Microsites
How can your charity reap the rewards?
Microsite 101….
The name kind of gives it away; a microsite is a website smaller than and separate to your main one.
Charities mostly use them for individual campaigns or important stories that ‘need their own show.’
A microsite usually has its own style, distinct from the ‘mother’ website, with clear calls for action such as to sign a petition or donate.
So, what’s the benefit of using a Microsite?
Microsites, being self-contained and devoted to one project, hold less distractions for the visitor.
If well-made and combined with a good marketing strategy, they can also allow you to reach more people, since they’re much more shareable on social media (they’re brief and tend to have simple, easy-to-remember web addresses)
They’re more likely to go viral! Can you imagine your whole website going viral? No way! There’s too much info on there, and too many different pages… a microsite gives a laser-beam focus on an important project.
Simplicity— it’s always a crowd-pleaser.
They also require minimum effort from you; being relatively quick to design and go live. Far less work than the mammoth task that was setting up your main site!
4 Tips for creating a microsite
1. Have a clear objective
What is the purpose of your microsite? Of course, it will be to promote a particular campaign, but decide what your main goal is — i.e. donations, raising awareness, petition signing –
and ensure the microsite is clearly dedicated to that end.
2. Plug, plug, plug
Spread the word wherever you can. Tweet it, Facebook it, post images from the new site on Instagram and Pinterest; put links on your main website; talk about it in your e-newsletters. Make sure everybody knows about it. Because nobody can love it and engage with it if they don’t know it’s there.
3. Choose a catchy web address
Think about what people are going to punch into Google if they’re looking for this campaign. The best idea, probably most obvious (and most charity microsites do this) is to just put ‘name of campaign’ and slap a ‘.com’ on the end!
4. Make it pretty
Your microsite needs to be easy to navigate (often just one page) and attractive.
Let’s face it; we often judge a company or charity on how beautiful their website is. And your microsite is the same — it represents you, your business and your professionalism.
Accordingly, it needs to be clean, well-oiled and drop dead gorgeous.
Two of Our Favourite Charity Microsites
- UNICEF’s Children of Syria
This microsite is dedicated to the children devastated by the Syrian crisis.
It promotes a single campaign, with a clear call to action and a simple donation process. The layout is brilliant, with a great combination of infographics and real stories with lots of photographs.
- WellChild’s Create Your Elf
WellChild (the national charity for sick children) made “Create your Elf” for Christmas 2013 and we think it’s a very innovative idea. All you have to do is go to the site and literally ‘create your own elf’ and in just five minutes you’ve helped bring a child home for Christmas.
It’s well-presented, fun, colourful, and completely in keeping with the ethos and purpose of the charity.
What are your favourite microsites? We’d love to hear from you. Tweet us at @ampleearth!
