Nonprofits
A group site does one job. Then it stops.
Groups die on the web when the homepage tries to be everything: a donate button, a shop, a blog, a volunteer form, and a hidden PDF of last year’s gala. Pick the next step. Put it in the first screen. The rest can wait. A nonprofit website on a budget is not a smaller version of a university portal. It is one job per URL: who you help, what you need, how to give or apply. Honest copy. No fake contests. No “national prize.” No stock of smiling strangers who are not your people.
Most standard jobs finish in under 72 hours when the brief is clear. A hosted website is $49/mo, hosting included on $49/month. This shop also builds photo-fundraiser programs (calendars, shirts, keepsakes) on other domains. That is a bigger machine than a brochure. Tell us which you want. Do not pay brochure money and expect a store.
One job, then stop
If the urgent need is donations, the first screen is who you help in one sentence, a real photo, and a give button pointed at the tool you already use — PayPal, Stripe, Tithe.ly, a bank link, a donor-advised form. We do not invent a second donation machine you will not check. If the urgent need is volunteers, the first screen is the shift, the town, the form. If the urgent need is applications, the first screen is who qualifies and a form or a PDF you will actually read. Three first screens is no first screen.
Board bios can wait. A 40-page archive of minutes can wait. A shop of leftover gala mugs can wait, or it can be a link to the shop you already have. A blog you will not write is a date stamp that says 2021 forever. Skip it. About can be a short true paragraph: who, where, 501(c)(3) if that is real, who to email. Forms notify a box you staff. On our sites that box is tampasbestdj@gmail.com. Yours should be a human who answers.
| Primary job | First screen | Buy |
|---|---|---|
| Volunteer / join | The shift, the town, a form | Same |
| Apply / get help | Who qualifies, how, a form or a real PDF | Same |
| Event this weekend | Time, map, what to bring | $49 hosted is often enough |
| Store + donate + blog + portal | That is several products | Quoted. Not this price |
What a budget still has to include
HTTPS. A phone or email a person can use without an account. Hours or “we answer in two days.” Photos of the actual work — the animals, the meals, the cleanup, the kids you have permission to show. If you cannot show faces, show hands, spaces, objects. Do not use a stock family from a library. Donors can tell. Volunteers can tell. Title, meta, Open Graph so a share in a group is not a blank square. That is basic SEO. It is not a ranking prize. We do not promise #1 for “best charity.” We do not sell fake awards to put above the fold.
Google Business Profile still matters if you have a door. Claim it. Match the name and the phone to the site. Put the URL in the website field. If you are a service area without a public office, say that instead of a fake suite. We will not put a fake street address on the page. We will not add LocalBusiness markup with a made-up NAP. That is how you train Google to send people to a building you do not occupy.
Money, honestly
$49/month is a page: name, one sentence, how to give or show up, a few photos. We also do not charge extra because you are a church or a 501(c)(3). Same product. Worldwide, 24/7.
If a grant wants a URL, a simple page is enough to be a URL. If a corporate sponsor wants a “portal,” ask them what they mean. Often they mean a page with their logo and a PDF. That is brochure work. Sometimes they mean a login. Live work here includes Pets Helping Pets and US Helping the World — this shop’s own sites, not a fake client reel. See /work and /for/nonprofits. Phone (813) 328-6079 if you want a human to say which product you are actually describing.
Free next step: paste the URL you send donors now — or the Facebook page you have been using as a site.