What Is Involved in Designing a Charity Website?

Designing a charity website is a unique challenge, as it involves creating a site that can effectively communicate the charitable organization’s mission and engage potential donors. When designing a charity website, there are several key considerations to keep in mind, including developing an effective and engaging content strategy, choosing the right website platform, and incorporating visuals that help to illustrate the mission.

Content Strategy

Content plays an important role on any website, but it is particularly important for charity websites. The content should inform and educate visitors about the charity’s mission, goals, and services and should be written in a clear, compelling way. Content should also be structured in an organized and easy-to-navigate way, as visitors will often arrive on the charity website with specific questions. Additionally, there should be plenty of opportunities for visitors to take action, such as donating or signing up for a newsletter.

Website Platform

The first step in launching a charity website is to choose the right platform. WordPress is the most popular choice among charities, as it is easy to use and cost-effective. Additionally, WordPress offers a wide range of themes and plugins that can be used to customize the website and add features such as donation forms. Other platforms

Designing For Charity Websites: the Basics

In the digital age, charities have become increasingly reliant on their websites to draw in potential donors and raise awareness of their causes. As such, creating a website to represent your charity is a key step in growing its reach and engaging with your target audiences. To make sure your charity website is as successful as possible, it is important to understand the basics of designing for charity websites.

Establish A Clear Goal

Before launching into the design process, it is necessary to clearly define the purpose of the website. Are you hoping to raise funds or highlight a particular cause? Is the goal to educate site visitors about the charity or its mission? Once the goal is established, you can tailor your design accordingly. For example, if you’re looking to raise donations, consider including a donation button on the front page and make sure it is easy to find.

Equally important is to establish the target audience. Who will be visiting the site? What kind of content will they be interested in? Knowing this information can help inform the tone, messaging, and structure of the website. Past examples of well-targeted charity websites include WFP.org, which uses visuals and stories to appeal to donors for humanitarian aid, or Stonewall.org.uk, which focuses on LGBTQ+ advocacy and the challenges faced by this community.

Design With Accessibility In Mind

It is imperative to consider accessibility when designing a website. Designing with universal usability in mind makes sure that everyone has equal access to the site’s content, regardless of any physical limitations they may have. This includes making sure the site is easy to navigate and legible, without the need to adjust any settings. Simplifying the navigation menu, using descriptive links, and providing subtitles for audio and video content are all ways to ensure that your website is accessible to everyone.

Additionally, adding alternative text to images, providing captioning and transcripts for multimedia, and ensuring the readability of text for screen readers are also important steps for creating an accessible website. Organizations like WebAIM provide helpful resources on how to make websites more accessible and userfriendly.

Make Mobile Friendly Designs A Priority

Making designs mobile friendly should be a top priority, as the majority of users access websites via their phones. Simple matters such as ensuring there is enough white space so that all text and images can be easily read on smaller screens and optimizing the speed of loading pages are essential for encouraging people to engage with your website.

Furthermore, incorporating mobile-friendly graphic design, including responsive design and larger font sizes, goes a long way in making your website more accessible. If possible, use a mobile-first design approach; such an approach ensures seamless navigation across all devices and makes sure the website looks great whether someone is viewing it on a phone, tablet, or desktop.

Understand the Impact of Colors

Choosing the right color palette is an important part of designing for charity websites. Colors can evoke certain emotions which can influence how people perceive and interact with the website. Bright, warm colors give off a cheerful, optimistic vibe whereas dark and cool colors can instill a sense of seriousness and trustworthiness.

When choosing the palette for your website, take the mission of the charity into account. For example, a charity focused on environmental preservation might opt for natural shades of green and blue, whereas one focusing on homelessness might use red and orange to call attention to the severity of the situation. Make sure to test out different combinations and look for feedback from members and potential site visitors to ensure the right message is being conveyed.

Creating an Engaging User Experience

1. Establish a clear purpose: Make sure your website has a clearly defined purpose so users know why they are visiting your site and what you are offering.

2. Create an Intuitive Navigation Structure: Use easy-to-understand language, labels, and categories to help users find their way around the site quickly.

3. Utilize Call-to-Action Buttons: Incorporate call-to-action (CTA) buttons throughout the website

To go fruther on the topic

If you’d like to explore more on the topic of The basics of designing for charity websites, we recommend the following litterature:

1. Web Design for Nonprofits: An Essential Guide by Rob Frankel
2. Charity Website Design & Development: A Step-by-Step Guide by Rachel Linn
2. Don't Make Me Think Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug
4. Designing for Good: A Guide to Creating Websites that Change the World by Sara Wachter-Boettcher
5. Nonprofit Web Design: A Guide to Developing and Designing Successful Websites by Erika Duchesne
6. The Nonprofit Website Design Book: The Complete Guide to Designing, Building and Managing Your Organization’s Site with Confidence by Anne Ferguson
7. The Nonprofit Storytelling Field Guide: The Five Steps for Using Stories for Impact and Fundraising by Kivi Leroux Miller
8. The Nonprofit Guide to Digital Strategy: From Planning to Execution by Chad Norman and Eileen O’Brien
9. The Nonprofit Guide to Going Social: Harnessing Networks and Online Communities for Fundraising and Advocacy by Heather Mansfield
10. Communicating for Results in Government and Nonprofit Organizations by Patricia J. Parsons