Taking marketing communications to the next level
Summary
I worked as a freelance Marketing and UX Manager at Happier Lives Institute (HLI).
HLI researches and recommends the most cost-effective charities for increasing people's happiness.
HLI itself is also a charity, and is affiliated with the Effective Altruism movement. HLI is recommended by Giving What We Can. I also contributed to HLI having its work featured prominently in the World Happiness Report.
In my role at HLI, I:
-
Improved quality and clarity of HLI's marketing proposition and communications 📈
-
Improved website and SEO rankings 📊
-
Implemented a new and hugely improved donations journey ↪️
-
Increased donations made to HLI and its charities 💰
The problem
I assessed the state of HLI's marketing and UX across channels, and found that:
-
Content was often overly technical – not appealing to broad audiences and donors
-
Poor SEO – website had low search rankings
-
Poor donations experience – both for donating to HLI's recommended charities, and when donating to HLI itself
-
Content was trying to serve too many audiences, needing more focus
-
Content focussed heavily on research and not geared towards fundraising / donations
Options for solutions were constrained due to HLI having a very limited budget. Also, I was only being employed by HLI part time, 3 days per week.
My approach
1. Review core proposition and marketing strategy
Given HLI is a small and lean charity, I put together a workshop to re-define:
Organisation strategy
-
What is HLI? Why does it exist? What is the mission?
-
What are HLI's goals? What are the top priorities?
-
Where's the most value in the market? What opportunities are there, and what threats?
-
Where does HLI sit in relation to similar organisations? What organisations can we take inspiration from (e.g. Giving What We Can, GiveWell, etc.)?
Answering these questions helped shape HLI's new mission statement and go-to-market plan.
Marketing strategy
-
Which metrics should Marketing focus on? Increase conversions from website visitors to leads? Increasing conversions from newsletter subscribers to donors? Donations to the charities HLI recommends, or donations to HLI itself?
-
Which marketing channels and activities will drive the most value? Is it social media, website SEO, newsletter engagement, PR and press releases, (etc.)?
-
Who is our primary target audience? Who are secondary audiences? Which audiences can we de-prioritise so we can maintain sharp focus?
-
What are the audience's needs? What reservations do they have? Where are they hanging out, and what media do they consume?
(Below: a snippet from the audience mapping exercise I put together)
Based on these exercises, I formed a new marketing proposition, and put together a marketing plan.
2. Implement the plan – website focus
HLI's main goals were to draw in donations to keep itself afloat, and raise funds for our recommended charities ... however, to do that, donors would have to use the website extensively, including:
-
Find HLI's website (via SEO, paid search, social media, newsletter, etc.)
-
Navigate through the website, find a charity they liked, and feel compelled to donate
-
Go through the donations UX journey
-
Make the donation
As a result, I recommended that we prioritise optimising HLI's website, as it would be the most effective way to reach our goals, at the lowest cost.
Site menu and information architecture
Before looking at the website content, I revamped the site's navigation menu and information architecture. For example:
-
Re-named the menu labels, based on best practices (e.g. changing the button text from "Give Now" to "Donate")
-
Simplified the menu – e.g. by removing menu items nested at the 3rd level of the hierarchy
-
Flattened the structure of page hierarchy – e.g. by reducing the levels of hierarchy from 5 to 4
(Below: mapping the 5 levels of page hierarchy on the site. Very complex architecture and UX.)
I then put together a proposition for new website page hierarchy and content overhaul. This included:
-
Improving high traffic and high value pages – e.g. home page, charities page, 'key ideas' page
-
Adding new dedicated 'charity marketing' pages – to improve SEO, and give prospective donors more useful information
-
Removing pages which were redundant, or had few visitors
-
Flattening the hierarchy of research pages, making them easier to find and navigate
-
Implementing more on-page navigation and signposting across the site – good for SEO and on-site search
Home page
(Below: see images of the page before and after changes)
-
Add new SEO-focussed page title / H1 heading: "Find the best charities for improving happiness". This also addressed the primary user need matched with HLI's primary goal.
-
Simplified and clarified hero banner – removed org logo, shorter sentences, removed secondary button
-
Improved focus of CTA button: changed from "Explore our research" to "Find best charities"
-
Changed the focus of the content to be less focussed on the organisation, and more focussed on the user and their goal
-
Simplified the explanations of what we do – clearer, shorter, addressing user needs
Home page – before changes
Home page – after changes
Charities / donations page
With the launch of several new recommended charities, I implemented significant improvements to the charities page. (See before and after images below.)
-
Implemented an SEO-focussed header – "Best charities for happiness and wellbeing 2025" (as opposed to "Donate to make the greatest impact on people's lives")
-
Used target keywords in H2 headings – e.g. "Top recommended charities" (rather than "Our top recommendations", which doesn't make use of the "charity" keyword)
-
Simplified information at the top of the page, and added keyword-rich content for SEO value
-
Designed and added new charity 'cards' with expandable information boxes – giving a cleaner look
-
Added section "Why donate to our recommended charities?" – simple snippet cards, aiming to engage and reassure donors
Charities page – before changes
Charities page – after changes
Outcomes
Organisation outcomes
-
Massively improved quality of HLI's marketing communications and content 🚀
-
Improved UX and donation journeys 📈
-
Increased website SEO rankings 📊
-
Revamped HLI's marketing strategy and brand proposition 🌟
-
Brought in more donations for HLI. This included a large donor who found HLI via our new web content 💰
Personal outcomes
-
Learned about the technical side of happiness research 😁
-
Developed relationships within the effective altruism / effective giving network 🤝
-
Made a big impact on a highly ethical and impactful organisation 💪