Digital round-up – June and July 2019

Highlights this month: tools and resources to accelerate digital progress, responses to the Oxfam report, diversity, spontaneous comms.

For one month only, here is a combined round-up with some of the things you might have missed in June and July. Wishing you a productive or restful month whether you are in or out of the office.

How to use the round-up: Pick and choose links to read now or later. Even better, subscribe and get future round-ups direct to your inbox so you don’t miss any.

Content highlights

• There was lots of comms to mark 50 years since the moon landing. Some charities spontaneously joined in with #UnlikelyFirstWordsOnTheMoon, like this one from The National Trust. Royal Museums Greenwich live tweeted the last 13 minutes to touchdown.
• #BringYourDogToWork day comms from Dogs Trust and Book Trust.
• Following the leadership contest result, the Charity Retail Association cheekily tweeted this.
• Oxfam’s supermarket scorecard campaign – nicely presented data to inspire people to use their consumer power. See also this Behind the Barcodes video.
• Charities are starting to talk about their responses to the climate emergency. Here’s an example from The National Trust. 
• BPAS raised awareness of abortion laws in Northern Ireland with this video message for Donald Trump.
• Nice reactive content from Blue Cross and Battersea to the new Cats Movie trailer.
• Kittens love tennis – who knew?! Wimbledon tweet from Cats Protection.
• Love this behind the scene thread from small charity Tiny Tickers. Their six staff all work from home. 
• Lovely thank you video from The Bike Project.
• Brand new videos about the UK asylum system – bite-sized videos in eight languages from Right to Remain.
• 3min video from The Law Society about the problems affecting the justice system.
• 50 stories to mark St Mungo’s 50th anniversary.
• Changing Faces shared an open letter from parents of a girl who was badly burnt in a fire. It gained a huge response including hundreds of comments and worldwide coverage.
• How do you keep people safe on the beach? RNLI are trialling sand signage in Cornwall.
• Some creative comms in this Moment of #WorldEmojiDay tweets.
• It was very hot last week, lots of charities were sharing useful tips. Some highlights in this heatwave Moment.
• Staff pic of the week from Battersea.
• Local funder Camden Giving showcased amazing organisations they support in this A-Z thread for Small Charity Week.

Twitter takeover of the month: VIP (very important pony) Dennis held the reins of Mencap’s Twitter for a short time during Volunteers Week.

Video of the month: The Bank of England revealed the new face of the £50 note in this video. Genius or awful? You decide…..

Comms: best practice

• Updating your style guide? Take a look at the universal content style guide project started by Sarah Richards. Rather than everyone coming up with their own, “what if there was one place where we, as a community, shared knowledge and created a style guide that was accessible, usable and – if we wanted – evidenced?”
• 6 practical tips to designing content with greater impact – Lightful.
• A definition of copywriting vs content design by Sarah Richards on ProCopywriters Network.
• Are personal stories too personal? The challenges of advocating for more progressive media coverage of criminal justice – Clinks.
• Do you live-tweet? My top tips for live reporting from events and conferences. Includes examples from the recent mighty #IoFFC.
• Dr Richard Berks shared examples of charities live tweeting through a recent documentary about leukaemia. Does your charity join in with relevant live TV events?
• After the event: using social media to maintain momentum – lots of useful tips from Gemma Pettman.
• Meaningful engagement: do you need a social strategy? Lisa Clavering for Charity Comms.
• How to nail your tone of voice on social media – Kirsty Marrins for Lightful.
• Practical tips for dealing with trolling online – Zoe Williams for Charity Comms.
• Oh…so you CAN go viral on Instagram! – Time to Change’s Natasha Dillon for Charity Comms.
• Doncaster Council had a party to celebrate hitting 20k followers!
• Five big ways that the world of media has changed in the last two decades – 5 trends plus what it all means for charities. nfpSynergy post from November 2018 which you might have missed.
• Small but mighty – key takeaways from our Small Charities conference – Charity Comms.
• Top tips for communicating in a crisis – Charity Comms.
• There was lots of coverage about how NSPCC dealt with its recent crisis comms following events with Munroe Bergdorf. This statement had 700+ comments.
• New brand launched on Action for Children’s 150th anniversary. New Choose Childhood campaign launched too with strong messages and images on Twitter.
• How Samaritans managed the launch of its new brand identity with digital – Charity Digital News.
• 30 Days Wild challenge reaches new record – 400,000 people took part in The Wildlife Trust’s annual event.
• 1.7m views of Emilia Clarke’s video recreating workplace stock photos.

If you are a Charity Comms member, don’t forget to vote in the trustee election. Closes at 5pm, 19 August.

Digital: strategy, design, culture

The Catalyst, a UK collaborative to bring a social purpose to the digital revolution, launched. They are a coalition of major foundations, digital design agencies, civil society bodies and the UK government, seeking to massively accelerate the use of digital in the UK’s voluntary and charity sector. Sign up via the website for information and updates. Read this post by Dan Sutch to find out more – digital, design and data for social good. And follow The Catalyst on Medium too.

More transformation resources:

• If you work in the arts, take a look at the Digital Culture Network which launched in June. This from MoDA is good too – A Museum of the Digital Age.
• New website to fast-track digital transformation in adult social care – VODG.
• Start Somewhere – report on making tech imaginable and usable for small charities – CAST and IVAR. Summary includes five suggestions for small voluntary organisations. And this thread by CAST includes tips for those supporting smaller organisations with digital. And this thread by IVAR shares tips for funders.
• Digital Leadership 101 conversation starter pack – useful resource for boards and CEOs from Superhighways based on the Charity Digital Code.
• 3 eras of digital transformation: Are we facing fatigue? – Webcredible.

Did you see the results from this year’s Charity Digital Skills Report, now in its third year? More than half (53%) of charities are aware of emerging tech developments but aren’t planning for them yet. Just 12% are planning for how this could change their charity. How does your organisation compare with the results?

• Six ways to increase your organisation’s ‘Digital IQ’ – Elizabeth Marsh for Digital Leaders.

See also:

• What are ‘digital ethics’ and why should charities care? Useful round-up of good reads by Charity Digital News.
• National Lottery funding to boost voluntary sector’s digital capabilities – eight organisations receive a share of £3.4m.
• Building a digitally accessible front door to the NHS – Digital Agenda.
• Microsoft’s Inclusive Design resources.
• New digital marketing strategy webinar series launched by Media Trust.
• 6 things I learned in 6 months as a user researcher – Zoe McClatchey, product design graduate at NHS Digital.
• The best Artificial Intelligence resources for charities – Charity Digital News.
• I updated my digital teams blog list to include some of the new teams now blogging.
• The guides I wish I had when starting digital work in charities – lots of useful links from John Dunford of The Developer Society.
• Giant thread of charity service design resources by Ross McCulloch.
• How to write a digital strategy for smaller charities – Michael MacLennan for Charity Comms.
• Culture is our strategy – Emma Stace for Digital Leaders.
• No more ‘computer says no’ – everyone in Barnardo’s is getting a new computer. Dan Fryer.
• Monthly accessibility link: RNIB aims to redesign emojis for visually impaired users – UK Fundraising. Includes some useful tips about how to make your use of emojis more accessible.
• Love this animation of the changing popularity of different browsers over the past 10 years. [No voice over though so accessibility is poor. Summary is that Chrome overtook everything else from 2012.)

Fundraising

• Ready. Aim. Fundraise! Clever fundraising campaign from Help for Heroes. Fab graphics. #BakeForHeroes.
• Rehoming Alerts – new text message-based way to donate to Battersea.
• Oxfam launch their first ever crowdfunder – #BeesForNepal.
• NSPCC launches innovative digital platform for regular giving.
• WaterAid’s Fempowered project: Harnessing the monthly power of periods – Nicholas Spandagos for Charity Comms. 
• Thread of tweets from IoF’s Communicating with Older Generations event – #IoFOlderGen.
• Smee & Ford Legacy Trends 2019 – free whitepaper if you give your email address. See also this thread from IoFFC by Howard Lake about multicultural in memory and legacy giving.
• Five creative ways to thank your Facebook fundraisers – Kirsty Marrins for GivePanel.
• Instagram donate – insights from WWF by Nicola Gee.
• IoFFC blog from Ruth Smyth.
• Branding: Help or Hindrance? The relationship between branding and fundraising by Roger Craver.
• The A-Z of writing fundraising appeals – Mark Phillips.
• What does fundraising ethically even mean? – Ruby Bayley-Pratt on Great Charity Speakers.
• Useful thread from NCVO summarising the Charity Tax Commission Report.
• Highlights for fundraisers from this year’s NCVO almanac.
• Fundraising Everywhere – virtual fundraising conference in November. FREE for small charities. Register now.
• Lizzie Hollis’ mega google doc list of fundraising learning resources.

People / careers / sector

Oxfam:

The Charity Commission’s report about Oxfam came out at the beginning of June.

• Here’s Oxfam’s video response from their Chair and their written statement.
• Karl Wilding shared some wider lessons for the sector.
• In this talk, Danny Sriskandarajah talks about the role of civil society and organisations like Oxfam. It was recorded at the end of his first 4months in post as Oxfam’s new CEO.
• Oxfam: doing well in reputation rehab – interesting data on trust up until July 2019 – UK Fundraising.

Diversity in the sector:

Karl Wilding was appointed as NCVO’s new CEO. While welcomed, the news prompted heated discussions about diversity. Here’s a small selection.

• Should white men step aside? by an anonymous white male fundraiser on Great Charity Speakers.
• Elizabeth Balgobin: To improve diversity in charities we must do more than tick boxes – Civil Society.
• Kirsty Weakley: Charities need to deal with the white man problem, but don’t get personal – Civil Society.
• BAME people are under-represented in our sector. This article from Charity Digital News says that it is time for us to recognise the barriers that BAME people face in the charity sector. If you know a digital BAME star, there may still be time to nominate them as a top charity digital BAME leader.
• Creating race equity: CEO and chair programme – new from ACEVO.

Other reads

• “What if the future of altruism isn’t a charity sector stuffed with variations on a theme? What if it’s a completely different set of business models which generate the power to change the world?” I failed and I liked it – Ben Holt.
• See also What will charities look like in the future? James Plunkett
• Getting ahead in your comms career: my key takeaways from the Charity Comms conference.
• Clore Social Leadership Talking Leadership report. Plus take a look at their Backpack of tools to address leadership challenges.
• ACEVO / Centre for Mental Health report into bullying in the sector – In Plain Sight. Here’s a thread of the six recommendations in the report. Plus actions for Chairs and trustees from Association of Chairs.
• Lucy Caldicott: If we’re the good guys, why is there still racism, homophobia, bullying and misogyny in the sector? – Civil Society.
• Why you should perfect your elevator pitch TODAY – Nicky Weelen. Good tips for freelancers.
• Why charities need to offer better flexible working options – TPP Recruitment.
• Managing overwhelm at work – advice from a realist – useful advice from Helen Reynolds.
• Case study: Changing leadership culture to drive innovation – WaterAid’s Marcus Missen for EFA.
• How do you attract people to work in your organisation? I liked this video from Shelter. Shame no subtitles though.
• Being the Story’s spokesperson network was launched.

And finally….

• Do American supermarkets have a British food aisle asked Joseph Freeman. [Also see Joe’s weekly round-ups which are excellent.]
• Check your copy. Proof-reading fail from Waitrose.
• More signs – love these shared for #NorfolkDay by @beakpie.
• Quiz: How much do you know about memes? BBC Arts.
• Did you watch the fully interactive episode of BBC Click?
• Have your thought about your own digital legacy? Interesting thread from Marie Curie from a recent event.
• What went right? January-June 2019 – the Positive News stories you need.

Your recommendations

What did you read, watch or launch this month? Please add your links in the comments.

Can I help you?

Get in touch if I can help you with content planning, training or strategy. I work with charities of all shapes and sizes. I can help give your comms or digital processes a healthcheck and ideas injection.

——

Did you miss May’s round-up?Catch up with more good reads!

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Digital round-up – February 2019

Highlights this month: designing comms for young people, housestyle / accessible writing, personas of offline users, February hashtags.

Although it was a short month, February was packed with great comms and good reads. Here’s some you might have missed.

How to use: Pick and choose links to read, or open in new tabs for later. Or bookmark this post. Even better, subscribe and get future round-ups direct to your inbox.

Content

• Family Action launched the Family Monsters Project to start a national conversation about everyday pressures on family life to mark their 150th anniversary.
• Did you spot any good Valentine’s Day comms? This simple message from Time to Change had 40k views. Refuge released another of their powerful reversable poems.
• A few charities joined in with the spontaneous #ImproveYourLifeIn4Words – such as the National Trust, Charity Commission, Small Charities Coalition, Rainbow Trust and Shelter.  
• Interesting to see charities joining in with other organisation’s awareness days showing that the event is bigger than the originator. Here are #TimeToTalk tweets from YoungMinds, The Ramblers and St John Ambulance. Time to Change of course ran a full-on day of comms. Here’s one of their flagship videos which got 133k views. And Time to Change’s Moment showing highlights from the day and Seb Baird’s highlights including 52,000 website visitors.
• Have you taken Friends of the Earth’s Drastic on Plastic challenge?
• London Fire Brigade’s new campaign #SprinklersHit – but is it a good hashtag?
• Excellent myth-busting Twitter thread from Leukaemia Care in response to a WWE wrestler in the news.
• Save the Children’s #PowerOfYourPen campaign urges people to call for peace in Yemen.
• Some of the highlights of #ReclaimSocial included this tweet from Help Refugees who said that their charity started with a hashtag, storytelling from The Connection and good news about ponds from Fresh Water Habitats. Here’s Lightful’s #ReclaimSocial Moment and their blog post which has more detail.
• Top social media marks to Doncaster Council who made this video to promote their appearance on Blue Peter.

Twitter takeover of the month: Fight Bladder Cancer took over MADLcharity’s Twitter account for three days to raise awareness and reach a new audience. It would be good to see a Moment of the takeover to preserve the messages and energy from the event, giving the takeover a longer shelf life.

Comms

• Young people: What you need to know about the channels they’re using in 2019 – 10 points from Ofcom data shared by Dan Slee.
• Nice examples of different types of content from YoungScot in their New Digs guide – how to make a dry subject fun with text with gifs, infographics and hot spots. Great example of content design for young people.
• Working with social influencers is a two way street, just ask our Boob Ninjas – CoppaFeel on working with influencers to connect with their young audience. (CharityComms).

Check your language:

• Do you write health information? NHS Digital have published an A to Z of words and phrases they use to make content about health and the NHS easy to understand. It includes some great tips (see the note about using ‘pee’ rather than ‘wee’ to avoid confusing people using screen readers) as well as useful notes about medical housestyle best practice. More about he guide in this blog post from Sara Wilcox.
• Do you over-formalise or use more complex words because you think it sounds more official? Take a look at this list of alternative words to help improve clarity (shared by @proCopywriters).
• I like this easy read manual to help spot things going wrong with a fridge. Useful for everyone.
• Why using plain English is about opening up not “dumbing down” Dawn Kofie explains the approach used on the new Scottish Parliament website.

Conferences:

• This year’s Social Media Exchange was as excellent as ever. Catch up with some of the learnings via the Wakelet from SMEX19. I went to sessions about building a movement and Jude’s session about people with lived experiences telling their own stories. The Digital Dunk held a live surgery – here’s the top talking points.
• Slides from Charity Comms’ storytelling conference as well as their top takeaways from the event.
• The Institute of Fundraising produced a nifty graphic for successful speakers to promote their #IoFFC sessions.

Comms news, tips and examples:

• Crafting stories that inspire action – how to write copy for activism by Krislyn Tan for JustGiving.
• Is your brand working for you? New tool from Spencer du Bois (via Charity Comms).
• ‘The more people who die, the less people care’ – findings from social scientist Paul Slovic.
• 230 new emojis coming soon in 2019 including guide dogs and wheelchair users.
• 12 habits of successful change-makers: looking at the bigger picture – Sue Tibballs on systems change for acevo.
• Why RNIB wants to transform public attitudes and what it’s doing – Sarah Lambert talks about how RNIB responded to a viral picture of a woman using a smart phone and a white cane.
• Meaningful social media campaigns: Braille Name Generator – Nathan Murray talks to acevo about the campaign in January.
• How to mark your charity’s anniversary. Some examples and tips if you have big one coming up.

Digital – strategy, design, culture

• Digital motivation: what, who and why? Tom French of the Good Things Foundation shares research about the specific reasons people in the UK give for being offline. Here’s the research and more detail about the four personas.
• Where charities are at with The Charity Digital Code of Practice – Zoe Amar shares data from the self-assessment tool gathered since the Code launched.
• You can be right, or you can make change happen – how to drive digital culture change by CRUK’s Giulia Merlo.
• Small Charities Coalition launched a new tool to help people setting up charities. It was developed with help from CAST and in response to the high volume of enquiries they get about this topic (40%+ of support line questions).
• 8 digital tools that will change your life – super useful post from NSPCC’s DigitalDunk.
• Ask a content strategist: will written content be obsolete by next year? Joe Lazauskas.
• Content strategy or content design? CRUK’s Chris Flood ponders job titles and roles.
• Prototypes and guerilla testing — how NCVO started exploring unmet user needs by Megan Griffith Gray.
• Barnado’s are on the look-out for 100 incredible people to help redesign social care for children. Read about #FutureBarnados.
• Monthly accessibility tip: how to increase the relative font sizes of a Word document without having to do it manually.  (Impress your friends too!) See also Vision Australia’s Document Accessibility Toolbar.
• Self-care strategies for community managers at charities – Good Community.

Fundraising

• How do you make your fundraising challenges stand out? Dan Papworth Smyth recorded the British Heart Foundation’s Facebook ad for the London to Brighton bike ride. Cool stuff! (See also this about the Ramblers’ Facebook Instant Experiences.)
• Samples from Diabetes UK’s legacy giving journey.
• A Taste of Home is Hospice UK’s new fundraising campaign.
• Small consistent efforts can change the world – Claire Colvin looks back at her early experiences of mass collective action.
• Sometimes the best thing we donors can do to advance social justice is to just write the check and get out of the way – Nonprofit AF on ‘cheque book activism’ and trusting that people working in organisations know their stuff.

People, teams and culture

• The six characteristics of resilient charities by CAF’s Beth Clarke for acevo.
• What will charities look like in the future? James Plunkett.
• A “golden triangle” for impact and trust? Martin Brookes looks at how to solve the overheads / impact messaging problem.
• How to love your team more than your donors – Blakely talk about team culture.
• You don’t have to be rich to do good — but it helps. How middle class guilt locks talent out of the social entrepreneurship world by Jack Graham.
• Finding joy at work in the NHS – how involving service users changed behaviour by Henry Stewart.
• I like these tips from Darren Caveney for continuous learning.
• If you have some time, why not pass on your knowledge (and get some new knowledge too) by signing up as an advisor for FSI’s big advice day as part of Small Charity Week in June? You can do it by phone or Skype if you are not in London or can only spare half a day. There are regional events too.

And finally….

• Watch this beautiful CBBC programme about Jonathan as part of the My Life series. Available until 9 March or watch a short clip.
• Recursion painting.
• Take the British-Irish dialect quiz.

Your recommendations

What did you read, watch or launch this month? Please add your links in the comments.

Can I help you?

Get in touch if I can help you with content planning, training or strategy. I work with charities of all shapes and sizes. I can help give your comms or digital processes a healthcheck and ideas injection.

——

Did you miss January’s round-up? Catch up with more good reads!

Digital round-up – January 2019

Highlights this month: January#, towels for owls, H-O-M-E, digital trends to avoid / embrace, how to declutter your digital footprint.

Things feel a little gloomy at the moment. So switch the news off and catch up with some creative charity content and recent good reads you might have missed.

How to use: Pick and choose links to read, or open in new tabs for later. Or bookmark this post. Even better, subscribe and get future round-ups direct to your inbox.

Content

• Did you see the nice January hashtag #NationalComplimentDay? This Dogs Trust tweet (Good dog!!!) stood out showing that sometimes simple is best. See more examples in this ZurichVolSec Moment.
• It was good to see charities using the #10YearChallenge to talk about their impact (although the meme itself was dull and there were sinister concerns about its origin).
• Nice gif counting down the days to RSPB’s annual Great Garden Birdwatch. (Here’s more about how they process the data from the 500,000 participants.)
• Changing the language around cancer – great film by Macmillan.
• RNIB transcribed people’s names into braille for #WorldBrailleDay.
• I love ACRE’s Village Halls Week. This year’s poem by Kate Fox celebrated the variety of things happening in halls.
• Did you see Refuge’s powerful reversible poems?
• Lots of creative comms for #NationalStorytellingWeek, examples in this ZurichVolSec Moment.
• Great impact board from Headway East London. Would have been even better if they had linked to a web page for more information.
• Full Fact fact checked headlines about government spending. How to pack lots of information into one tweet. (Conversely, how to use a long thread to explain a complicated subject – why we don’t need a wall.)
• What we all need now is more fun + silliness. Did you see this thread of unsolicited duck pics from museums?
• Great work from Shelter who tweeted a still from the Bros documentary aired on TV over Christmas.

It can be difficult to remember all the good stuff from last year. Take a look back in these review from 2018:

• Dan Papworth-Smyth’s charity digital round-up of 2018.
• Charity video roundup – highlights from 2018 curated by Magneto Films.
• The CharityComms team’s personal campaign picks of 2018.
• Did you do your own round-up? It can be a nice antidote to all the Christmas fun. See CRUK’s top 5 cancer research stories from 2018.

Coming soon….

• Lightful are spearheading #ReclaimSocial on Wednesday 6 February. Join in!
• Thursday 7 February is Time to Talk Day. Get talking about mental health.
• Social Media Exchange 2019 is on Monday 11 February. Follow #SMEX19 if you can’t be there.

Comms

• How to deal with difficult social media shifts – useful post from Montfort.
• How to write a social media policy for your company – tips from Hootsuite.
• No time for that? Take a look at Time to Change’s social media principles.
• Slides from Charity Comms’s seminar, Unlocking the power of social influencers.
• The story behind Stories and our journalistic approach to digital content – Wellcome’s change in editorial strategy.
• Why CEO letters suck (and how to make them better) – Matt Chittock for CharityComms.
• Do you still believe in social media? asks Bertie Bosredon on CharityComms. See also How much longer can your brand stay on Facebook by James Mullarkey.

Digital – strategy, design, culture

• Digital transformation is a risky business – lessons from NSPCC’s Digital Dunk.
• Ten ways to make your charity genuinely digital – NPC.
• Why do digital? Matt Collins for Charity Comms gives persuasive arguments if you still need to convince colleagues.
• Is your organisation making the most of digital technologies? Take SCVO’s digital check-up.
• Then avoid these 5 digital trends – Matt Collins for JustGiving.
• But keep ahead of these – 5 Charity Digital Trends for 2019 by Montfort.
• What can we learn about information giving from The Weather Channel who use AR to bring extreme weather to life.
• And The Big Issue goes AR!
• AI is changing the world; who will change AI?  NESTA
• The Periodic Table of SEO Success Factors – Search Engine Land.
• I analysed the searches people used to read my blog and it’s not good news for women – Jessica Eaton.
• The service design story at Reach Volunteering.
• Assumptions, assumptions — how NCVO started talking about what we know (and what we think we know) – Megan Griffith Gray.
• Service Design Fringe Festival: Lessons from creating digital services within a charity – CAST.
• Where should UX sit in an organisation? Centralised vs embedded asks webcredible.
• Keep On, Keep Up: Collaboration in older person tech – great case study from Reason Digital.
• Monthly accessibility tip: don’t use special characters that look like letters.
• We need to talk about accessibility on chatbots – UX Design.
• I used the web for a day using a screen reader – Smashing Magazine.
• KonMari For Digital Clutter – CodesLikeAGirl – not just for clearing out the clutter in your home.
• CRUK’s tech team have tidied their digital up and moved their blog to Medium.

Fundraising

Still think you can’t ask for donations on Twitter? Be authentic / fun like these examples:

• Excellent responses to this request for donations of towels for owls.
• Eye-catching requests for toy donations to Little Village as part of their Think Small promotion.
• And lovely responses to this request for knitted blankets for a hospice.
• Cycle from Scratchy Bottom to Broadbottom for Toilet Twinning. Creative promo for their fundraising package.

See also:

• A golden formula for generating trust – important read by Kate Lee, CEO of CLIC Sargent.
• BT’s MyDonate fundraising platform will close in June particularly hitting small charities. White Fuse compiled alternatives to BT MyDonate for donations and fundraising.
• Seven common ‘funding headaches’ for charities – and what you can do about it – DSC.
• What does digital fundraising really mean? CRUK’s Rob Green.
• Charities try new tactics to be remembered in wills – view from The Economist (subscribe to read).
• Five strategies for motivating supporters – nfpSynergy.
• Charities: we need to start with why! Richard Sved.
• Tales from the Secret Giver #1: opening some Christmas crackers: a review of three Christmas campaigns – UK Fundraising.
• Martin Lewis: What happened to my pledge to give £10m to charity in 2012? Insights from a major giver.
• Making your Thank You’s SUPER – by David Burgess.

People

• Why I am recruiting more remote workers – call to action by Emily Casson for IoF.
• Matt Haworth: the digital entrepreneur who does good – profile article in UK Fundraising.
• 12 things you need to understand if you want your team to perform consistently well – Halo Psychology.
• How we transformed Happy from a £180k loss to a £165k profit in one year – good read from Happy Ltd.
• What do you have on the back of the toilet doors in your office? These posters from Monzo were widely shared this month.
• The rise and fall of the Chief Digital Officer – useful insights from webcredible
• Meet Oxfam’s new CEO Danny Sriskandarajah (and volunteer Pat and volunteer Sam).
• Have you read NCVO’s new volunteering research Time Well Spent?

And finally….

• Download British Red Cross’ power of kindness calendar.
• Cheer yourself up with TheMERL’s helpful cheat for #MuseumSelfieDay.
• Or this dad and baby chatting via Best Beginnings.
• A young boy joins in with the drumming at Welcome to the Forest.
• I love Olivia Colman screeching at her subjects in The Favourite.
• Hypnotise yourself with these polygonal sine waves.

Your recommendations

What did you read, watch or launch this month? Please add your links in the comments.

Can I help you?

Get in touch if I can help you with content planning, training or strategy. I work with charities of all shapes and sizes. I can help give your comms or digital processes a healthcheck and ideas injection.

——

Did you miss the last round-up? Catch up with more good reads!

Be a good Secret Santa

It’s that time of year again. Rather than spending money on plastic tat / novelty socks, why not use some or all of your Secret Santa in a more impactful way? Here are a few examples of charities running Secret Santa sized fundraising campaigns and other ideas for doing good within your budget.

Christmas campaigns

• Give the gift of reading – make a donation to Beanstalk + give a book you already love to your Secret Santa.
• Surprise a child with a book through Book Trust’s annual campaign.
• Be a Secret Santa with Action for Children. Help light up the map. Don’t festivalFail.
• Order a letter from Santa via NSPCC.

Secret Santa gifts

• The Charity Retail Association is encouraging everyone to be a #GoodCauseSantaClaus and buy gifts from charity shops.
• Oxfam’s online charity shop is an amazing treasure trove of unique items if you are looking for a gift. From used football stamps to vintage knitting patterns, a jigsaw of the Queen Mother, and GoggleBox board game, there’s something for everyone. You can search by price to fit your budget.
• Many charities run virtual gift packages. For example Oxfam Unwrapped gifts start at £5.
• Social Enterprise UK say #BuySocial and get #PresentsWithPurpose. Check out their Christmas catalogue.
• Use the Giving Machine’s Secret Santa generator to pick names and buy gifts.

Christmas cheer

Why not pool your funds and do something bigger as a team?

• Reserve someone a place at Crisis at Christmas for £28.18.
• Is there a Christmas Dinner for care leavers or older people near you? Could you buy something from their wishlist? Here’s Hackney’s Christmas Dinner (part of a programme of 17 Christmas Dinners for care leavers across the country, donate to their crowdfunder) and John Popham’s Connected Christmas campaign for older people.
• Set a place for a child at Mary’s Meals virtual Christmas dinner table for £13.90.
• Buy a safety kit or actual bike for a refugee via The Bike Project.
• Twin your office loo via Toilet Twinning for £60. “Santa can’t give toilets but you can.”
• Is there a local toy collection you could contribute to?

There are countless fundraising appeals, Christmas jumper days and local food bank collections you could instead donate to in the name of your Secret Santa.

Leave Relf on the shelf and give a gift that matters say International Rescue Committee in this fab video.

What are you doing?

• Do you do Secret Santa in your team? Any tips?
• Is your charity doing an interesting appeal?

Please share in the comments.

See also: charity digital advent calendars – tips and examples from 2017

Digital round-up – October 2018

Highlights this month: big hashtags, user-generated content, AI, voice tech, digital skills and more….

The nights are setting in and seasonal content is upon us. October is a very busy month of awareness days. There was lots of great content launched. Pop the kettle on and catch up.

How to use: Pick and choose links to read, or open in new tabs for later. Or bookmark this post. Even better, subscribe and get future round-ups direct to your inbox.

Content

10 October was #WorldMentalHealthDay, #WorldHomelessnessDay and #HousingDay. I have never seen my list of trending topics look like this for an hour, let alone all day. The trending hashtags and topics were consistently related to these issues. Nothing else got a look-in all day.

There was some amazing content including:

• A powerful poem from Crisis for #WorldHomelessnessDay.
• 22 local charities donated their HOMEpages to homelessness charity St Basils in the West Midlands to raise awareness.
• Did you see Time to Change’s new #AskTwice video? And their Moment of user-generated content – these are the reasons people say ‘I am fine’ when they’re not.
• Love these prompt cards from Young Minds.
• Mental Health UK produced beautiful images to illustrate people’s stories in their Let’s Talk series. See Nathaniel’s story.

Also this month:

• Plan International UK launched a video about sexual harassment. It has had 94k likes and over 7 million views.
• Check your breasts video from Breast Cancer Now.
• Love this promo for the Charity Comms podcast.
• Parkinson’s UK launched their list of approved apps and devices for people with Parkinson’s. A charity first.
• It was RNIB’s 150th birthday.
• This is how to promote a new area in a museum. Top video from Eureka! Museum.
• SCVO’s what is modern charity video.
• The warning signs of genocide, powerful video from RightsInfo.
• Choose your own next line for #NationalPoetyDay. Great use of a thread / polls by the Museum of English Rural Life.
• Charities don’t usually tweet on a Sunday night. I liked this moment to paws from RSPCA.
• There was some great halloween content around.

Twitter takeover of the month: CoppaFeel’s Kris Hallenger / @nhs. Kris who has been living with stage 4 breast cancer since 2009, talked about treatments and good health.

Comms

• This excerpt from Clic Sargent’s impact report was widely shared and celebrated as a great example of transparency. Could your charity do something similar to show what didn’t work?
• What if we scrapped the annual report and started again? asks David Ainsworth in Civil Society.
• Why do we ignore digital impact? Matt Haworth asks why the impact of digital services isn’t included in impact reports.
• Go on, go on, go on, go on! What charities can learn from Father Ted’s Mrs Doyle by Anna Pietrowski for Charity Comms. (best URL I have seen for a while!)
• Thread about the future of advertising by Nik Sharma.
• FRIENDS IMPACT: A tongue-in-cheek shoplifting appeal led to 50 per cent of Blackpool people thinking better of their police by Dan Slee.
• Does your search strategy match how people expect content? Think about the Netflix effect say The Royal Academy.
• If you missed Being the Story, here’s my blog post about it and links to others’.
• Will you join in with #YouMadeItHappen on 19 November? Find out about this new day, led by NCVO. >> I’ve written a blog post with some ideas about how to get involved with #YouMadeItHappen.

Digital – strategy, design, culture

• Internet-era ways of working by Tom Loosemore of Public Digital.
• 6 tough questions third sector organisations need to explore in a digital age from SCVO’s digital team. Linking to their ‘what next’ report.
• Digital is growing up, is your charity maturing with it? (Spoiler: probably not!) by Anya Pearson, Contentious.
• Digital strategy: The four fights you have to win from McKinsey.
• 15 principles of good service design by GDS for Digital Leaders.
• Why Amazon, Alexa and #TechforGood can’t be in the same sentence by James Mullarkey.
• Five ways to engage with responsible technology by Sam Brown.
• How Cancer Research UK is exploring AI and voice tech in Charity Digital News.
• Welcome to the Golden Age of Data – examples from a brave new world of personalisation – NSPCC’s Digital Dunk.
• Dealing with digital changes – useful tips about keeping up with platform changes and changing tack if needed, by Montfort.
• Blockchain: the next radical change for charities by Stromi for Digital Dunk.
• How to create a great charity website experience, case study from MS Society on Charity Digital News.
• Digital user tests which are easy, fast and affordable – YoYo Design for CharityComms.
• 4 user research guides from co-op digital.
• Monthly accessibility tip: RNIB shared 10 #DigitalAccessibilityTips including this one about colour contrast.
• And if you have never heard a screen reader, here’s an example of how they read image descriptions from Dr Amit Patel. See more about access tech in this Moment of his Twitter takeover for Scope.

Fundraising

• Did you join in with the first ever Gift Aid Awareness Day?
• Digital fundraising trends for small charities not to miss by Charity Digital News.
• Putting fun into contactless donating at two historic sites in Scotland. Tap the past to preserve the future.
• Hospice fundraisers tend to go the extra mile, like 10-year old Harriet who played her cello at the top of a mountain for Compton Care.
• Are you ready for #GivingTuesday on 27 November? Here’s a guide to using the day to say thank you.

People

• How we teach digital skills at PwC for Harvard Business Review.
• 3 steps to growing a digital culture – Clive Gardiner of NSPCC shares what they are doing.
• Three amazing Ted Talks for charities by Kirsty Marrins for Lightful.
• Critical lessons for charity trustees by Beth Clarke for CAF.
• The Association of Chairs asked Chairs to share their top tips to mark their 5th birthday. Here are the best ones in a Moment: tips for effective chairing.

And finally….

• Feeling helpless about the state of the world? Here’s a thread about the little things we can all do to make things better.
• A thread of perceptual illusions to mess with your brain.
• Have you ever looked for treasure in the Thames (or any other urban river)?
• An otter eating – happy noises!

Your recommendations

What did you read, watch or launch this month? Please add your links in the comments.

Can I help you?

Get in touch if I can help you with content planning, training or strategy. I work with charities of all shapes and sizes. I can help give your comms or digital processes a healthcheck and ideas injection.

——

Did you miss September’s round-up? Catch up with more good reads!

Digital round-up – September 18

Highlights this month: AI, ethics, the Human search engine, and hope.

September is a busy month of awareness days and a good time to launch new brands or websites before the noise of seasonal fundraising. Pop the kettle on and catch up with some content and good reads you might have missed.

How to use: Pick and choose links to read, or open in new tabs for later. Or bookmark this post. Even better, subscribe and get future round-ups direct to your inbox.

Content

• Love this video of people with dementia using VR headsets by The Wayback.
• Video from Rights Info – do we have a human right to sex?
• Nice behind the scenes / call to action film about Oxfam’s shops.
• 17k likes for this picture of a Barnardo’s shop with the writing round the wrong way, yet only a handful for Barnardo’s Scotland’s response.
• Did you see Mind’s new Mental Health at Work website?
• #WorldAlzheimersDay Moment of tweets from large and small charities supporting people with dementia.
• Lovely copywriting from Toilet Twinning in this tweet.
• Great content from The Blurt Foundation – We’ve Answered 10 Popular Google Searches: Why Does Depression…?
• And from Gingerbread –14 things not to say to a single parent (and seven things you should.
• Time to Change made a Moment of What people want you to know about suicide for #WorldSuicidePreventionDay. Here the tweet where they asked for people’s views.
• Lots of charities joined in with #InternationalSpeakLikeAPrirateDay such as this cheeky tweet from CoppaFeel.
• There was some great content around for Remember a Charity’s Human search engine. For example, take a look at material from Dogs Trust, Scope, and Shelter.

There were new websites from Sue Ryder, and NPC this month. Plus new brands from National Autistic Society and RNIB who created a short video about the change..

Comms

• How content is your content? – nifty quiz from Contentious.
• A reminder about the difference between copywriting and content design by Sarah Richards.
• 4 charity campaigns with stories at their heart – Helena Hastings for Lightful ahead of Being the Story on 19 October. [Don’t miss Being the Story. There might still be a few spaces left. Buy your tickets today.]
• Truly ethical images must tell a complete story by Water Aid.
• 5 doodles that help to make sense of UK poverty – JRF blog.
• 5 secrets to Instagram success by Dawn at Morello Marketing.
• 7 tips for social media advertising success by NSPCC’s Digital Dunk.
• Facebook advertising for charities: A guide to designing your first ad by Lightful.
• Live tweeting at events: seven tips for avoiding the pitfalls – Sarah Myers for Charity Comms. I’d add an extra tip about using threads to tweet from particular sessions. This makes it so much easier to follow what is being said.

Digital

• Five things an NGO learned about Artificial Intelligence – excellent blog post from Friends of the Earth’s Innovation Team. See also Time to trade Ai power for responsibility on Digital Agenda.
• Screw tech ethics says Matt Howarth also for Digital Agenda.
• Great blog post from the outgoing #SocialCEOs overall winner, Matthew Hodson about using social media for social good.
• Designing our design principles – more useful stuff in the CRUK blog.
• NHS’s manual for designing and building digital services.
• A guide to procuring service design by Sarah Drummond.
• Digital = Potential Part 1: The power of an app to help people in crisis by Gillian Murray, CEO of Pilotlight.
• 6 key new trends for charities on digital – CharityDigitalNews coverage of the Salesforce report.
• Why our communications team is going Agile – Citizens Advice blog.
• Data doesn’t have to be scary: why insights should inform your digital projects by Dee Russell for Charity Comms. Includes Google Analytics video tutorials.
• ‘Our sector needs to respond with urgency. People are seeking support more and more expect a digital ‘way’ of solving their problem.’ Important post from Dan Sutch about bringing digital into service delivery.

Fundraising

• Ethical fundraising: 7 critical questions for the board and Chair by John Williams.
• Is compassion fatigue inevitable in an age of 24-hour news? Text from a Guardian podcast.
• This thread by Jon Arnold about fundraising applications was widely shared.
• PayPal / NSPCC video about their donation journey. Accompanying article from PayPal talks more about the redesign project.
• Brathay launched their 3.7 programme with the funds raised following Matt Campbell’s tragic death during the London Marathon in April this year.

In case you missed it, I wrote this about donor experience / in-memory fundraising.

People

Hope… and where to find it – read this moving post by Kate Carroll to help remind yourself why your comms / information / fundraising work, really matters.

• Simple ways to keep your digital team adaptable and creative – love this from Seb Baird of Time to Change for CharityComms.
• 5 ways charity leaders can make better decisions – Zoe Amar.
• The Post Office: How can a 375-year-old brand attract the best in digital talent? – eConsultancy.
• How to spread digital knowledge to other teams – Platypus Digital.
• The ageing population: what impact will a 100-year life have on charities – predictions from Joe Saxton.

And finally….

• Different messages on boy’s and girl’s t-shirts in Primark. FFS.
• How The Weather Channel Made That Insane Storm Surge Animation in Wired.
• Top charity shop idea of the month – Jeff Goldblum in every photo frame. This had 144k likes!

Your recommendations

What did you read, watch or launch this month? Please add your links in the comments.

Can I help you?

Get in touch if I can help you with content planning, training or strategy. I work with charities of all shapes and sizes. I can help give your comms or digital processes a healthcheck, skills review and ideas injection.

——

Did you miss August’s round-up? Catch up with more good reads!

Digital round-up – August

Highlights this month: ethical marketing, voice search, digital evolution and shopping with a giant fundraising cheque.

It’s back to school / work time. If you were off in August or just head-down because everyone else was, here’s some great content and good reads to catch up with.

How to use: Pick and choose links to read, or open in new tabs for later. Or bookmark this post. Even better, subscribe and get future round-ups direct to your inbox.

Content

• Scope launched their rebrand, disability gamechangers campaign and have been running a series of takeovers on Twitter. Here is a Moment from Sam’s takeover day.
• Nice promo for Woodland Trust’s family membership package.
• Simple, strong 11 second video from social enterprise HeyGirls challenging period poverty. No link for the call to action though. See also BloodyBigBrunch who invited followers to illustrate their periods in gif form.
• You have 5 ambulances and 9 patients – what would you do? Great content from North West Ambulance Service.
• Lovely video storytelling from the Mayhew. Here’s Nayan’s story for #InternationalFriendshipDay.
• Bake Off is back. Selection of the best charity fundraising bakes and cake content in this GBBO Moment.
• Museum Meme day included lots of absolute units and curator frustrations.

Here are some useful reminders about how images can reinforce negative stereotypes. I spotted a call for #NoMoreWrinklyHands and an article shared by Time to Change about the rise of the head clutcher image to illustrate mental health stories. >> Review and improve your use of images.

Comms

• Why the battle for our attention matters for charities by CAF’s Rhodri Davies for Charity Digital News.
• More on ethical marketing in this opinion piece from Sam of NSPCC – Smarter targeting or smarter content? Is a new standard of expected ethics forcing us to change how we think about digital marketing?
• You had me at hello – the importance of a welcome journey and how to get it right via email. Top tips from CharityComms.
• How to think strategically about email personalisation – eConsultancy.
• More email in this from Charity Digital News – Five great automated email marketing programmes for charities.
• Get your split testing right. There is Nothing Magical About 95% Statistical Significance – CXL.
• Our writing guidelines (they’re for everyone, not just for writers) – the Co-op’s approach to writing.
• Downloadable comms planning guide – in the style of snakes and ladders.
• Five Steps To Create A Social Media Content Plan by Teresa Litsa of Lightful.

Digital

• How does your organisation measure up? The latest global charity technology trends: results from the latest Global NGO Technology Report – Civil Society.
• The emoji report: analysis of every emoji published over 2 years on Twitter – Brandwatch.
• What will social look like in the next 10 years? We Are Social.
• Why we need to stop repeating the “50% by 2020” voice search prediction – eConsultancy.
• And what Government are doing about voice search – GDS.
• Facebook subscriptions and content monetisation by Dan Papworth-Smyth.
• The Anatomy of an Optimized Web Page [Infographic]– Social Media Today.
• Your monthly accessibility reminder: image descriptions on Twitter.
• Four Google Adwords scripts that retailers can use to supercharge sales – eConsultancy.
• The New York Public Library release classic books on Instagram Stories – this thread by Jack Appleby shows it in action.
• Promos’ survey found that 44% of consumers watch at least five videos online per day. Read their research into online video habits 2018 based on a survey of 500 people.
• 4 of the top innovative charity digital products – JustGiving – featuring the BECCA app from Breast Cancer Care, Austica’s app, RSPCA’s pet search function and Wateraid’s online donation platform.
• 5 things learnt from the Childline #UnderstandMe campaign by Marnie on NSPCC’s Digital Dunk.
• I am seeing many more organisations recruiting for data analysts in their digital teams. This is interesting from GDS showing how data capture, use and application moves on in an organisation. They are bringing the disciplines of user research and analytics together to reduce the artificial divide created by data created in different ways and by different teams.
• This is also about digital evolution. Cancer Research UK share the things they have learnt through their digital adaption journey. It’s time to throw out your ‘digital’ strategy.

Fundraising

• These charity experiments successfully nudge people to give more – interesting results of research encouraging people to see the broader picture of their giving.
• How to improve your online donation journey by Tim Dixon at nomensa.
• Losing the donor relationship – as we lose access to data about donors, Beate Sorum asks whether this will be fundraising’s digital disruption.
• Truth or dare: why are some causes harder to fundraise for than others? Examples and tips by Olivia Fuller for UK Fundraising.
• YouTube Giving

Alzheimer’s Research UK show some love for a giant fundraising cheque. Here we see it in action at the station, in a shop and on a train. A cheque picture with personality! >> Here are more examples of alternatives to cheque line-up pictures in my post Just say no to giant cheques.

People

• Getting comfortable talking about diversity and inclusion in the third sector. Take part in healthy conversations argues Sushi Juggapah of CharityComms.
• 55 steps to workplace happiness by Henry Stewart.
• The Independent’s Happy List 2018.
• Free digital skills courses from Accenture.

Have you booked your ticket for Being the Story in October? Here’s more about last year’s inspirational event. Being the Story 2017 – carthartic and powerful storytelling. Don’t miss 2018.

And finally….

Blue Peter explain the world wide web – from the BBC archive,1995.

Your recommendations

What did you read, watch or launch this month? Please add your links in the comments.

Can I help you?

Get in touch if I can help you with digital copywriting, content planning, training or strategy. I work with charities of all shapes and sizes. I can help give your comms or digital processes a healthcheck and ideas injection.

——

Did you miss July’s round-up? Catch up with more good reads!