Change your business address
If you're a full access user, you can update your business, registered, mailing and personal addresses within Online for Business and the Business banking app.
A guide to SEO for charities, clubs, and societies
Boosting your visibility online can be an effective way to raise awareness, engage donors, and reach a wider audience. Search Engine Optimisation, or SEO, is one way of doing that. This guide will cover how SEO works, best practices and more, to support your organisation.
Read time: 8 mins Added: 03/02/26
What is SEO?
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation. It’s the process of making your website more visible on Google and other search engines.
SEO means optimising content to closely match what people search for online. The goal is to rank your website high on the search engine results page (SERP) for specific searches. A higher rank could bring more visitors to your site.
Understanding SEO principles can allow organisations to:
- compete with larger groups and/or websites
- build credibility by appearing at the top of the SERP
- drive organic traffic without relying on paid ads.
The SERPs are split into organic search and paid search. The sponsored section at the top, and sometimes the bottom, are where companies have paid to promote their website. Organic search results are free and make up the rest of the results.
How does SEO work?
SEO works by aligning your website to relevant search queries. Search engine algorithms decide who ranks. They consider many factors, including relevance, internal and external links, and metadata.
The main areas of SEO are:
-
Off-page SEO focuses on building your website's reputation and authority in line with SEO best practices. This involves elements outside of your website, in other words, off the page.
Methods include:
- Backlinks: Earning high-quality links from reputable websites as a vote of confidence.
- Social media: Building an online presence for brand awareness can help increase website traffic.
- Influencer outreach: Collaborating with influencers to promote your content to audiences can also encourage users to visit your website.
-
Technical SEO involves optimising your website’s backend to improve its performance. It allows search engines to crawl, index, and understand your website through:
- Crawlability: Helping search engine bots navigate and access your website’s pages.
- Indexability: Letting search engines store and organise your pages in their search index.
- Page speed: Optimising your website’s loading speed, which impacts the user experience.
- Mobile-friendliness: Making sure your site is easy to use on mobile devices.
-
To rank well in the SERP, your website should include relevant keywords. A keyword is a word, query, or phrase that people use when looking up something online.
By doing keyword research, you can identify the words people use in search engines to find services, products, or information.
You can then look at search volume, user intent, and other SEO metrics to see if these words are good targets. This lets you narrow down the best keywords and create content that attracts users to your site.
On-page SEO involves optimising your website’s content to improve its relevance and visibility. On-page SEO focuses on the content on your page and how it captures search intent, supported by:
- HTML tags: Titles, metadata, and headings give a clear summary of the page's content for indexing.
- URLs: Descriptive and keyword-rich URLS give search engines and users context. This explains what the page will be about.
- Images: Alt text helps accessibility and provides context to the image.
- Internal links: Linking to relevant pages improves navigation and site structure.
Keep AI in mind
AI is shifting and shaping the way we use search engines. Google often uses its AI Overviews at the top of the SERP to pull out the content that best answers the search query. This helps users quickly reference the information.
AI needs websites to adapt. Search queries generated by AI are more conversational, with question-and-answer-style copy performing best. This type of content should perform better and allow organisations to move into those wanted top spots.
Many websites have experienced a drop in traffic because of AI. Users can quickly find what they need from the overview. They don't need to click through for more information. Google has more information about AI and search.
7 SEO tips for beginners
1. Carry out keyword research
Keyword research is important for any SEO content strategy. Think about the words and phrases your target audience might use when searching. Google Search Console and other free SEO tools can show you the terms people use to find your site. They can also help you identify gaps in the market for new content ideas.
2. Craft high-quality, relevant content
Turn your relevant search terms into engaging, SEO-friendly content, addressing the needs of your audience. Consider blog posts about your cause, guides on how people can get involved, or success stories. Improve your content with relevant images, videos, and infographics.
3. Optimise page title and meta content
Implementing keywords in your meta content can improve your site’s search visibility. For each web page, consider the following SEO best practices:
- page titles under 60 characters
- meta descriptions between 120 and 155 characters
- clear H1 tags and H2 and H3 subheadings
- image alt text for improved accessibility.
4. Earn links from other websites
Earning links from credible websites builds authority and trust in your website. A good backlink comes from an authoritative site that’s relevant to your brand in some way.
5. Think about the user experience
User experience (UX) is crucial for turning visitors into supporters. Make sure your website is responsive and easy to use on mobile devices. Use clear, simple menus so visitors can find your mission, how to donate, and ways to get involved. Make sure your site is responsive, fast-loading, and easy to navigate on mobile devises as well as desktop.
6. Make your site secure
Enable Hyper Transfer Protocol Secure (HTTPS) on your site to make your site more secure, protect users and their data.
7. Make sure your site is accessible
An accessible website is a site that everyone can use. That includes those with impairments, disabilities, and restrictions. Website accessibility builds trust and credibility. It can also show that your organisation aligns with inclusion, equality, and other core values.
Learn more about making your site accessible from the Web Accessibility Initiative.
Local SEO
Free SEO tools everyone should know
Here are some free SEO tools from Google you can use to track and improve SEO.
Google SEO tools
- Google Search Console: Shows the performance of individual pages and keywords visitors use to find you.
- Google Analytics: Shows how visitors find and interact with your site and the actions they take on your pages.
- Google Keyword Planner: Helps find relevant keywords for your content and campaigns.
- Google Trends: Shows popular search topics at any given time for you to find relevant and timely content ideas.
- Google Page Speed Insights: Analyses your site’s speed and user experience on desktop and mobile.
There are a lot more SEO tools out there. Most of them will need a subscription but some offer free accounts or a limited amount of data for free.
How to write SEO optimised content
Here are some SEO writing tips to make your on-page content shine.
How to track SEO performance
Summary
Try these tips and tricks to improve your SEO. They can help increase traffic to your website and improve accessibility.
For more information on getting started with SEO, check out Google’s SEO Starter Guide.