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Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern WisconsinFood Security · Google Ads (Ad Grant & Paid Search)

One search strategy, two engines: awareness that feeds a donation funnel

Second Harvest paired Ad Grant–funded visibility with A/B-tested paid donation campaigns, turning qualified traffic into $42,815.66 in attributed giving.

Services

Google Ad GrantPaid SearchDonation Landing Pages & A/B Testing

Launch

2026

Key results

$42,815.66 attributed donation revenue · 51,959 sessions · 100% engagement rate

About Second Harvest: Second Harvest Foodbank of Southern Wisconsin works to end hunger in its community, distributing food through a network of local partners and programs, including its Farm to Foodbank Initiative, which connects local farms with families in need.

A Second Harvest volunteer loading fresh produce into a mobile food pantry

The story

The Challenge

Second Harvest needed a two-pronged Google Ads strategy: build visibility and attract high-interest organic traffic through the Google Ad Grant program, while using paid Google Ads to directly maximize monetary donations. Neither channel alone could do both jobs.

Our Approach

Our strategic insight was simple: treat organic and paid search as one funnel, not two channels. A Brand Awareness campaign funded by the Google Ad Grant fed the top of the funnel with qualified, high-intent traffic. Beneath it, we built dedicated, optimized landing pages for each donation initiative (General Donations and the Farm to Foodbank Initiative) and ran A/B tests on messaging, page structure, and calls to action to find what drove the strongest conversion rates and the highest donation value.

Why It Worked

By pairing Ad Grant–funded visibility with tightly optimized, A/B-tested paid donation landing pages, Second Harvest turned qualified traffic into measurable revenue: proof that a coordinated organic-and-paid search strategy can significantly outperform either channel alone.

The Results

$42,815.66

In attributed donation revenue: General Donations $28,231.50, Farm to Foodbank $10,813.13

91%+

Of all attributed revenue driven by the two optimized donation campaigns

51,959

Sessions at a 100% engagement rate, with 11.9 events and 1:14 of engagement per session

13,797

Sessions added by the Ad Grant–funded Brand Awareness campaign, feeding qualified traffic into the donation funnel

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