Why have a professional looking website
It is becoming increasingly important for charities of all shapes and sizes to have a strong, accessible web presence. A professional looking and functional website can bring the following benefits:
- Increased support and engagement for members, beneficiaries, staff and volunteers
- Reach new members, beneficiaries, volunteers and supporters
- Raise awareness of you, your aims, your cause and your charitable objectives
- Improve your reputation and increase confidence in you
Simple and Responsive Design
You should want your website to look attractive and be easy to understand for your beneficiaries, members of the general public, potential donors and funders. It needs to tell people who you are, what you offer and what you want from them.
Pictures of your volunteers and your beneficiaries at your groups, sessions and activities will add to your uniqueness and will avoid you paying for high quality stock photos. Using your own photos will also help to build trust with anyone who visits the site and help to illustrate what your text is telling your visitors.
It is reported that smartphones are the most common device followed by tablets to access a website therefore you need a responsive website. Responsive means that it looks great and functions on all devices, including PC’s, laptop’s, tablets and smartphones, etc.
User Friendly, Helpful Navigation
The navigation of your website needs to be intuitive, easy and smooth for your visitors. They need to quickly and easily find the information they are looking for. Friendly well planned navigation will also help with search engine rankings making your site easier to find for new members and donors. You will need to carefully consider all of the content you want and then place this into groupings that work best for your charity.
Top level categories can include About Us, What We Do, Volunteer, Contact, Donate. Using subcategories cuts down on the number of menu items and can help sort your content making things easier for your visitors to find. For example; What we do, could go inside About us (About us > What we do).
Easy to update Content Management System
It’s great to have someone build you a new website or to use an online all in one builder and hosting provider yourself but if you do not understand the ongoing costs or how to change and update its contents then it will quickly become a burden for you and even possibly not something you own. This website is built using WordPress as the base content management system with a base theme from Elegant Themes that has been developed by me. As a Charity or non-profit you will also find there are options for free web hosting.
Strong Brand Identity and High Quality Content
The content on your website provides important details regarding your charity and the services it delivers. It needs to match with any existing branding you have such as colour schemes, logos, images, text formats, etc. Good quality content will make it easier for people visiting the site to understand and relate to your charity.
Clear Calls to Action
The site needs to have clear calls to action, these could be for example; join our mailing list, donate, become a member.
Frequently Asked Questions
You will know yourselves what these are. A frequently asked questions page can help to save you time and also help people to better understand you and the services your charity offers. Examples include; what you do, where you meet, when you meet, membership, how much does it cost, etc.
Testimonials and Story Telling
This is a must have and will benefit new beneficiaries and possible donors in many ways. The testimonial section can display comments and appreciations of satisfied people, their families and informal carers. The testimonials make new visitors feel comfortable and more confident about your charity. Story telling from people who come to your groups will help people to understand what it is you do and the benefits they may get from joining or getting involved with your activities. Testimonials and storytelling will also help increase your websites credibility.
Legal Bits and Bobs
You should include the following policies Privacy, Data Protection, Terms and Conditions, Safeguarding (if applicable), Complaints, Cookies and Accessibility Statement as a minimum. You will also need to include your full charity name, registered office and contact information.
