Joshua Blackburn laments the charity sector’s tardy uptake of mobile technology
My agency pitched for a dream digital project with a national charity recently. The brief involved smartphones, apps and social media – exciting stuff for a creative agency.
We got busy researching the world of charity apps, ready to be wowed by what was out there. We were seeking the cutting edge of charity communications: inventive, effective and cool. We were digging for gold but all we found was a hole.
Certainly, there are charity apps in the market and a very few are quite neat. Depaul’s iHobo is a great example and Battersea Dogs and Cats Home and Movember are often quoted as charities that get digital right. But there’s a reason those same examples are always mentioned – it’s a desert out there. There are hundreds of charity apps, but, dare I say it, they’re just not very good. What’s going wrong?
The problems fall into four categories, all of which start when someone with limited knowledge of apps says: ‘We need an app’. There’s the ‘this’ll do’ app that squeezes a bunch of press releases, event information and a donate button into an app-like shape; the ‘pointless’ app that does something time-wasting and irrelevant; the ‘this doesn’t work’ app that starts with big ambitions but doesn’t deliver; and lastly, the ‘potluck’ app that chucks any or all of the above into one eight megabyte package of disappointment.
I’m not suggesting charities have a monopoly on bad apps. Apple has over 425,000 apps in their store and among them there are some real stinkers. Programming that limps, grinds and crashes away, ugly design and apps of such inanity and uselessness it beggars belief. In fact, if you have absolutely nothing better to do, look up SimStapler or eShaver to witness pure, jaw-dropping pointlessness.
Nor am I naïve about the challenges of producing a well oiled, beautifully designed, compelling and useful app. It’s not easy and charities have a duty to be cautious of frittering away valuable resources on shiny new technology. Given Apple doesn’t yet allow direct donations via their apps, the dearth of charity players may reflect a common feeling that it’s best to hold fire.
I understand these issues and am not arguing charities throw themselves into the gold rush of app development without understanding what they’re doing, why or how. But still, amongst the UK’s 160,000 registered charities, the sector’s showing is disappointing. The problem is that, either organisations don’t recognise the potential of apps or, when they do, they get it frustratingly wrong.
For me apps are tools of boundless potential, whichever sector they are designed for. They are an oyster of opportunity where the only limits are those of your imagination. Commercially, apps have delivered the goods as profitable products, mechanisms of service delivery and instruments of marketing, promotion and education. Above all, they have opened up a space of incredible creativity and innovation where technology is fantastically employed to solve problems and make life easier, better and more fun.
For charities in particular, apps present new ways of engaging and inspiring audiences. One elegantly executed big idea can pack a punch well above the resources that have gone into it; educating, motivating, publicising and, arguably most importantly, fundraising… take your pick.
Think of the three eternal challenges faced by charity fundraisers: how to connect with new audiences; how to build richer relationships with the audiences you have; and how to turn these relationships into money and action. The use of ‘app-ology’ (a term I briefly thought I’d invented!) isn’t, as some think, a frivolous gimmick but a rather clever way of addressing these three challenges.
So my first message is to think about apps. They aren’t for everyone, and many charities, as with many businesses, won’t have the wherewithal to get it right. Remember that producing no app at all is infinitely better than making a lousy one. But if you represent an organisation that has ambition and imagination, and if you have access to technical know-how and resources, then an app could be a smart investment of time and money.
More important than just thinking about apps is understanding them. Successful apps are built consistently on the same foundations: clarity of purpose; desirability; simplicity; usefulness; design; user experience; and technical execution. It isn’t rocket science, but when apps go awry it’s invariably because these foundations are neglected. There are two other charities that stand out for the quality of their apps. The Alzheimer’s Society Brain Map and LiveStrong’s MyQuitCoach tick all these boxes and are inventive to boot. More of these please.
Yes, apps can be daunting and tantalising, a huge opportunity or a giant red herring but get it right and the prize is great. The potential to unlock an entirely new tool in the fundraiser’s kit is there, but the sector has some way to go in understanding and realising this. Of this I’m sure – there’s gold in them there apps, but charities need to dig for it.
About the author: Joshua Blackburn is founder and director of strategy at Provokateur
This article first appeared in The Fundraiser, Issue 11, November 2011
