Content testing for Catalyst’s new homepage

A summary of what tested well, what didn’t, words to be careful about and questions we need to answer.

Catalyst will have a new website at the end of March. Since December we’ve been designing content for the homepage. While I’ve been working on content the team at Passion4Social have been working on visual designs with the help of feedback from the network. You can see the current concept.

Language guide and internal content testing

While we don’t have resources to run a full content testing project we do have an emerging language guide backed up with branding guidelines to help us. These resources are based on solid evidence.

We also have tested 3 different homepage content drafts with the core team, many of whom have lived experience of minoritisation and working in UK nonprofits in the UK. This has been helpful in learning:

• what words and phrases align with the team’s vision of Catalyst
• which ones speak clearly, safely and empoweringly to their lived experience.

Their insights and empathy for others potential experiences have helped me evolve the content.

Good enough for now, safe enough to try

We’re aiming for content that conveys the new mission and vision, while also being accessible to people unfamiliar with terms like tech justice and liberatory tech.

Our language needs to be:

• Anti-oppressive
• Inclusive
• Justice and equity focused
• Liberatory and future oriented

It also needs to avoid jargon, frame a collective effort that we are only part of, and emphasise people’s agency.

I’m also realistic. Aiming beyond good enough runs the risk of getting bogged in the content committee swamp. I want us to launch the new site with content that feels safe enough and a structure that is flexible enough to handle future edits.

What tested well — that we feel confident about

Let’s start with some of what received good feedback. This means content that provoked a positive response (‘I like this’, ‘reading this makes me feel good’, ‘This moves/inspires me’).

For the purposes of this blog I’ve focused on sub-heading content that tested well. Later I’ll talk about body text that tested badly.

‘Imagine a world where technology serves everyone equally.’

This is the hero section’s strapline. It is aspirational and points towards the problem of injustice and inequity that sits in the section beneath it. It received consistent, solid feedback with no issues.

‘A world where technology liberates and restores…’

This is the second section’s subhead. It may appear above the fold and encourage the reader to scroll. The actual phrase here is a combination of 2 phrases that tested well. The body text describes the problem.

‘We are the change’

This subhead for the ‘About us’ section tested well. However by itself it doesn’t communicate whether it refers to the ‘collective we’ or the Catalyst ‘we’.

‘It’s going to take all of us’

This was an alternative subhead for the ‘About us’ section. It tested similarly to ‘we are the change’. It is our preferred option because it’s more inclusive. It shifts the focus from the Catalyst ‘we’ to the collective ‘all of us’.

‘From edge to centre’

This is a subheading for a section that explains how we work together. The section body text explains how we prioritise the expertise of people with lived experience. It suggests our approach to centring the voices of those excluded.

What didn’t test well

Though our subheads tested well, some of the body text versions didn’t.

How we describe what we do

Phrase: “We are working with communities negatively affected by tech”.

Feedback included confusion about what we mean by it. It’s bland — everyone says we are working with communities… it doesn’t actually tell me about what we do.”

Phrase: “We amplify and advocate. We convene and co-design. We intervene and challenge.”

This actually tested well for readability and for alignment with our vision. But we aren’t yet actively advocating or directly challenging anyone. And words like ‘advocate’ have different meanings for people. So this phrasing isn’t accurate enough.

Perhaps a bigger question is:

“How do we describe what we do in a way that is faithful to where we are in what we do, and what we aspire to do?”

‘We try’ vs ‘we do’

Phrase: “We try to prioritise people who have lived experience of…”

The word ‘try’ tested badly. It didn’t feel strong enough. Either we are doing this or not. Strong affirmational statements sound better and inspire confidence.

How we describe who we are

Phrase: “We’re a network of rebels, activists and allies”

Phrase: “We’re a network of advocates, campaigners, designers and others“

These phrases weren’t inclusive enough. The labels of being a rebel, an activist, a campaigner, a designer etc suggest you need to be one of these to be a part of Catalyst. One tester said “there needs to be something about it taking us all” (this inspired the subhead ‘It’s going to take all of us’ — see above).

Another tester said: “These words attempt to describe our network as particular types of people… the words are exclusionary. Maybe we are just people or humans.”

How we describe the network or people we work with

Writing content that describes Catalyst, the network, and the people we work with has surfaced some questions:

• How do we describe ‘us’ — the people working day to day at Catalyst in a way that de-centres us as experts or leaders in our work, while acknowledging with humility that we have power in terms of organisational status and resources?
• How do we describe the network in a way that is welcoming and inclusive to anyone? Are we a network of people working with the voluntary sector or are we people from across sectors and communities?
• How do we describe the people we work with in a way that is inclusive, recognises their membership within communities we wish to centre in our work, without reinforcing power imbalances or creating artificial distinctions between us and them?
• How do we describe the network in a way that avoids us and them, that doesn’t reinforce power imbalances?

There is also a question that crosses over between what we do and describing the network and people we work with:

“Are we working with people with lived experience or are we those people? Or is it both?”

Words to be careful about

Some words that received a mixed response.

• ‘Just’ — ‘just’ (as in ‘fair’) is ambiguous. It can be easily confused with ‘just’ as in ‘just in time’. Context can signify which type of ‘just’ we mean but it’s a word to use with care for clarity.
• ‘Suffer’ — people do suffer due to tech injustice, but people with lived experience is a more empowering term
• ‘Equity’ — the difference between equity and equality isn’t commonly understood
• ‘Liberates’ — what do we mean? Liberation is quite a loaded term, provokes strong emotions (that’s not necessarily bad!) and can mean different things to different people
• ‘Collective power’ — is a beautiful term, but often needs qualifying — what do we actually mean by ‘collective power’?
• ‘Advocate’ — is a common legal term — people easily assume it means a legal advocate
• ‘Perpetuates’ — this is a bit jargon. An alternative could be ‘continues’ or ‘continues to cause’
• ‘Exacerbates’ — this is a bit jargon. An alternative could be ‘makes worse’

Decisions to make

So we need to decide how we describe:

1. Who we are — perhaps we need to get clearer on who are we?
2. What we do — how to be faithful to both current reality and future aspirations ?
3. The network and people we work with (are these actually the same?).

Meantime, you can see our full draft content for the new homepage.