Here at Pedalo we work with charities and not for profit organisations on an ongoing basis in helping them with their digital strategy. Through our experience over the last decade in web design, web development and web consultancy we have gained the knowledge and expertise to provide your organisation with ideas that can help make all the difference to your online strategy.
Over the coming months we aim to provide one helpful hint each week that will help your not for profit organisation maximise its online presence. We will be looking at different aspects that can make all the difference to a charity including fundraising, increasing donations, social media and more.
We will be sending out links to these hints on our Twitter account so follow us now so you can take advantage of our free advice.
This week we have decided to keep it simple by giving an overview of charity sites we like and what they are doing well that you should consider for your own website. So here goes…
1. Slavery Footprint – www.slaveryfootprint.org
The site is dedicated to getting consumers to take a survey about the products they purchase and consume which in turn provides them with information on ‘how many slaves are working for them’ i.e. how many products they own that are made through slavery.
“The Slavery Footprint team works to engage individuals, groups, and businesses to build awareness for and create deployable action against forced labor, human trafficking, and modern day slavery.”
This is a fantastic website in terms of design, functionality and not to mention promoting the organisation’s values. This website has generated a lot of publicity and praise recently with good reason. One of the strongest points of this website is throughout the survey the small notes along the side and the end result really promote what they are trying to achieve and this has the potential to really make consumers think about their purchases.
2. Life in my Shoes – www.lifeinmyshoes.org
This site promotes a campaign by Body & Soul to challenge the misconceptions of HIV in the UK. The focal point of the campaign is to get people to understand the feeling of living life in someone else’s shoes. The site has interactive elements too and allows users to be involved by posting a description of a time in their life when they felt different – they can even post a photo of their shoes!
The design of this website is clean and modern whilst the functionality including JQuery transitions, the horizontal slider and full parallax page is user friendly and sophisticated. It is a great site and it works really well in promoting this campaign. The interactive element is a really important way to get users involved and to draw attention to the campaign.
3. Head2Heart – www.head2heart.us
This website aims to raise money to help build Collyde – an organisation that allows individuals to give their time, donations and talents to make a change.
The Head2Heart website is like a campaign site to encourage people to donate towards building Collyde. The site highlights some of the issues that they want to help with such as access to clean water and trafficking. By clicking through the arrows it takes you along a journey that helps you understand why your donation is necessary.
Once Collyde is launched they are projected to dig 4,640 Wells in Africa, save 1,160,000 kids from dying due to lack of clean water, rescue 11,600 young girls from entering the sex trafficking industry and more. This one page site has a fantastic design and the simplicity of the site in getting the message across is great.
4. Talk the Walk – www.takethewalk.net
The launch of this campaign began with one mile barefoot walks throughout America and Canada to encourage people to make a difference to poverty and HIV and Aids in Africa. The band Hanson lead walks which were in partnership with TOMS shoes – providing shoes to children living in poverty across South Africa.
The website was then developed further and individuals are now able to host their own walk and also donate not only towards shoes but towards medical care, drilling water wells and building schools.
One of the great things about this website is that each cause outlines how much money is needed to make a difference and it allows you to donate as little or as much as you wish. It is really important that donors understand how their money is being used and by outlining how much money is required to make a difference it empowers donors to make an informed decision.
5. War Child – www.warchild.org.uk
War Child aim to change the lives of children whose lives have been torn apart by war. They do this by providing medical care, counselling, setting up safe houses, rebuilding schools and helping children get their voices heard.
The use of images and colour across this website works really well but one of the main things that stands out is the donate button. It is clearly visible on every page and the page you land on once you click on donate gives many options and forms of donating to make it as easy as possible for those wanting to make a contribution.
Keep an eye out for next week’s helpful hint by following us on Twitter. To read more of our charity related articles click here.
