Category: Digital

Nonprofits had to adjust during COVID-19 in the way they deliver services, communicate with their stakeholders and their own teams.

Many nonprofits embraced digital during COVID-19 to maintain their service delivery, volunteer management, stakeholder engagement, and internal communication.

Nonprofits embraced digital technologies during COVID-19 in order to continue delivering their services and reach their beneficiaries. However, the transition was not smooth for everyone, and there were many obstacles they had to navigate.

Nonprofits around the world have had to change the way they deliver services as a result of COVID-19. A combination of restricted movement, furloughed staff, and increases in demand at a time when forecasted revenue has become more uncertain has created a challenging - at times, impossible - environment in which to make adjustments to delivery models. However, so many nonprofits have shown remarkable resilience, transitioning to virtual delivery models where possible and in many cases, almost overnight. For some, the challenging circumstances have led to accelerated digital transformation and related opportunities.

What are you up to this weekend? Perhaps you’re going to the pub or a restaurant, or even the cinema. Life as it was before the pandemic is starting to return. Maybe you’re even planning your first face-to-face work meeting or a day in the office soon.

Right after the initial shock and the months of uncertainty with COVID-19, it’s time to think of what’s comes next. As we’re moving on from the emergency fundraising, we know that the crisis is not over.

This week we’ve hosted a free webinar with a wonderful panel on community outreach for #GivingTuesday.

It’s the perfect time to start planning your end of year or Christmas campaign.

We hosted a fantastic webinar last week including great guests to talk about nonprofit digital capacity building and how it is rapidly evolving during COVID-19.

Starting a charity podcast is not hard. We’ve asked the podcast expert, Rachel Stephenson Sheff, Senior Advisor at Lightful and IG Advisors and also Producer of the successful podcast ‘What Donors Want’ to share her tips. From coming up with an idea of a podcast to the practical aspects of it such as the equipment and the software.

There’s been some anxiety in the recent global shift to home working. Here at Lightful, we’ve shifted to homeworking, which has been an adjustment in terms of how we work. The change, however, has perhaps been less drastic than we’ve thought. I’m happy to say that many of us here at Lightful have pushed forward, and have, among other things, facilitated a new special Covid-19 related cohort of our BRIDGE programme.

As the world moved into lockdown earlier this year, we seemed to experience ten years of digital acceleration across the charity sector in ten days. Engaging (online) with supporters, raising (emergency) funds, delivering services (remotely) – under increasingly difficult circumstances, charities are needed more than ever to help those who need it more than ever.

‘Fast-changing priorities’ has been one of the biggest challenges facing charity professionals during the Coronavirus epidemic. For those working in comms and social media, it has never before been more imperative to know your audience, what their needs are and how their behaviours are changing.

No one could have predicted a global pandemic that would force the world to go into lockdown with no guaranteed end date in sight. This has, of course, come with huge challenges. From setting ourselves up to work from home, juggling work and home life, having to change course to find different ways to support beneficiaries, to having to get creative with fundraising.

We’ve hosted a webinar last week with nonprofit expert, master trainer and author Beth Kanter to share tips to get better at online meetings. There are more meetings than ever happening right now, both internal and external ones. It’s easy to be tired, distracted, confused. That’s why we’ve asked Beth Kanter to join us in a practical and interactive session that will teach us how to improve our online meetings using Zoom.

It’s a hard time for all of us both personally and professionally. We are experiencing a range of emotions during uncertain times but we’re still trying to work on projects that we’re passionate about.

It’s time to be more digital and we need to access the best tools to make our lives easier. The problem is there are too many tools out there and our time is limited.

We’re all adjusting to a new reality that asks us to stay safe and work from home for the foreseeable future. Some of us may have experience in working from home for a day here or there, others are completely new to this. Either way, many of us have found ourselves having to get used to this new ‘normal’.

We are certainly living in strange times and we are trying to adjust. Charities of all sizes are exploring new ways to adjust to this new reality to survive. From work from home policies and crisis comms to staying in touch with their supporters and maintaining regular donations, the challenges are real.

This article was written in collaboration with Matt Saunders from Charitybox. His book, The Digital Charity is available in paperback now.

On Friday 14th Lightful hosted a BRIDGE networking breakfast for charities and social enterprises in Bristol at the coworking space the Engine Shed. We were joined by a number of organisations to discuss the digital trends for charities looking forward to the rest of 2020 and beyond.

It’s that time of the year that we love thinking ahead to predict the digital trends that will affect us over the next 12 months. We’ve asked #TeamLightful to share their thoughts so these are our digital tech predictions for 2020.

We all have special dates pinned on our calendars. Online awareness days can make great opportunities for charities and nonprofits to celebrate their work while inspiring their supporters on social media.

#GivingTuesday is a global movement of generosity and it makes a great opportunity for charities and nonprofits to come together to celebrate their inspiring work. #GivingTuesday 2019 had been a great success and it was very inspiring seeing organisations sharing their messages of how they’re working towards changing the world.

It’s that time of the year where charities are gearing up for Christmas so we thought we’d share some awesome, inspiring end of year/Christmas campaigns we’ve spotted from charities big and small.

It’s Black Friday today, the biggest shopping day in the USA, but also a great day for charities. In recent years, retailers have started to move their attention on this shopping day to raise good causes for charities.

#GivingTuesday is a global community with millions of people celebrating and inspiring generosity. Last year alone, more than $400 million has been raised online. This year, charities and nonprofits from more than 150 countries are coming together on December 3 to share their story and be part of the big day.

Today CharityComms has launched a very important guide. Written by Kirsty Marrins, with input from charities and experts, A guide to wellbeing for Comms professionals comes at a vital time for individuals and organisations in the sector. We are delighted to be supporting it.

Although Service Design is a well-established discipline, it’s not mainstream in the charity sector. I spoke with Giulia Merlo, Service Design Lead at Cancer Research UK to discover more about the discipline as well as how charities can incorporate it into their work.

When we asked charities to tell us last year what the key issues were that they faced in digital, the main challenge wasn’t tools, data or platforms. It was about people, and specifically, leaders. In the 2018 Charity Digital Skills Report, which we run annually with Skills Platform, charity professionals told us that they expected greater digital leadership.