The situation
When we first took on AACSB's paid media, they had earned a Google for Nonprofits grant, but it wasn't spending the budget. The granted dollars were going to waste.
The challenge
AACSB asked Imarc's team to find out why the dollars were being left on the table so that they could garner even more brand awareness with the nonprofit budget. We decided to do some strategic research into the Google for Nonprofits grant process and use our learnings from their non-nonprofit paid media AACSB campaigns as a base.
The solution
Learning all the unique aspects of what a Google for Nonprofits grant actually meant took time. Here are some details on them.
First, the Google for Nonprofits grant limit is $10,000 USD per month and is only issued to qualified nonprofits. Beyond that, those chosen nonprofits must:
- Be registered as a charitable organization in a country or region they support.
- Have Google for Nonprofits' validation partner Goodstack, verify your charitable organization
- Meet country-specific requirements.
- Adhere to the Google for Nonprofits Additional Terms of Service.
- Maintain a monthly click-through rate (CTR) above 5% and a $2 maximum cost per click (CPC).
FAQs about this program are listed here if you are interested in applying.
Once we had a full understanding of what must be done to maintain live ads that performed, we scaled our existing search campaigns through additional geotargeting and by testing new Google features such as AI Max and PMAX using the Google Grant budget.
There wasn't a silver bullet to make the most of our Google Grant budget. We had to rely on a variety of campaign types and get creative with our targeting. However, we're proud to see continued growth in our ad spend & conversion results on behalf of AACSB.
Derek CummingsSenior Digital Strategist, Imarc
The results
Since AACSB asked Imarc to take on this work, we have consistently been able to spend 50-80% of their monthly Google for Nonprofits allotment. This has resulted in some serious wins!
Although we've seen success before this year with the Google for Nonprofits grant budget, our 2024-2025 website results, generated through a combination of Always-On, Heavy-Up, and Google for Nonprofits grant paid media, are particularly impressive.
Our partnership with Imarc has significantly optimized AACSB’s Google Grant, targeting key audiences while maintaining high click rates and almost doubling our monthly grant spend. Their approach has enabled us to engage more educators and learners on meaningful content pages, for quality interactions that demonstrate the value of business education globally.
Andrea SmithDirector of Marketing, AACSB
The future
Imarc assists AACSB in Heavy-Up campaigns several times per year and Always-On campaigns for brand awareness. We appreciate the opportunity to continue optimizing their paid media, Google for Nonprofits and otherwise, and will continue lowering costs and increasing value wherever possible.