Why an unofficial website?

Article created: 2009/01/31

This Web Portal is a link based database. That is it requires a link for each listing. If I cannot find an existing website for a ministry, I create a generic website with the basic information for a ministry. In the case where a ministry loses a domain for whatever reason, we will go so far as to "rescue" the domain, that is, re-register the domain and rebuild the website (if it is not copyrighted) with old copies of the web pages. I have created a tag called "Unofficial Web Site" to identify the ministries that do not have a web presence. If we find out (through research or through an error report) that a ministry has their own web presence (in many cases the "Unofficial Website" will place higher in a Google search than the new website) I will go back into the unofficial website and put up a message indicating that their website can be found at their new address. This adds a link pointed to their website (which helps is their search engine rankings), and sends traffic to our unofficial website to their new website. It gives the ministry's new web presence an instant pipleline for people looking for their site.
     The "unofficial website" can also help a ministry out. Search engines can sometimes assign a totally unrelated website to your ministry if the keywords match up. A lot of times the unofficial website comes up as the first choice when a ministry is searched.