

Access

As for the client, their priorities may be:

Mobile device-friendly first: Is the website conforming well to handheld devices (is it “responsive”)? According to a Pew study, 50-75% of homeless and low-income people only have access to a mobile device, be it a smartphone or tablet. Considering this, the website should be designed with a desktop in mind for the donors and in responsive format for clients—which requires a judicial approach to paring down content, along with format tweaks, for the best view on mobile devices.
How intuitive is it to locate the product/service? Are dates and times clearly stated? Are schedules, directions, and maps provided?
What are the limitations and “need to know” messages?

Unique Content for the Nonprofit

There are pages and applications that are geared more toward the nonprofit than the for-profit:

Client programs/services
HIPPA or other statements of privacy
Financial disclosure
Volunteer program and forms
Board of directors page
Access to departmental staff
Robust About Us / History page(s)
Achievements and profiles
Membership/subscription
Dynamic social networking center-point
Calendar
Donation options page (from one-time donations to planned/estate giving)
A very user-friendly “back end” so that in-house staff can make updates and new pages without needing a dedicated webmaster.

In a nutshell, the user experience differs between nonprofit and for-profit websites, and we get that. Dot Org Web Works stand out from other website developers because we only work for the charitable nonprofit sector.

This article was originally published on May 5, 2018. Last update: January 12, 2023

We would LOVE (that’s no exaggeration!) to work with you on your next (or first ever!) website. And if you think that having professional assistance may be outside of your current budget, you might be in for a pleasant surprise.

WordPress Compared to Joomla and Drupal

August 8, 2020/in Special/by webguy

Content Management Systems (CMS) has been the choice for website developers ever since they metamorphosed from its humble beginnings as Dr. Glen Barry’s “blog” in the 1990s, to the web platform that is now powering the vast majority of all websites on the Internet. Though there were many startup CMS choices just a few years ago, the field has narrowed to three main competitors: Joomla, Drupal, and WordPress.

Currently, WordPress is by far the dominant choice. An astounding 64% of all CMS sites are from WordPress (or an even more amazing figure of 38% of all websites within the worldwide web). Trailing far behind is Joomla with its market share of 3.9% of CMS, and Drupal with 2.6% of CMS.

WordPress, Joomla and Drupal have their key technical features in common:

they’re open source content management systems,
they all support the MySQL database, although Joomla and Drupal allow for support with other database systems,
and, all of them use pre-developed themes and plugins (modules that extend features) to enhance functionality and showcase content.

Taking a closer look…

Installation and Use

WordPress is relatively easy to install. If you understand the basics of uploading files to a server and configuring the database (MySQL), then the process will take just a few minutes. (Although, WordPress comes with its “famous five minute install,” unless you are a professional or have prior experience, you better budget in a few more minutes.) Once you’re set up, you’ll be introduced to the Dashboard (control panel) where prime settings are adjusted, new Pages and Posts are made, and customization with the plugins are achieved. WordPress is quite intuitive—and, given its dominance in the market, very familiar to many website managers.

Joomla is also rather quick to install, but not as fast as WordPress. The control panel is a bit more complicated to navigate. Drupal’s installation is also fairly similar to WordPress and Joomla. Its post installation can be a bit complicated for beginners, and knowing how to make changes are not as intuitive. Overall though, they are all intuitive and should work fine for you once you’ve familiarized yourself with the chosen system.

Support

Because of WordPress’ popularity, there are more free support options available. Plus, WordPress has a massive support community through various forums and through WordPress.org. Joomla and Drupal also have support communities, although not as vast.

Plugins and Themes Availability

Where the real benefit of WP is over the other two, aside from a larger market share and user base, is its access to more than 38,000 plugins, which are free within the WordPress.org plugin directory. These are, of course, in addition to the “premium” plugins available to WP systems for a nominal cost.

Joomla and Drupal also have many templates and plugins that work with their respective systems, but they are not nearly as plentiful and the quality tends not to be as high.

Security

For many operators of CMS sites, security ranks near or at the top of concerns. All three provide for a respectable level of security, with quick remedies to counter hacks, and backup systems for when you need to re-install part or all of your website. Overall, there is no clear winner for the average CMS website in the security department. However, since WordPress is the bigger dog in the yard, hackers tend to focus on WP first. That said, all three CMS platforms have equally good response times and fixes for when security breaches are realized.

Two of the less talked about and more vulnerable aspects of a CMS framework, according to Randy Morris of Releventure, are plugins and themes. These prolific and popular elements provide a quick functionality fix, however oftentimes at the cost of security, as they usually have very few developers and not very frequent updates.

In general all three platforms have similar release cycles and robust communities. The key with each of these platforms will always be to follow proper security policies, maintain vigilant updating, use well-maintained monitoring and scanning services (such as Sucuri), have solid backups, and recover processes in place.

Winner?

The overall winner then? Well, since all three CMS are reliable and have adequate access to themes, plugins, and support communities, and each resolves security issues; it comes down to what your specific needs are. But if those needs are sufficiently addressed in all three (which is likely), then it comes down to user friendliness. That said, since WordPress has the natural advantage of being the most popular CMS, with its very user-friendly control panel (Dashboard) and its far greater percentage of users (e.g., staff and volunteers who are familiar with the system), this, in our view, puts WordPress on top.

Sources: PC Tech Magazine, WP for Beginners, W3Techs, Sitepoint, Quora, Randy Morris.

This article was originally published on 17 June 2017

WordPress for Nonprofits

July 31, 2020/in Special/by webguy

WordPress is the go-to content management system platform for your nonprofit organization. Its user-friendly interface will inspire you to develop your nonprofit marketing to its full potential.