Greater Chicago Food Depository – Hunger Action Month
Every day, Greater Chicago Food Depository distributes an average of 200,000 pounds of food to people in need across Chicago and Cook County through their network of partner agencies and programs. The Food Depository works tirelessly to expand access to nutritious food, strengthen community-based responses to hunger and its root causes, and engage the community to lift its collective voice to end hunger. In September 2016, Charity Dynamics worked with the Food Depository to revitalize their Hunger Action Month campaign in order to inspire more people to take action and support their hungry neighbors.
Project Details
Client Greater Chicago Food Depository
Skills Strategy, Engagement, UX Design, Fundraising
Challenge
- Enhance an already strong Hunger Action Month campaign that had seen a 46% increase in amount raised online year-over-year
- Create and plot out unique but connected touch points over a variety of digital channels: email, web and social
- Update website strategy to replace an email acquisition lightbox that had lackluster conversions
Approach
- Developed strategy, copy and design that focused on an all-inclusive theme that “everyone can do something to help fight hunger” during Hunger Action Month
- Redesigned all assets including email templates to incorporate best practices that would accentuate mission imagery and bold calls-to-action
- Steered campaign in more of an upfront fundraising direction while continuing to find ways to promote other Hunger Action Month activities and landing pages (advocacy, restaurant partnerships)
- Re-imagined communication timeline to flow throughout the entire month of September in order to keep up campaign momentum rather than appearing at the start of the month with majority of sends falling in the last week
Outcome
- 77% increase in amount raised and a 113% increase in number of individual gifts year-over-year; the campaign also came in 59% over budgeted goal
- Refreshed design and creative included animated call-to-action images that lifted final AM/PM email sends to top performers of the email series by drawing attention to the campaign deadline and goal
- The new, donation-focused campaign lightbox was the largest contributor to campaign success, generating 51% of total amount raised; in addition, 32% of lightbox gifts came from brand new online donors