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Mercy ShipsGlobal Health · Google Ad Grant Management

Better measurement, not bigger budget: how sharper tracking accelerated giving and volunteering

Rebuilding what Mercy Ships’ Google Ad Grant optimized for turned the same grant dollars into 24% donation growth and an 80% single-month surge in volunteer applications.

Services

Google Ad Grant ManagementConversion Tracking Rebuild

Featured data

January – July 2026

Key results

168 donations YTD · 63 completed volunteer applications · +80% volunteer applications in the most recent month

About Mercy Ships: Mercy Ships operates hospital ships that deliver free, world-class surgical care to people in nations with little access to safe surgery, while training local medical professionals to strengthen healthcare systems for the long term. Its work runs on two engines: donors and volunteers.

A Mercy Ships nurse holding a smiling young patient aboard a hospital ship
The Global Mercy hospital ship at its inauguration
A Mercy Ships patient after receiving surgical care

The story

The Challenge

Mercy Ships needed its Google Ad Grant to perform against two distinct organizational goals: fundraising and volunteer recruitment. But the account’s measurement setup was optimizing toward lower-value conversions, making it impossible to see which campaigns and keywords were actually driving donations and volunteer sign-ups. The grant was working hard; nobody could prove it was working right.

Our Approach

The fix wasn’t more spend — it was better signal. We rebuilt the account’s tracking to stop optimizing for less meaningful actions and refocus entirely on high-value conversions: completed donations and completed volunteer applications. For the first time, volunteer applications were measured accurately, allowing the account to optimize directly toward that objective rather than proxy signals, and giving Mercy Ships clear visibility into which campaigns and keywords produced real outcomes.

Why It Worked

The turning point was better measurement, not a bigger budget. By narrowing optimization to the conversions that actually mattered and finally tracking volunteer applications accurately, the campaigns could optimize toward real outcomes instead of noise. A well-structured Google Ad Grant strategy paired with precise tracking delivers concrete impact on a nonprofit’s core mission.

The Results

168

Donations year to date, with 93 in the last three months alone

24%

Growth in donations over the most recent three months

63

Completed volunteer applications year to date, measured accurately for the first time

+80%

Volunteer applications in the most recent month alone

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