20 Nonprofit Blog Ideas

Maintaining a blog for your nonprofit can showcase your organization's accomplishments as well as share useful content for your community. But we know from talking with our nearly 250 nonprofit and health advocacy partners that time and resource restraints can make it difficult to blog regularly.

From talking with our Connect Network as well as former nonprofit professionals on our staff, we've collected ideas on ways to save time while keeping up with fresh content. By striking a balance between posts from your team and input from other experts as well as members of your community, you can regularly create quality posts with much less stress.

And, as you experiment with different types of content, track its success on your social media channels and your email newsletter so you can prioritize the topics that your audience responds to most.

In the below list, we've shared a range of ideas from a variety of sources that can inspire your next content calendar brainstorm for your nonprofit blog.

  1. Share a research update related to your nonprofit's disease area. If your nonprofit funds research, this is a great area to cover on your blog regularly. Share when a new drug passes another milestone toward FDA approval, or when a new research project gets off the ground. For major research updates, you can also create content that goes more in depth about the research, explaining more complex medical terms and giving additional background information.
  1. Curate a roundup of recent research in your nonprofit's disease area. You can also cover research updates that your nonprofit wasn't involved in on your blog. One simple way to gather recent news is to create a research roundup. You can link to other coverage of the news and share a brief summary of each story in your blog post.
  1. Make a list of easy fundraising tips. If your nonprofit runs a peer-to-peer fundraising or sponsored athletics program, your supporters may be looking for advice on raising funds to meet their personal goals. You can include tips on types of events to host, like silent auctions and bake sales, and suggest messaging that's helpful when sending out emails and creating Facebook posts.
  1. Collect community comments on a topic that's important to your audience. Asking a community questions is a great way to engage your social media followers and create useful content for your audience. Ask your community for their advice on coping with a particular symptom, or having tough conversations with friends and family about living with their condition. If they give you permission, you can then share their responses in a blog post. Your featured commenters will likely appreciate the shout out and share via their personal social media channels, and your readers will connect with the personal experiences you share in the post.
  1. Host a guest blogger. Featuring a story from a guest blogger is another way to share content that your community can relate to. To find bloggers, ask your social media community about bloggers they follow, or if any of your supporters maintain their own blogs. Healthline also curates a list each year of the top blogs in various disease areas, which is also a useful place to start. When you find a blogger you're interested in, reach out and ask if they would be interested in having their content re-posted on your site, or if they would like to write an original post for your website.
  1. Feature an inspiring volunteer's story. Writing about a star volunteer on your blog is a great way to thank your supporter while showing your community how they can get involved, too. When interviewing your volunteer, ask them about why and how got them involved, their personal connection to your cause, and any tips they have for others who are interested in volunteering, too.
  1. Create a blog post around a frequently asked question related to care for your nonprofit's condition. If you have a researcher or doctor on staff who's an expert in care for your nonprofit's condition, enlist their help in creating a useful piece of content that answers a frequently asked question. You can look for ideas on where to start by checking comments on Facebook and Twitter, as well as by looking at common Google searches. For example, your community may wonder whether a particular condition has a genetic component, or what a disease's earliest symptoms are. Readers may also have general questions about research into your condition area that you can cover on your blog.
  2. Give advice on having a better conversation with doctors. Include questions to ask, tips on tracking symptoms, and other guidance on getting more out of a doctor's appointment.
  1. Share a timeline of research progress related to your nonprofit's disease area. Research progress often feels slow for members of disease communities. Putting together a timeline of research progress can help show how far scientists have come in better treating or understanding a condition. You can also highlight areas where your nonprofit has been involved or helped fund critical research.
  1. Create a list of ways supporters can get involved. This kind of list may be particularly useful around the holidays, or during a disease awareness month. Be sure to include both monetary ways to get involved, such as a one-time gift or recurring gift, and non-monetary ways, such as volunteering for clinical research or sharing content.

  2. Write a list of common misconceptions around your nonprofit's disease area. This is another engaging content idea that's perfect to share during your condition's awareness month. Ask your community for feedback on what they find to be the most common myths and misconceptions surrounding your condition. You can also encourage your supporters to share the blog post to help dispel myths among their own family and friends.
  1. Share how to get involved in clinical research. Even if a patient is interested in participating in clinical research, they may not know how to begin the search for a clinical trial or what to look for. If you're using Antidote's Match tool for your website, include directions on how to use the tool, beginning with answering a few short questions. You can also explain what clinical research terms mean, particularly words patients will see in trial listings, such as the phase of the trial.
  1. Host a Q&A with an expert on Facebook or Twitter, then share the conversation in a blog post afterwards. Interview a scientist, doctor, or staff member about the latest research in your disease area or another popular topic on Facebook Live or a Twitter chat. Then share a summary of the chat along with the video or tweets on your blog.
  1. Create blog posts for caregivers, too. If your nonprofit works with a condition that often requires the support of a caregiver, consider creating content that speaks to that audience in particular. Caregivers can experience stress and burnout from providing support, but sometimes don't feel comfortable talking about those challenging emotions. Interview a caregiver about stress relief tips, or simply share their experiences.
  1. Post write-ups of press hits your nonprofit receives. Press coverage of your nonprofit can give a helpful boost to your site traffic and help raise awareness. Build on that success on your blog by featuring the coverage in a short write-up of the story. Include a link to the original piece as well as key quotes so your supporters can check out a summary while staying on your website.
  1. Interview a clinical trial volunteer and share their experience. One way to help demystify the clinical trial participation experience is to interview a volunteer and share their story on your blog. Ask them what went into their decision to participate, what expectations they had going in, and what they would say to others who are considering participating. If you're looking for someone to interview, ask on social media if any of your supporters would be willing to share their clinical trial experience.
  1. Tell a story that demonstrates your nonprofit's impact. If your organization funds research, the impact can be more difficult for supporters to visualize than it is for nonprofits that provide direct care, for example. Take readers into the research lab with your blog, or explain the complexities of how a new potential treatment reaches the market, and where your organization comes in. Of course, human stories typically resonate the most. If it's difficult to connect your organization's work directly to one story, sharing the story of a patient who found a research participation opportunity through your organization could make for an engaging read.
  1. Share information on finding or starting a support group. If your organization hosts support groups online or in person, share information about how to connect with them. If you don't, consider sharing resources from other organizations. You can also ask your social media community for their tips on finding or starting one on their own.
  1. Interview a physical therapist or other professional for tips on daily living with a particular condition. Use an expert interview to provide your community with useful content. If your community deals with physical symptoms that can benefit from the help of a physical therapist, for example, ask them about how their services can help and how a patient should go about finding one that works for them.
  1. Make a list of travel tips for patients. Especially in the summer and around the holidays, many members of your community may be planning a vacation. Travel-related blog posts can include tips on what to pack, ways to make travel easier if you have physical symptoms, and other advice. Include quotes from a doctor or other expert, or ask your social media community for input.

Interested in connecting your community with clinical research opportunities for your organization's disease area? Get in touch to learn about the benefits for you and your community of being in the Connect Network.