Top 30 National LGBT Advocacy Websites

There are three types of media that our National LGBT organizations can use to call attention to their important causes. The first type is paid media.  This is when an organization pays for an advertisement on a website or in a newspaper.  The second type is earned media.  This is when an organization does something that is worthy of press attention and receives coverage in an article, or even a retweet or facebook mention from a third party.  The final type is owned media.  Owned media encompasses all the ways an organization can communicate directly with their supporters without relying on anyone else.  In thew not-so-new age of social media, owned media is more important than ever for National LGBT organizations.  Owned media includes an organizations’s website, blog, and social media channels, as well as any other ways the organization reaches supporters directly, like a newsletter sent through the mail.

Which LGBT organizations are dominating the owned media field and which are falling behind?  I looked at over 50 national LGBT websites to find out.  This analysis weighed several different factors.  Each ranking is based primarily on the Alexa.com ratings. Alexa’s traffic estimates are based on data from their sample of millions of Internet users using one of over 25,000 different browser extensions.  The complete breakdown of each score is as follows:

  • 60% – Alexa.com rating (lowest numbers are the highest ranking)
  • 10% – Google estimated number of backlinks
  • 10% – Facebook likes
  • 10% – Twitter followers
  • 10% – Instagram follwers

There are a few important disclaimers to consider.  First, the focus of this list is to look at the influence of national LGBT organizations.  Many state and local LGBT organizations are therefore not included in this list, but have an equal or greater influence then many of the national groups.  Similarly, this list does not include LGBT programs that exist within organizations that are not exclusively focusedo n the LGBT community.  Notable exclusions include the Family Acceptance Project at San Francisco State University; the Williams Institute at UCLA Law; and LGBT Initiatives at the Center for American Progress.

Top Ranked Websites

Included below are the rankings as of November, 2014 for the top 30 websites I identified. The entire list of websites is included at the end of this article.

Website Alexa Backlinks Facebook Twitter Instagram Score
Human Rights Campaign hrc.org 57006 225000 2067056 457194 593000 96
No H8 Campaign noh8campaign.com 604501 34322 1224646 689766 214000 79
GLAAD glaad.org 112538 56894 256573 242567 22400 67
Trevor Project thetrevorproject.org 374613 49080 308630 187703 20900 66
It Get’s Better itgetsbetter.org 376321 49183 375941 117239 0 65
Freedom to Marry freedomtomarry.org 121860 35651 514973 58374 867 65
GLSEN glsen.org 139745 22411 545752 52618 1100 64
Lambda Legal lambdalegal.org 438136 23591 221013 77253 150 62
National LGBTQ Task Force thetaskforce.org 944352 37390 92317 33608 602 60
National Center for Lesbian Rights nclr.org 422430 13581 40354 22264 8 60
IGLHRC iglhrc.org 653872 29796 41668 12978 14 60
PFLAG pflag.org 612298 13856 51574 37821 714 60
Campus Pride campuspride.org 396341 13607 4514 8211 380 60
Lambda Literary Foundation lambdaliterary.org 514535 17779 6069 8562 0 59
Transgender Law Center transgenderlawcenter.org 687135 7473 52162 14534 482 59
NGLCC nglcc.org 703463 16963 6034 2951 0 59
Family Equality Council familyequality.org 1202758 31798 11738 13716 54 58
Metropolitan Comm Church mccchurch.org 902538 7392 6854 4188 0 58
Out and Equal outandequal.org 1078521 13210 24579 3879 115 58
SAGE sageusa.org 985465 1313 7542 4533 96 57
Immigration Equality immigrationequality.org 1105060 4976 19124 11302 0 57
CenterLink lgbtcenters.org 1346060 20883 5736 10401 0 57
Equality Giving equalitygiving.org 1163307 203 0 0 0 57
Victory Fund victoryfund.org 1519667 3137 122885 16450 342 57
NLGJA nlgja.org 1507660 4025 5713 8548 0 56
Sylvia Rivera Law Project srlp.org 1471720 1602 7264 1213 0 56
National LGBT Museum nationallgbtmuseum.org 1496746 817 262 2632 0 56
Equality Federation equalityfederation.org 3633883 11958 3004 373686 0 56
Bi Net USA binetusa.org 1617622 2940 251 5650 0 56
Arcus arcusfoundation.org 2056431 19947 1369 6515 0 55

Lessons from the Numbers

Welcome to Three New Players

Three new LGBT organizations did not quite make the top 30, but they did rank among the top 50.  They are:

  • The LGBT Tech Partnership.  Spearheaded by ED Chris Wood, the LGBT Tech Partnership explores the intersection of the LGBT community and technology, and has an impressive team including former OutServe/SLDN ED, Allyson Robinson.
  • Trans Women of Color Collective.  Inspired by the success of local chapters of TWOCC, Ashley Lourdes Hunter recently moved to Washington, DC to start the National Headquarters for this budding organization.
  • LGBT-FAN.  The LGBT Freedom Asylum Network (formerly the LGBT Freedom Asylum Network) is an inspiring network of local grassroots initiatives to support the growing influx of LGBT Asylum Seekers.
Goodbye to Old Friends

Although there has been no official announcement, it is pretty clear at this point that the National Office of Stonewall Democrats, once an important player in the nation’s capitol, is now defunct.  The same can be said for the National Coalition for LGBT Health.  There has been little dialogue, if any, on what the demise of these organizations means for our movement.

A Slow, Steady Decline for the Task Force Alexa Rating

I remain a huge fan of the National LGBTQ Task Force (formerly the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force), and an even bigger fan of the annual Creating Change Conference, which plays such an important role for activists across the country.

The numbers don’t lie, however.  When I first started tracking Alexa ratings more than a decade ago, the Task Force had an Alexa rating of 152, 139, which means the Task Force website was among the top 153,000 websites in the world.  Over the years, there has been a gradual decline.  As of this analysis, the number was at 944,352.  This means, that the site has dropped to being among the top million sites in the world. In contrast, several of the groups I first looked at in 2003, including NGLCC and Pride at Work, have grown their online presence.

A National LGBT Latina/o Organization

Ever since the National Latino/a Lesbian and Gay Organization (LLEGÓ) closed their doors in 2004, there have been rumblings about starting a new national organization for the LGBT Latina/o community.  Unid@s LGBT- The National Latin@ LGBT Human Rights Organization, was founded in 2007.  While their facebook page remains online, their website is now defunct, and the future direction of the organization is unclear.

What do the Numbers Tell You?

What is most interesting to me about these numbers are the comments and feedback I receive after posting them.  What do these numbers mean to you?  Are their LGBT organizations that I missed and should have included?  What suprises you about the rankings?  Please be sure to post your comments below.

Complete Ranking of all Organizations Researched

Website Alexa Backlinks Facebook Twitter Instagram Score
Human Rights Campaign hrc.org 57006 225000 2067056 457194 593000 96
No H8 Campaign noh8campaign.com 604501 34322 1224646 689766 214000 79
GLAAD glaad.org 112538 56894 256573 242567 22400 67
Trevor Project thetrevorproject.org 374613 49080 308630 187703 20900 66
It Get’s Better itgetsbetter.org 376321 49183 375941 117239 0 65
Freedom to Marry freedomtomarry.org 121860 35651 514973 58374 867 65
GLSEN glsen.org 139745 22411 545752 52618 1100 64
Lambda Legal lambdalegal.org 438136 23591 221013 77253 150 62
National LGBTQ Task Force thetaskforce.org 944352 37390 92317 33608 602 60
National Center for Lesbian Rights nclr.org 422430 13581 40354 22264 8 60
IGLHRC iglhrc.org 653872 29796 41668 12978 14 60
PFLAG pflag.org 612298 13856 51574 37821 714 60
Campus Pride campuspride.org 396341 13607 4514 8211 380 60
Lambda Literary Foundation lambdaliterary.org 514535 17779 6069 8562 0 59
Transgender Law Center transgenderlawcenter.org 687135 7473 52162 14534 482 59
NGLCC nglcc.org 703463 16963 6034 2951 0 59
Family Equality Council familyequality.org 1202758 31798 11738 13716 54 58
Metropolitan Comm Church mccchurch.org 902538 7392 6854 4188 0 58
Out and Equal outandequal.org 1078521 13210 24579 3879 115 58
SAGE sageusa.org 985465 1313 7542 4533 96 57
Immigration Equality immigrationequality.org 1105060 4976 19124 11302 0 57
CenterLink lgbtcenters.org 1346060 20883 5736 10401 0 57
Equality Giving equalitygiving.org 1163307 203 0 0 0 57
Victory Fund victoryfund.org 1519667 3137 122885 16450 342 57
NLGJA nlgja.org 1507660 4025 5713 8548 0 56
Sylvia Rivera Law Project srlp.org 1471720 1602 7264 1213 0 56
National LGBT Museum/Velvet Foundation nationallgbtmuseum.org 1496746 817 262 2632 0 56
Equality Federation equalityfederation.org 3633883 11958 3004 373686 0 56
Bi Net USA binetusa.org 1617622 2940 251 5650 0 56
Arcus arcusfoundation.org 2056431 19947 1369 6515 0 55
Gill Foundation gillfoundation.org 2032092 4140 3732 1918 0 54
GLMA glma.org 2180739 2743 4787 851 0 54
Astrea Foundation astraea.org 2318937 2121 4880 2293 0 54
National Gay Pilots Association ngpa.org 2536174 512 1700 104 0 53
LGBT Bar Association lgbtbar.org 3294566 2386 2324 1617 7 51
Funders for LGBTQ Issues lgbtfunders.org 3501132 1335 3577 2328 0 50
Out for Work outforwork.org 3582352 461 195 747 0 50
OutServe SLDN sldn.org 4719528 55251 28014 9288 0 49
COLAGE colage.org 4215347 8452 5084 1275 0 49
Get Equal getequal.org 4528989 9541 31412 28883 205 48
National Black Justice Coalition nbjc.org 6353583 1507 7824 2700 0 42
Bohnett Foundation bohnettfoundation.org 4395104 6481 1064 523 0 48
Faith in America faithinamerica.org 5,337,820 726 10,783 1124.00 0 45
LGBT Tech Partnership lgbttechpartnership.org 6987137 242 966 1129 0 40
Trans Women of Color Collective twocc.us 8275220 2 0 0 0 37
Center for Black Equity centerforblackequity.org 9536384 69 1978 462 23 33
Pride at Work prideatwork.org 10404989 8883 5916 2296 0 31
National LGBT Cancer Network cancer-network.org 13364027 1121 2154 20834 0 23
Military Partners & Families Coalition milpfc.org 14688889 375 7816 809 0 19
National Queer Asian Pacific Islander Alliance nqapia.org 15381834 509 1655 2208 0 17
LGBT Faith (Freedom) Asylum Network lgbt-fan.org 17369035 3372 393 94 0 11
National Center for Trans Equality nctequality.org 19652409 1603 36333 26771 0 5
Transgender Legal Defense & Ed Fund tldef.org 20077845 4100 3448 16018 0 4
Transgender Americans Veteran’s Association tavausa.org 21252285 1429 688 104 0 0

Note: this data, along with the formulas I used to come to the final number, are available on a google spreadsheet. I will gladly share this spreadsheet with whoever is interested and I encourage you to a dd, tweek, change, and share.  I would be very interested in seeing what changes others might make.

 

6 thoughts on “Top 30 National LGBT Advocacy Websites”

  1. David, Great report, though I have to say I am a little surprised by your editorial comments on the”Slow, Steady Decline for the Task Force.” It was not a surprise to see the Task Force’s place in the top million sites has dropped, as the Web has grown. And it supports their effectiveness to see that they rank in the top 10 of LGBT Websites. What I take issue with, in your editorial assessment, is the groups that you are now comparing the Task Force to. Many of these sites have a much broader appeal to a more mainstream/Straight audience, than just a LGBTQ viewer, with missions focused on issues like anti-bullying and HIV/AIDS. It seems like a score of 60 puts the Task Force in very good company with Lambda Legal and NCLR and ahead of many other very effective organizations, like The Victory Fund, GLAAD, PFLAG, and Get Equal, just to name a few.

    Reply
  2. Hey Lee,

    I agree, it does put the Task Force in good company. I’m not trying to make any assertions about the overall effectiveness of an organization. I’m just sharing the data. And “slow, steady decline” is an accurate description of what happened to the Task Force’s Alexa rating between 2003 and 2014.

    Reply

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