Parkinson’s UK to overhaul digital strategy
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Parkinson’s UK, the national charity that supports sufferers of Parkinson’s and their families, is to overhaul its digital strategy.
The charity hopes to bring together a number of separate strands including its online forum and social media communities under one “umbrella” strategy.
It has appointed digital agency SiftGroups to carry out a usability research project to establish how people are using and navigating the site.
Findings will be used to develop a long-term digital strategy that will include an overhaul of the website and it’s community forum.
It hopes to develop its strategy to use digital channels and social media to support its “ambitious” fundraising targets.
Liz Winthrop, head of digital at Parkinson’s UK, says: “Thanks to the growth of social media, we have all these effective communities, but it can be a bit siloed so we want to find out how we bring it all under one umbrella”.
“The charity has gone through a lot of changes in the past few years and we’re getting all this data and looking at how we deliver it online. What we want to do is inspire people to want to raise funds and to have a relation with the charity.”
The digital strategy overhaul follows the charity’s rebrand to Parkinson’s UK from Parkinson’s Disease Society last year and a consumer research study earlier this year to identify hard to reach groups, as part of its goal to raise awareness and reach every person in the UK affected by Parkinson’s.
YouGov Insight:
Charity Shops
· Charity shops are widely supported by UK shoppers with 73% buying from charity shops.
· However, purchasing by many is likely only to be occasional as 36% of adults had not purchased from a charity shop in the last six months.
· The most popularly bought items are books (24% purchase penetration) and clothes (18%).
· 90% of adults state that they donate to charity shops but 22% indicated that they had not done so in the last six months.
· The most popularly donated items are clothing (62%), books (38%) and footwear (30%).
· In all categories more people donate than buy implying that demand is unlikely to outstrip supply.
Readers' comments (1)
Nick Pride, MD, DMS | Tue, 18 Oct 2011 8:41 am
I congratulate Parkinson’s UK on recognising the importance of engaging with potential donors through involvement, and more importantly, acknowledging the need to build engagement programmes centred on donors’ most relevant communication channel - in this case digital.
Charities can no longer fulfil their needs by just relying on the old model of dependence: asking people to donate and relying on altruism. In this economic climate, charities, like brands, must build relationships with both existing and potential donors - fundraising ‘with’ rather than fundraising ‘to’ them - if they are to maximise their income.
There's still one step to go though, and the clue is in the 'silo' idea. Donors do not think of themselves as 'digital' or 'offline', and we need to go the next step to integrate their involvement across whatever communication channel they choose. It's hard, but it's worth it.
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