Using Google Tools As Reasearch Tool For NGO

Using Google Tools As Reasearch Tool For NGO a case study of philanthropy website. 

Keyword Search: Philanthropy

With the growing prevalence of key word search engines has come alongside the benefit ofa rather helpful research tool for an unfamiliar topic. Using the example of Philanthropy, this document will explore the many ways it can benefit research.




An initial Google Search of your topic will link you to some associated search terms. So for example, for philanthropy I used an online encyclopaedia, dictionary, thesaurus and news article. This aided in providing me with my main buzz words.

The next stage of my research involved the use of the Keyword software website – Ubersuggest (http://Ubersugggest.org). It provides an extended version of the Google Suggestions that appear in the search tool. You simply enter a search term, choose a region, and press suggest.




Ubersuggest provides an extremely quick search and within seconds you can receive up to 300 results. A disadvantage, however, is that it doesn’t offer any insight as to how popular each search query is. So, for example, when I searched “Philanthropy”, many of the Uber-suggestions were of misspellings of the word “philanthropy.” As there is no form of filter many of the results are irrelevant such as “Metal Gear Solid: Philanthropy” – a video game which has no bearing of significance to my research.


I began by searching for Human Welfare. And then I repeated this method with all my buzz words found in my initial research. Ubersuggest doesn’t have any way of searching for more than one keyword at a time, thus has to be done one-by-one. Whilst this wasn’t time consuming for me, if you had a lot of data which need be extracted, this could prove to be monotonous. 

To retrieve all this search data easily and extract it into Excel choose the “Select All Keyword Functions”:








In order to delete any doubling I highlighted the whole column, chose the “Data” tab and clicked “Remove Duplicates.”
Next, after all the duplicates had been removed, I used the “Sort” button to arrange the results alphabetically.  

This is where Excel surpasses other programs as it is an extremely quick and efficient method of sorting through the search results from Ubersuggest; although it does little for excluding anomalies.



Once my results were sorted I created Tree-Maps in excel to display my results. This provided a nice visual aid of my results.






For reliable and current statistics for my research I used Google Trends (www.google.co.uk/trends)







Here you can find out the number of searches in each year, regional interest and related searches.

Google AdWords

Google AdWords gets a website to the top of searches in the form of prominent ‘sponsored links’ on the google search page.
How does Google AdWords work?
•    You create a simple advert by choosing keywords and phrases that are relevant to your business.
•    Whenever anyone uses these keywords whilst searching: a link to your website will appear
•    Thus Google AdWords is an effective marketing technique, as the audience who see your advert are already searching for your business.

How to choose the perfect keywords?

•    It’s vital to choose relevant words and phrases that will bring an audience that want to be your customer.
•    Quality is more important than quantity: Google AdWords charge on a ‘pay-per-click’ policy, thus getting huge traffic into your website isn’t important, if they are there for the wrong reasons.

Positives of Google Ad-words

•    AdWords ads can be really helpful if you’re looking to drive traffic to your site quickly. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) can take weeks, sometimes months to take effect. AdWords is instant.

•    You can be up and running on AdWords in a very short space of time. While there is a lot more to AdWords than just campaigns, ad groups, keywords and ads, these are the building blocks. And you can set them up very quickly. Do a bit of keyword research, decide on your budget, set up a campaign and a few ad groupsand away you go! Your ads will appear as soon as they’ve been approved, which could be instantaneous.

•    You have the chance to appear on the first page of the Internet’s largest search engine! And what does that mean? Unprecedented exposure! And you’re appearing to someone who’s actively searching for what you offer when they really need it.

•    AdWords doesn’t have to be expensive. Sure, if you’re a personal injury lawyer, you might be looking at a cost per click of about £50-£60, but if you’re not, it’s quite easy for small businesses to set up small, tightly optimised campaigns and reap the benefits. You can specify how much you’re willing to spend, and set your maximum cost per click for your keywords, and then you only pay for clicks. This allows you to maintain control of your spend.

Negatives of Google Ad-words

•    You pay for clicks. That means that you pay whenever someone clicks on your ad, regardless of whether that click converted or not. So you may get clicks from visitors who have no intention of ever buying your product or service.

•    You are restricted by the amount of characters you’re allowed. 25 in the headline, 35 each in the two lines of text and 35 in the display URL. And you ideally need to include an attention-grabbing headline, keywords, benefits and a call to action in that.

•    It can be tricky. There’s a rather steep learning curve when it comes to AdWords, and mistakes may cost you dear. You need to invest quite a lot of time after the campaign’s been set up to ensure that it has been done so properly. And then you need to keep monitoring it to find out what’s converting and what’s not, and so on.

•    Google looks at the quality of your landing pages too, so if your website is not up to scratch in terms of relevancy to the search query, so you can’t just rely on AdWords to get you traffic and neglect your SEO. Make sure your landing pages are good, and that they relate to what’s in your ads. This will improve your Quality Score, which will mean you pay less for your clicks.

What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

As opposed to Google Ad-words, this is what is known as ‘organic search.’ Search engine optimization (SEO) can be described as strategies and tactics used to ensure that a site is accessible to a search engine and improves the chances that the site will be found by the search engine.
The goal of successful SEO is to obtain a high-ranking placement in the search results page of a search engine (e.g. Google, Bing, Yahoo and other search engines).  Internet users often do not click through pages and pages of search results, so where a site ranks in a search is essential for directing more traffic toward the site.
The higher a website naturally ranks in organic results of a search, the greater the chance that that site will be visited by a user.

SEO vs Google Ad-words

•    SEO takes longer than Adwords to get results but can assist you in getting high rank in Google for an amount of key search terms.
•    There’s no charge per click linked with the organic search results. But, on the other hand requires a typically small ongoing expenditure to sustain your search engine rankings.
•    Adwords can be switched on and off instantaneously while SEO can take a lot longer to make an effect on search results.
•    Adwords more or less assurance your business is being displayed in the search results. There are numerous of ways people can search for you, your business or your products and services. There’s no assurance you’ll rank in the organic search results but you’re just about guaranteed a ranking with Adwords
•    AdWords pulls instant traffic from the start of the campaign. This is useful for new websites or services and products that are seasonal.
•    Adwords targets abundant variations that you have around particular keywords
•    Adwords ads are displayed on top of the organic listings. On some screens this frequently denotes all the visitor sees.

The website Phylantrophy of Vietnam  in this case study is HERE

By Amir - Minh Vu