The Brooke

Established to help horses, donkeys and mules working hard in some of the world’s poorest communities, the Brooke is a development-oriented animal charity that is considered to be one of the most innovative in its field. Baigent's brief was a website redesign, within which the key priority was to optimise fundraising potential whilst clearly communicating the nature and purpose of the Brooke’s work.

Our approach

Baigent and the Brooke took a strategic approach, setting measurable targets for the website and introducing ways to meet them online.

Part of the challenge was to communicate high-level development issues in an engaging way that helped raise money. Making the animals the message was key to this, hence the navigation bar leads with ‘the animals’ (instead of ‘about us’). Strong use of great imagery and an earthy colour palette on the new site convey a visual sense of the developing world and gives the design widespread appeal - from children interested in fundraising to adults interested in finding out more about the Brooke’s ground-breaking practical approach. The site also features good-quality video content, bringing the subject matter alive and encouraging donations. Site navigation is easy, enhanced by well-structured, organised and presented content, including lots of case histories.

A clear ‘donate’ button takes the visitor straight through to a choice of online donation methods, including regular direct debits or ‘do it today’ donations, ‘gift giving’, legacies and more. Donors can even chose from five currencies emphasizing the international nature of this charity. It also provides extensive assistance and support for people organising their own fundraising activity, with online events listing and telephone helpline numbers.

Visitors can subscribe to an online newsletter that keeps them informed and in return helps the Brooke build an email list database for future communication.

Results

At launch in February 2007 the site delivered 27,000 sessions each month, by May 2008 this was up by over 70% to 45,000.

In terms of return on investment, The Brooke gained back the money that they had invested in their website within eight months due to the positive reaction of their supporters to the redesigned site.

The value of new donations made online has risen from around £20,000/yr to around £120,000/yr in the one year since The Brooke’s site was relaunched by Baigent.