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By Jane Atkinson
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Currently, membership management settings are used for determining who receives the various emails regarding new member opt-ins. You can also make the system automatically send the New Member Welcome Email immediately after a new member clicks the approval link in the new member opt-in email.
Any one of the club officers can be selected from the pull-down menus.
The default is the website admin, if no one else is chosen; it's necessary for someone to receive these emails.
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Effective May 25, 2018
Cookie Policy
Our Cookie Policy explains what cookies are, how we use cookies, and what your choices are regarding cookies.
What are cookies?
Cookies are small text files stored on your computer by the web site you visit. Cookies usually remember your personal or website settings, such as your preferred language or address. Later, when you visit the same website, your browser returns these text files belonging to that website. This enables the website to display information adjusted to your preferences.
Which cookies do we use and why?
We use cookies to enhance your experience and allow you to customise your settings. Some examples include hiding member photos in the agenda and hiding the Toastmasters Convention advertisement. A cookie is also used to "remember" that you are logged in. Another notes that you've agreed to accept cookies.
In some cases, your browser will store cookies from other sites (3rd-party cookies). The main example is Google Analytics, which is used by some clubs for analysing their website traffic.
What are your choices regarding cookies
By disabling cookies, you decide to not allow cookies to be stored on your computer. You can do this by clicking on the "I do not agree to the policy" button in the dialogue box that appears when you first visit a site. Cookie settings can also be controlled and configured in your browser.
Please note, however, that by blocking cookies you will still be able to browse Toastmastersclubs websites, but some of the features will not be available. In particular, you won't be able to login.
Changes to our Cookie Policy
Any changes we may make to our Cookie Policy in the future will be posted on this page. Please check back frequently to be informed on any updates or changes to our Cookie Policy. This Cookie Policy replaces any previous cookie policies.
Contact
Questions, comments and requests regarding this Cookie Policy can be made on our support site.
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Effective May 25, 2018
Your Privacy Matters
FreeToastHost 2 is a free website provider, content management system, and email list server for the exclusive use of Toastmasters clubs and districts in good standing. Use of this system is strictly for purposes of Toastmasters related activities and business. We take privacy very seriously and it is our intention to be transparent about the data we collect about you, how it is used and with whom it is shared.
This Privacy and Cookie Policy applies when you use our website system or email list server (described below). We offer our users choices about the data we collect, use and share as described here.
Table of Contents:
- Introduction
- Data We Collect
- How We Use Your Data
- How We Share Information
- Your Choices & Obligations
- Other Important Information
Introduction
We are a free website provider, content management system, and email list server for the exclusive use of Toastmasters clubs and districts in good standing. Toastmasters clubs and districts use our system and services to greatly simplify the effort needed to produce a good website while additionally making use of custom FreeToastHost provided functionality for club operations and communications. Our Privacy and Cookie Policy applies to any Member, District Leader or Visitor making use of our websites, our email system or other FreeToastHost provided services.
Our registered users ("Members" or "District Leaders") share their contact information to communicate with other Members and District Leaders, engage with other Members or District Leaders in their club or District, sign up for meeting roles online, post and view relevant website content, and learn new communications and leadership skills in the Toastmasters educational programs. Content and data on some of our Services is viewable to non-members ("Visitors").
We use the term "Designated Countries" to refer to countries in the European Union (EU), European Economic Area (EEA), and Switzerland.
Services
This Privacy and Cookie Policy applies to your use of our Services.
This Privacy Policy applies to www.toastmastersclubs.org, all sub-domains of www.toastmastersclubs.org, the FreeToastHost support website (support.toastmastersclubs.org), FreeToastHost websites using a user-registered custom domain, and associated communications and services ("Services"), but excluding services that state that they are offered under a different privacy policy.
Data Controllers and Contracting Parties
Your personal data is stored on and controlled by our FreeToastHost server located at IP address 50.19.253.65
As a Visitor or Member of our Services, the collection, use and sharing of your personal data is subject to this Privacy and Cookie Policy and updates.
Change
Changes to the Privacy Policy apply to your use of our Services after the "effective date."
FreeToastHost ("we" or "us") can modify this Privacy and Cookie Policy, and if we make material changes to it, we will provide notice via email, or by other means, to provide you the opportunity to review the changes. If you object to any changes, you may request deletion of your FreeToastHost website.
You acknowledge that your continued use of our Services after we publish or send a notice about our changes to this Privacy and Cookie Policy means that the collection, use and sharing of your personal data is subject to the updated Privacy and Cookie Policy.
1. Data We Collect
1.1 Data You Provide To Us
You provide data to create a FreeToastHost website (website administrator's contact information) and Members / District Leaders provide data as part of being registered with the club or district website, respectively.
Registration
To create a FreeToastHost website you need to provide data including your name, email address, and the club or district number that you are requesting a website for as the new website's administrator. Upon approval by recognized club or district "authorities" (e.g., email address on toastmasters.org), the administrator will receive an email via the provided email address containing link to set their administrator password. The website administrator is a "superuser" role recognized by the FreeToastHost system for administration of club / district websites. Only one registered website administrator is recognized by the system, but the website administrator has the ability to delegate certain administrator functions to club / district officers.
The website administrator is a distinct role recognized by the system and does not have a profile, per se, as the role is associated with the regular club or district website maintenance and administration. The website administrator does not have to be a registered Member / District Leader in the website.
To become a registered users of a FreeToastHost website as a Club Member or District Leader, you generally need to provide your name and email address, at a minimum to the club / district website administrator or their delegate to be entered into the website. You can optionally provide a phone number that is only visible to other registered users of the website. When you are registered, you can gain access to other club members / district leaders contact information by requesting a new password link be emailed to you when you log in.
You can still use the website if you do not provide an email address, but you will experience fewer benefits from using the website if you do that. You would not be able to receive emails from the club / district distribution lists, you would not be able to receive emailed meeting agendas, and you would not be able to receive notifications from the website intended to be of benefit to you. The system does contain a number of settings available via your Member Profile to enable you to control which notifications you would like to receive and which you do not want to receive.
Once you have obtained a Club Member / District Leader password for your club / district website, you can access and edit your member profile to optionally add additional details about yourself and set your website usage preferences.
Profile
You have choices about the information on your profile, such as a secondary email address, your phone number, your Toastmasters member number, your email preferences, your social media links, a short biographical summary, and your photo. You don't have to provide additional information on your profile; however, profile information helps you to get more from your website, including facilitating familiarity and communication with other club members / district leaders, enabling you to easily sign up for Toastmasters meeting roles, and helping your club or district attract other members and district leaders. It's your choice whether to allow your name, biographical information, and photo to be listed on the club/district's Meet Our Members web page—by default, that is disabled. Please do not post or add sensitive personal data to your profile.
By default, when a new member or district leader is added to a FreeToastHost website, the "Allow Administrator Edits to my Profile" setting is enabled to allow the member to quickly be added to the system (with the administrator's assistance). However, once the member is registered in the system, gets their password, and obtains access to their member profile, this setting can be disabled to prevent further changes to the profile by the website administrator or their delegate. If the member chooses to leave this setting enabled, they will be notified whenever someone other than themselves has edited their profile.
1.2 Data From Others
Website Content
You and others may post content that includes information about you (as part of web pages, meeting agendas, meeting notices, forum posts, comments, member emails, and videos) using our website system. FreeToastHost does not make use of this information for any reason other than to compose web pages for your club / district website.
Contact Information
We may receive personal data (including contact information) about you when you complete the Contact Us form or send messages using our email services.
Toastmasters International
We may receive publicly available contact information from Toastmasters International (e.g., information published on Find a Club pages).
1.3 Service Use
We log your visits, use of our websites, use of our email services, and file uploads to our websites. If your club / district has elected to use Google Analytics, then the pages you visit on the website will also be logged via that service.
We use log-ins, cookies, device information and internet protocol ("IP") addresses to identify you and log your use.
1.4 Cookies and Other Similar Technologies
We collect data through cookies and similar technologies.
As further described in our Cookie Policy, we use cookies and similar technologies (e.g., HTML5 local storage and device identifiers) to recognize you and/or your device(s) on, off and across different websites and devices. We also allow some others to use cookies as described in our Cookie Policy (e.g. Google Analytics). You can control cookies through your browser settings and other tools.
1.5 Your Device and Location
We may receive data from your devices and networks, including location data.
When you visit our websites, we receive the URL of the site you came from. We also get information about your IP address, proxy server, operating system, web browser and add-ons, device identifier and features, and/or ISP or your mobile carrier.
1.6 Messages
If you communicate through our email services, those communications are logged for troubleshooting purposes. (All emails through the system are logged.)
We collect information about you when you send, receive, or engage with messages in connection with our websites and email services.
1.7 Other
We are often improving the FreeToastHost website system, which means we get new data and create new ways to use data.
Our system is dynamic, and we often introduce new features, which may require the collection of new information. If we collect materially different personal data or materially change how we use your data, we will notify you and may also modify this Privacy and Cookie Policy.
2. How We Use Your Data
We use your data to provide, support, personalize and develop the FreeToastHost Website System and email services.
How we use your personal data will depend on which website features you use, how you use those website features and the choices you make in your website settings member profiles. We use the data that we have about you to provide custom websites and personalize user experiences, including email, including with the help of automated systems and inferences we make, so that they can be more relevant and useful to you and others.
2.1 Services
Our services provide free websites, custom Toastmasters-focused functionality (e.g., meeting agendas), and email communications for Toastmasters in good standing.
We use your data to authorize access to our Services.
Websites for Toastmasters Clubs and Districts
Using our website template, we provide websites filled in with your custom content for a appealing website that represents your club or district.
Custom Functionality
FreeToastHost provides some custom functionality such as online meeting agendas that are intended to simplify Toastmasters club operations. You are not obligated to used this custom functionality—it can be disabled.
Email Communications
We provide an email list server that supports email distribution lists and officer email addresses. You can also create custom email addresses and distribution lists.
2.2 Communications
We contact you and enable communications between Members. We offer settings to control what messages you receive and how often you receive some types of messages (e.g, meeting notifications).
We will contact you through email or messages viewable when you log in to your website. We will send you messages about the availability of our services, security, or other service-related issues. We may also send messages about system updates, reminders, documentation updates, and useful forum posts from our support forums. Please be aware that you cannot opt-out of receiving service messages from us, including security and legal notices.
2.3 Developing Services and Research
We continue to develop our system and may collect usage data or conduct surveys to determine how to best use our limited resources for further development.
Service Development
We use information, including public feedback, from our support forums, database queries, and user surveys to inform our decisions about how to further develop the FreeToastHost website system in order to provide you and others with a better, more intuitive and personalized experience and facilitate good communications.
Surveys
Polls and surveys may be conducted by us and others through our support forums. You are not obligated to respond to polls or surveys, and you have choices about the information you provide.
2.4 Customer Support
We use data to help you and fix problems. We may collect debugging information in testing logs when troubleshooting a problem that could include personal information. This debugging information is flushed from the system regularly.
We use the data (which can include your communications) to investigate, respond to and resolve complaints and FreeToastHost system issues (e.g., bugs).
2.5 Aggregate Insights
We use data to generate aggregate insights. This is typically done via database queries to determine what settings have been changed from the default settings.
Clubs and districts may collect additional information via services such as Google Analytics which tracks what web pages are being accessed.
2.6 Security and Investigations
We use data for security, fraud prevention and investigations.
We use your data (including your communications) if we think it's necessary for security purposes or to investigate possible fraud or other violations of our Terms of Use Agreement or this Privacy and Cookie Policy and/or attempts to harm or mislead our Members, District Leaders or Visitors.
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This article is intended to give some specifics on the features and functionality in FreeToastHost that support Toastmasters Pathways education program.
As of the time of this writing, there are two specific areas that are Pathways related and one area that was developed in the past with Pathways in mind.
1. All Pathways projects have been incorporated into our project selection drop-down in the Meeting Agenda module. This drop-down includes a filter to assist you in finding your desired project, whether it is a Pathways project or a project in the Traditional Toastmasters Program. Additionally, the relevant project details show up in the Role Reports. The projects of the Traditional Toastmasters Education program will be moved to the bottom of this drop-down after the spring of 2018, and will be removed from the drop-down after the 2-year Pathways transition period is over.
2. FreeToastHost has special functionality in it to support Base Camp notifications to be routed to the 3 club officers designated as possible Base Camp Managers: the Club President, the Vice President of Education, and the Club Secretary.. If you insert either the club contact-####@toastmastersclubs.org email address or a FreeToastHost provided officer email address (e.g. vpm-#####@toastmastersclubs.org) for your club's contact email address in the Toastmasters Find a Club page, then any Base Camp notification emails will be automatically re-routed to the three officer roles designated as Base Camp Managers. Please see "Updating club contact on Toastmasters International site" to read how to update this club contact email address.
If you are uncertain what your Club Contact email address is, any club officer can determine this by logging to the Toastmasters.org website and checking the Meeting settings in Club Central.
NOTE 1: If you use the contact-####@toastmastersclubs.org email address for your club contact email address in Find a Club, remember to verify that the this email address is enabled in the Email and Contact Forms module. It must be explicitly enabled for it to work. See "Email and Contact Forms" for more details.
NOTE 2: It does not matter which roles or people you actually have set for your club contacts in your Email Settings. There is no connection between who you set and who gets the Base Camp Notifications. It only matters that you use either the contact-####@toastmastersclubs.org email address or a FreeToastHost officer email address (e.g. one of the president/vpe/vpm/vppr/treasurer/secretary/saa email addresses) as your Club Contact email address for Find-A-Club. Then the re-routing of Base Camp notifications will happen automatically.
Since Base Camp will always send its notification emails to the club contact email address entered in Find a Club, but this address is often used for communications with new potential club members, this special re-routing provided by FreeToastHost is intended as an improvement to the default Base Camp email notification functionality.
FreeToastHost accomplishes this re-routing by examining the email address that the email was sent from and changes its behavior if a Base Camp notification email is detected. To illustrate this, lets imagine a hypothetical club #123456 that has entered its vppr officer email address (
SUCCESS (User Email) Thu 2018/04/05 00:25:23 UTC Club:[123456] From:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ()] To:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. >This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ] CC:[] Subject:[toastmasters first visit]
This is just a normal email from a non-member to the vppr email officer email address, which FreeToastHost then forwards to the VPPR's actual email address. Now consider what happens if Base Camp sends a notification to the same email address:
SUCCESS (User Email) Sun 2018/04/29 23:50:17 UTC Club:[123456] From:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ()] To:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. >This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ] CC:[] Subject:[A member submitted a level completion request]
SUCCESS (User Email) Sun 2018/04/29 23:50:17 UTC Club:[123456] From:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ()] To:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. >This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ] CC:[] Subject:[A member submitted a level completion request]
SUCCESS (User Email) Sun 2018/04/29 23:50:18 UTC Club:[123456] From:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ()] To:[This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. >This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ] CC:[] Subject:[A member submitted a level completion request]
In this case, even though the same VPPR email address used corresponds to one person, FreeToastHost has detected that "From:" address indicates that it is a Base Camp notification, and it redirects the email to the actual email addresses for the Club President, VP Education, and Secretary.
This special re-routing happens whenever the contact-####@toastmastersclubs.org address or any officer email address is used for club contact email address in Find a Club, and FreeToastHost detects that an email is coming from
3. Pathways encourages mentoring as part of the educational program. Mentoring-specific features were added to FreeToastHost a few years ago when it became apparent that there would be greater emphasis on it moving forward. FreeToastHost allows multiple mentors to be assigned to a club member--see Assigning Mentors to Members. FreeToastHost supports mentors and mentees getting in communication quickly by sending emails to each of them containing their respective contact information. Additionally, there are mentoring reports available in the Membership Management module. (look at "Membership Reports" in Membership Tools) There are also specific mentors and mentees email distribution lists to allow easy communications with current mentors and mentees. Lastly, FreeToastHost can be configured such that mentors are notified when their respective mentees take or drop a meeting role.
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This article is large, but don't let it frighten you. You can follow it a little at a time. Life is busy, and you shouldn't expect to try all this in one day or even in one week. If it takes a month or two, don't fret; you'd have been doing something in that time anyway. Concentrate less on getting it all done and more on doing each part well. And remember, every little bit helps.
Here are a few links to help you find your way around:
1 - Making Sure Google can Find You
2 - Try a few Experiments - Keyword research
3 - Decide which keywords and phrases are important for your club
5 - Adding quality content to match the keywords
What in the world does Google want?
The good news is, they want a good website -- and so do your site's visitors. As we go through the steps to pleasing Google, we'll probably bring more visitors to our club's meetings, even without an increase in the Google ranking.
Part of Google's business is to help us find exactly what we want on the web, as quickly and as pleasantly as possible. The happier we are with their performance, the more likely we'll use them again, instead of Yahoo or Bing. When we type keywords into Google, it wants to show us the very best sites that matched our query. Almost everything else here will help that to include our sites.
In your community, there are people who want to improve their speaking and communication skills. In this exercise you'll probably find plenty of non-Toastmasters competition who also want to reach them. When people ask Google for help with public speaking, your site must hold its own with all that competition, and Google has to see it. We have to help.
We must never try to "game" the system. If we try to make our site look better than it is, Google can put a penalty on us. That is, if they spot us trying to fool them, they will lower our ranking.
Google isn't trying to turn this into an opaque puzzle or a power game. When someone wants to become a better speaker, Google wants to find the best and most helpful sites for them. We're going to give them what they want.
By the way, Google has published a little guide to help us understand what they're looking for:
https://static.googleusercontent.com/media/www.google.com/en//webmasters/docs/search-engine-optimization-starter-guide.pdf
Here, we'll be looking to use fewer technical terms, and we'll be pointing you to a lot of FTH-specific controls. In a Toastmaster'ish way, we'll cover a lot of Google's suggestions but Google's guide is very worth your time to read.
The Preliminaries.
Before we play around with your site, let's find out what needs to be done for your unique place on the web, and in the real world.
1) Make Sure Google can Find You
Google may seem like magic, but the rabbits are all hidden in some logical place. It's most likely they'll find you when other sites link to you. Google just crawls along all the trails, and makes extensive notes.
1a. Make sure you can be found through Find A Club on www.toastmasters.org. Test it. This makes sure there's at least one link to your site.
1b. If your District has a website, and it links to its various clubs, make sure it also points to your site. Test that too.
Later on, we'll look into getting more links and see why it matters.
2) Try a few Experiments - Keyword research
What does it really mean to rank high on Google? We want to appear prominently when people type in certain keywords or phrases, but which ones? Are the obvious ones enough?
A good keyword might be "Toastmasters," but many don't know who we are or what we do. How about "public speaking?" If Google finds us under "Toastmasters" or "public speaking," we may still be invisible if they look for "communication," "confidence," or "speaking skills." Can we afford to be missed by those people? How do we make sure we're found by the people in our locality?
While there's some art (or maybe guesswork) to this, we can better our chances with some research. If you're certain of the words you want to target, you can skip section 2. We'd recommend that you endure the tedium of completing it.
Let's go into Google and see how visible you are. Start with "easy" searches, and make them progressively harder. Enter sets of keywords and note which ones find your site, and how far into the search results you have to go to find it. Any keyword in angle brackets, like <your town> means to substitute the actual name of your town there.
2a. Try the following. They contain the keyword "Toastmasters."
Toastmasters <your town>
Toastmasters <some neighboring town>
Toastmasters my area
Try all the nearby towns. See where you show up and where you don't.
2b. Try the following. They do NOT contain the keyword "Toastmasters."
It may shock us, but many people have never heard of Toastmasters, or they have a strange (or even bizarre) idea of what we do. We want these people to find us and learn who we really are. They might use search keywords like:
learn public speaking <your town>
public speaking class <your town>
public speaking workshop <your town>
speaking skills <your town>
improve communication <your town>
Think of similar phrases, and repeat the process as long as you like. Don't expect to appear on the first page for these searches, yet. That can change.
You're likely to find that Toastmasters has a lot of competition, in community classes, businesses, private tutors, and elsewhere. Note who your local competition is.
2c. Try the same for other towns nearby
This may increase your list of local competition.
2d. Visit the websites of all your local competitors (or as many as you can stomach) and look carefully for new useful search phrases in the body of their website text. Increase your list of possible keywords and phrases.
2e. If you find new keywords, try them in Google, and see if any of them will bring up your site.
This exercise will be sobering to most of us. The good news is that a little work will bring some real improvement.
3) Decide which keywords and phrases are important for your club. (Including other towns where you want to be visible.)
3a. What you have by now is a list of keywords that people might use when they want to learn public speaking. You also can make a list of keywords that do and do not locate your site at the moment. It's time to decide which keywords are really important, which are mildly important, and which would simply be nice to have in a perfect world. It's good to want 'em all, but this is a big job. Let's prioritize and work our way up.
3b. While it's not always possible to target every keyword and phrase to your home page, you might plan to add future pages that target some of the keywords. For example, phrases like "fear of public speaking" or "conquer stage fright" might be saved for a future page that'll contain an article on conquering our fears. We'll elaborate on this, later.
Getting our hands dirty
Now, we'll start working on your site. Even Google can't afford to treat every word on the internet with equal favor. It'll give extra attention to a few things when it starts evaluating your site. Sadly, we may be ignoring many of them.
Think of them as prime advertising space. If you were given a display window, at street level on Fifth Avenue, you would not use it to store merchandise. This is where you would sell with all your might! These will be the best places to show off your club, and to use your best keywords. We will carefully plan to fill:
4a. Your site's DESCRIPTION, in the basic Settings tab. The sample description is something like, "We are a Toastmasters club located in..." and that's a great start when you're setting up FTH. Now you're going to put in your best keywords, in a description that's bold, exciting, and uses all the space you're allowed. This crucial phrase will appear right below your club's name in the Google search result, so it'll be compared with your non-Toastmasters competition. Study the competition's descriptions carefully, and make sure you stand out. In all likelihood, Google will truncate this description when it makes your entry. Start with a short sentence or two that will stand out to someone who's just quickly scanning the page of Google search results. For extra credit, be aware that Google's search result may sometimes throw away the first sentence, if the user's search words included only words from the second sentence. Try to make the description stand on its own without that first sentence.
4b. Your CLUB NAME in the Basic settings tab. This may be a surprise. It not only appears in reports and things; it also appears in BOLD PRINT for your club as the first line of your Google search result! Besides just your club name, can you sneak in a keyword or two? This is the first thing the potential visitor sees and compares against your non-Toastmasters competition; make it really count. Note that this will also appear in the banner of your site, though the text in the Admin Console tells how to override this. Also, it appears in the email header, every time you send out a meeting agenda, but but you can edit that email header, though you'll have to do it every time. The benefit is that you'll look golden in Google.
If you added keywords to your club name, you can edit them out here, when you mail out meeting agendas
4c. The KEYWORDS field, in the basic Settings tab. At first glance, this one seems like a natural; actually, there's a lot of controversy there. This is a place where you tell the world what your keywords are, and it's publicly visible if you know how to look. Because it's been severely abused in the past, (not by Toastmasters!) Google reportedly doesn't look at it. (Editorial Comment: It's hard to imagine Google throwing away any information...)
Some organizations leave it blank; they've paid a bundle to keyword search experts, and their findings are proprietary. Others, like Toastmasters.org, have an enormous list of keywords and phrases set as public keywords. It may be worth learning how to see the keywords on your particular browser, and perusing what TI has done. There are many useful ones we may have overlooked.
In contrast, one of Toastmasters International's competitors, http://www.dalecarnegie.com, has a very small and rigidly specific set of keywords declared. Our suspicion would be that they're concealing the real keywords that they're targeting, but this is purely guesswork.
What to do in your own KEYWORDS field? We've presented lots of information, but humbly offer no useful advice, other than: it probably can't hurt to fill it in.
4d. Each time you upload an image to FTH, you have the option of adding Alternative Text to the image. Because this text doesn't appear on the web page, it's easy to leave this field blank. That's a mistake, because Google does look at it. While they have looked here for keywords in the past and may continue to do so, this also makes your site more accessible to the vision-impaired. While they may not see the picture well, they can hear the description, and this makes you a good citizen in Google's eyes. Besides being more inviting to potential vision-impaired club members (my club has had one in the past and hopes for more in the future) the addition of Alternative Text does help improve your Google ranking.
If your page includes images that have symbolic meaning, the Alt Text can easily be expanded. First, describe the image, then point out what it's symbolic of. This is one place where keywords can be plausibly stuffed into the description.
Please note that this invisible text is not in any way related to an actual image of readable text that you may display. In fact, if you include an image of some text wording on your site, perhaps to use some special text font, it's completely invisible to Google, as far as we know.
4e. When you create a Custom Web Page in FTH, there are three blanks to fill in that look awfully redundant; they're not. If we're in a hurry, we're tempted to put the same information in: "Web Page Title / or Link Title," "Web Page Name," and "Web Page Description" and this would hurt us. Fill them in like this:
Web Page Title / or Link Title - The visitor will see this. FTH displays it on the page, and if the page is in the Main Menu or Members Only Menu, this is the text that will make up the menu entry. Including keywords may be nice, but making it short, sweet, and very descriptive is mandatory.
Web Page Name - The visitor probably never notices this. It's the name the website uses for the page, and it appears in the gobbledeygook in that little bar at the top of your browser, with the website's URL. Google does check it for possible keywords, so be sure to include the words you're targeting on the page. It should also be readable as a plausible alternate title for the page.
Web Page Description - Your home page is not always the first thing that appears in a Google search. When the custom page page appears instead, it has to stand by itself. This text will be the description that appears in the Google search result for the page. What you put here may decide whether the visitor clicks on your page or goes on to the competition. Include keywords here if you can, but aim to be eye-catching or enticing. The web page title will already be part of the result, so give some new information here. Since your home page may not also appear nearby, consider including your club name. There may be an occasion where shorter is better, if the page description can be taken in at a glance. People who are quickly skimming the Google search results may not take the time with a lengthy description and this is not a place where we absolutely must include a lot of keywords.
All combine to produce the following Google search result:
4f. When you add a link to another page, you give both the text that the visitor can read, and the actual HTTP or HTTPS link. Google notices the readable text, so it's less useful if the link text says "Click Here," than if it says "Click to learn how to conquer stage fright." The second choice added lots of useful keywords.
5) Adding quality content to match the keywords
This would first apply to new content that your keyword research suggests you need. We'll also update our site's current content to match specific keywords.
5a. Make the content of each page not only include the keywords from its page name, description, photos, etc., but use them in a meaningful way. Google's text parsing is sophisticated enough that it can tell whether the keywords play an important part in the page content, or if they're just dropped in casually. Make each page as much about its targeted keywords as you can. Visitors to your site would want the content to match the names and descriptions, anyhow.
5b. Consider adding lots of content that's not dated in any way. It's important to mention contest winners and Distinguished Club status, but you can also add descriptions of what your club is like, what you can do for your members, or articles on improving your skills. Visitors are interested in these things, and these pages become permanent improvements to your site. As such, their keyword targeting will not vanish because a future webmaster replaced outdated material with something more current.
5c. Put that material that won't become outdated onto separate pages whenever you can. This material won't change much, so all the keyword targeting will remain consistent. Consider leaving comments in the "Web Page Reference Notes" box for each page you create, describing the keyword targeting for future webmasters.
5d. Make plans to add new pages in the months (or years!) ahead that will target new keywords and phrases. Grow your site slowly but steadily. Every new tidbit that's not dated becomes a permanent improvement to your site. You're not merely promoting your club now; you're leaving a legacy for future members. Understand that the more quality content your site has, the more interesting you will look to visitors, and the higher Google will rank you.
5e. Find clever ways to mention the names of nearby towns where you also want to be visible in a Google search. Google will probably be able to figure out where you're located, and it can also figure out how far away you are from those other towns. Expect that the further the distance, the more Google will resist your trying to appear in searches that include those more distant locales. Be gentle but firm, and keep trying.
6) Getting more links: When Google's rankings are like being in High School
Back in High School, what made someone "cool?" It was when all the other kids thought they were cool. You'd really arrived if even the other cool kids thought you were cool. It's not much different with Google.
If other sites think you're "cool," they link to you. The more links, the "cooler" you are. If other "cool" sites link to you, you're amazing, i.e., your ranking goes even higher. Once you've made your site wonderful, it's time to get others to link to you. Here's a starter list of suggestions; there are many more possibilities:
6a. We've already mentioned Find A Club at Toastmasters.org and your district website. If you've put off checking these, do it now.
6b. If your club has social media sites, be sure to link them to your club website. Get club members to post links on their personal Facebook, and other social media pages.
6c. If anyone in your club is a blogger, ask them to write about your club and post a link.
6d. Many (Non-Toastmasters) bloggers are happy to have a guest do a posting on their sites. Find local bloggers who might appreciate a short article on some aspect of public speaking and offer to write one, in exchange for credit for your club (and a link.)
6e. Find online calendars for community events and post your meeting times, with a link to your website. These links will age-out and vanish with time, but you'll want to keep promoting your club on these sites anyway, with new links. Work with your Vp-PR to keep your exposure current in community calendars.
6f. Avoid making a quick comment on a site somewhere, just to leave a link. Google sees and makes a note that you're annoying people. If, on the other hand, you leave a helpful comment, with quality content, the link might seem appropriate both to the readers, and to Google. Use good judgement and extreme caution.
7) Penalties
We mentioned earlier that Google will lower the rankings of bad citizens on the 'net. Google wants to show the very best sites first, and those who try to look better than they are, or those who do things to annoy visitors don't fit anywhere near the top of the ranking.
7a. Don't duplicate content. If some of the info on a custom page is so good that you also want it on your home page, don't copy and paste a duplicate there. Find a new way to express what you need to say. Otherwise, Google thinks you're trying to make your site look bigger than it is, and visitors will be bored by reading the same text twice.
7b. Remove dead links from your site. Every now and then, you link to something that eventually vanishes; this is a dead link and it annoys visitors who click on it. FTH now has a built-in tool to find them. Under the "Home Page" tab in the Admin Console is a menu box titled "Web Page Tools." Select "Check for Bad Links." Use this tool often; it's not your fault if someone else's site goes away, but you can be penalized for not keeping your parts tidy.
7c. Do not create useless links to your site. We mentioned that your ranking goes up if other sites link to you; Google will penalize anyone who abuses this. There was a time when shady businesses took payment to link to you on their websites. Google adapted quickly, and penalized people who used these services. Do NOT pay anyone to link to your site, and make sure that the content around the links to your site give just reason for your link to be there. If it looks contrived or fake, Google will spot it.
7d. The keywords in your prime descriptive locations should also be found in the main text of the page, and the higher in the page, the better. If lengthy text is divided and separated by subheadings, they'd be great places for the keywords, too. If the keywords from descriptions and pictures aren't reflected in body of the the text, Google may conclude that the descriptions don't match the content, and you look disorganized.
7e. Don't try to squeeze a ridiculous number of keywords into awkward or enormous sentences. Word processors from 15-20 years ago were able to spot and underline clunky and ungainly text. Google's modern text parsing can easily spot you trying to stuff in too many keywords. Your text should all flow naturally, clearly, and make sense. (If you don't do this, a visitor may get frustrated and go somewhere else, anyway.)
Some of your non-Toastmasters competition is probably already doing these things, and as you rise above them in the Google searches, they'll fight back. It's your decision as to how vigorously you'll want to contend for ranking position. This can take as much of your spare time as you'll allow, so don't go crazy with it. (There's an F-shaped pattern that shows how a lot of people supposedly scan Google search results. You can find this on the 'net, think carefully about how seriously you want to take it, and decide if it's worth fighting to be in that zone. Below, we'll show an example that was available at the time of this writing:)
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/f-shaped-pattern-reading-web-content/
8a. Monitor your position on various Google searches over time. Add keywords and content as needed. (Following this whole procedure once is good; revisiting it on occasion is excellent.)
8b. Competing non-Toastmasters sites that begin jockeying for position with you are also updating their material. See what they're adding and if you're in a competitive mood, respond accordingly.
WARNING: Google's tools for webmasters are large, complex, and not at all obvious to the beginner. On the plus side, they're free, and can give a remarkable amount of useful information. If your time is severely limited, you won't want these as your first priority.
8c. Install Google Search Console on your site. It can sometimes show you links to your site, and some of the recent Google queries that located your site. Exactly what information is available is subject to change. To install it on your site, Google will give you a string of text that you paste into the "Google Webmaster Tools Meta Tag" box, in the Website Statistics tab, in the Admin Console.
8d. This isn't strictly part of your Google ranking, but if you become hungry for more data, install Google Analytics. This will let you see how visitors found your site, whether they're local, which pages they viewed, how long they stayed there, and many other things. (It does not disclose the identities of the visitors, though Google probably knows all.)
There's a certain thrill when a visitor hits your home page, maybe reads an article or two, goes to The Meeting Info/Directions page, goes to Meet Our Members, and then goes back to The Meeting Info/Directions page. Contact the Vp-Membership! Chances are good that your club has a visitor coming!
As you begin upgrading your site, the analytics can provide valuable clues as to how you're doing and which pages are effective. To install it on your site, Google will give you several lines of text that you paste into the "Google Analytics Script Code" box, in the Website Statistics tab, in the Admin Console.
Wrapping It Up
If you made it all the way through, congratulations! This is not a task for quitters. Try to redo portions of this procedure from time to time. If you keep an eye out for useful new keywords and phrases, occasionally add new content, and look for ways to make your site better and better, you'll move up in Google, and you'll start seeing more visitors to your meetings. And when they do arrive, ask them what they'd like to get from Toastmasters, and pay close attention to the exact words they use.
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