WHAT A TV SEGMENT TAUGHT ME ABOUT SEO
Recently, a nonprofit I work with was featured on the local news. One of our programs was featured in a segment, and at the end, they encouraged people to learn more and sign up at the web address splashed up on the screen. Great segment. Couldn’t have been happier.
Until I looked more closely.
They didn’t list our main website. They listed our yearly festival website.
What. The. Heck?
The segment had nothing to do with the festival. I immediately reached out to the Executive Director to see if this was something he had arranged. Nope! So I contacted the reporter and asked if they could correct the website URL. Her response stopped me in my tracks:
“When you Google the nonprofit name, your main website doesn’t show up. The festival site is what comes up first. I couldn't even find your main website.”
😳
She apologized and said she’d request a correction, but at that point, I knew we had a bigger problem: somehow, our SEO was working against us. And so I started digging.
I asked the Executive Director to do a Google search from his device. Sure enough, the festival website popped up first. In a way, it made sense; we had been promoting it heavily for weeks. But he confirmed the reporter’s story that our main website wasn’t showing up at all, even further down the page on Google.
This was in stark contrast to my own Google search which proudly featured our main website as the first result! So I kept going. I asked a few of my coworkers to do the same search from their own devices. And guess what? We all got different search results. Some saw our main site. Some saw the festival site. Somehow our Instagram page managed to consistently get first page ranking (thanks IG!).
Mind. Blown.
Turns out, what you see on Google isn’t universal. Your search results are influenced by:
Your location
Your search history
Your device
And even whether you're logged into a Google account
So while I might see one thing, a news producer at a TV station may see something completely different. It was really frustrating in the moment, but it was a great reminder that SEO isn’t static; it needs constant tweaking and updating to stay relevant and effective.
What I learned about SEO
SEO is the art and science of helping people find your website online. And in our case, we had accidentally trained Google to favor our festival site over our main one.
Why? It was probably a combination of the fact that::
The festival site got more recent traffic.
It had more external links pointing to it.
It was more actively promoted through ads and social media.
The festival site was recently optimized for mobile.
This whole experience reminded me of the importance of:
Using Keywords Wisely
Make sure your site includes clear, consistent language about who you are and what you do. For us, we weren’t using the name of the organization prominently on our homepage. But the festival site was! That was a missed opportunity.
Tip: Include your organization’s name in page titles, URLs, and headers. Search engines prioritize that.Updating Your Site Frequently
Google likes fresh content. The content on our main site hadn’t been updated in a while, but the festival site had new blog posts, ticketing info, and event announcements every week.
Tip: Post news, updates, or blog entries regularly, even short ones. It signals that your site is active and relevant.Using Descriptive Page Titles and Meta Descriptions
Each page on your site should have a unique title and meta description that tells search engines (and people!) what the page is about.
Tip: Avoid generic page names like “Home” or “About.” Instead, try “About [Org Name] – Our Mission and History.”Linking Internally and Externally
Link to your own content (like blog posts, event pages, and resources), and get other reputable websites to link to you too. This tells search engines your content is credible.
Tip: Whenever you’re featured in a news story or collaborate with another group, ask them to link directly to your main site.Optimizing Your Site for Mobile
Mobile-optimized websites provide a smoother, faster, and more intuitive browsing experience for users on mobile devices. This results in lower bounce rates and higher user engagement - two critical factors for SEO.
Tip: If you get a lot of traffic from social media or if many of your email newsletter subscribers open your emails on mobile, that’s a sign that you need to prioritize mobile-optimization for your website. Hire a web designer that designs for mobile first.
I thought I understood how SEO worked, until I saw how many variables actually influence what shows up in search results. It’s a moving target. But with the right tools and strategy, we can help Google find the right site next time. And hopefully, the next time we’re on TV, our main website gets the spotlight it deserves.
—RK
