Search advertising delivers immediate, measurable returns. For every dollar spent on fundraising search ads, nonprofits raised $2.23 in 2024, maintaining its position as the highest-performing digital channel year after year.
Why it matters
The temptation to maximize immediate return on advertising spend (ROAS) is real. When search delivers more than double what you invest, it's easy to pour everything into that channel and call it success.
But here's what immediate ROAS misses: the major donor whose first touchpoint may have been a display ad three years ago. The volunteer might have seen your awareness campaign and now runs your peer-to-peer fundraising. The board member who discovered you through a "failed" brand campaign.
These aren't failures of your advertising. They're investments in relationships that immediate ROAS can't capture.
Your mission isn't a quarterly earnings report. The pressure for instant returns is real, but the organizations thriving right now have figured out how to balance both: accepting that some campaigns will "lose" money in the short term while building the audience that sustains them long term.
Do this
- Balance your advertising mix strategically. While search deserves investment for its strong returns, allocate budget to awareness campaigns that build long-term supporter pipelines, even if they show lower immediate ROAS.
- Track engagement metrics alongside donation metrics. Create attribution models that capture non-monetary actions like email signups, content shares, and event registrations that indicate future donor potential.
- Have honest conversations with leadership about what growth actually looks like. Not every valuable action has a donate button attached, and your board needs to understand that building relationships takes time.
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