How non-profits and political organizations ask for funds online: A quick review
By definition, the objective of political organizations like the Democratic Party (USA), LREM (France) or the BJP (India) isn’t to make money and be profitable like a business. Neither is making money the objective of organizations like the UNICEF, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the World Memon Organization or the World Jewish Congress.
That made me think how non-profits and political organizations talk about their services. Since they don’t have a business from which to earn money, how do they pitch for fundraising online?
You’d have thought they very well understand how to start a newsletter and how to leverage them, or took email marketing pretty seriously but I found a slightly different situation.
I visited three websites and this is what I found:
1. UNICEF
The Donate page begins with a brief but well-explained case study — in my case, I was shown the story of Rishita’s.
Pitch: The pitch is simple but direct. It explains how a donor’s contribution can save lives.
Visuals: The visual of Rishita, now healthy but born severely underweight, certainly arresting.
The image of smiling parents, now that the child has survived and is growing, is effective, especially because the parents are everyone’s idea of a common, average family.
Testimonials: UNICEF doesn’t need to establish its authority; however, to drive the point home, they use two kinds of testimonials:
- Photographic testimonials: The photo of the severely underweight child some time after birth raises compassion. That UNICEF’s intervention ensured the child survived is effectively shown in another photo.
- Mother’s testimonials: A mother’s words apparently appeal more than a father’s. This is done intelligently by using a small sentence from the mother.
Design: The Donate tab is visibly placed on the homepage.
The blue background gives a powerful background to the orange “Donate” button and makes the button easy to spot without being intrusive.
Most children on the page I saw were girls, perhaps subtly promoting the Save The Girlchild program.
2. Friends of the Earth
Friends of the Earth is a not-for-profit organization committed to fighting forces that destroy nature, something that makes the world less safe to live in.
Pitch: The home page has a eye-catching Donate button, but the pitch for why should one donate isn’t clear.
Visuals: There are no visuals on the Donate page itself. There’s a body copy and some buttons with amount mentioned.
Testimonials: There are no obvious testimonials anywhere on the Donate page or on the home page.
Design: The minimalist design of the Donate page is difficult to justify. The copy, however, addresses the reader as “you did [this]” and “you did [that]” to build engagement.
3. The Bharatiya Janata Party
The Bharatiya Janata Party, shortened as the BJP, is currently the ruling party in India and the largest political party in the world. It is well-known to use digital marketing effectively to engage young voters.
Pitch: As you scroll down the home page, you see three ways of supporting the BJP: volunteering, becoming a member and donating. The pitch is clear: be the social change.
Visuals: The visuals are large and well framed. As a political organization, they send clear message of good governance with the right photos of the Indian masses.
Testimonials: Unlike testimonials that you in charity organizations, the home page carries images of the ‘founding fathers’ of the political party.
The next part of the home page is in the form of what the BJP administration has delivered to women, farmers and other sections of the society.
Design: The Donate page has a smartly designed color combo: the leader’s headgear is saffron-colored, his dress is white and the kids around are in green. This combination and sequence is significant because that’s exactly the color and design of India’s national flag.
Summing up
There are a number of things that immediately catch your attention. For instance, newsletters can be a good way to keep current and potential donors engaged.
Newsletters play a big role in increasing your reach and your impact and you can raise funds at much lowered costs with well-designed newsletter. Despite that, you see no visible prompts on these sites for signing up newsletters.
The bright part is that these sites carry a strong narrative and appear to understand the psyche of their visitors. Their layout and content strategy seems to be heading in the right direction. With a few tweaks here and there, they could potentially be a good reference for other non-profits too!
Sites:
Note : “Images are screenshots of respective websites”
