37 Must-Have Strategies to Better Engage Website Visitors, Part 4

By Joe Boland

35. View search results to explore how people find your site
You want to know where your traffic is coming from so you can understand more about your audience and optimize the tools people use to find you.

36. Test-drive your donation page
Kapin shared this tip from Jocelyn Harmon, VP of sales and marketing at Network for Good: You should give a friend $10 to make a donation on your website and ask him or her to try and break your donation page. If he or she does, chances are someone else visiting your site could encounter the same problem. Also, get your friend's feedback on the user experience.

"You can learn so much from just asking a friend to do this," Kapin said.

37. A/B test the donation landing page to find the best conversion
Simple things such as color can make a big difference, just like in direct mail, so it's important to test. For example, the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund changed its submit button to "Support Haiti" and saw a 15 percent increase in donations raised per page view, Kapin said, and making the donation form a single column increased donations as well.

"A/B testing is really important for donation pages to raise money," she said. "Raising another million dollars off an A/B test is significant."