FIGARODIGITAL.CO.UK
The Storytellers: Digital Storytelling At Marie Curie
more ways for non-profit organisations to connect with and benefit their supporters. Find out how Marie Curie uses storytelling to do just that.
R
etailers are getting better and better at persuading consumers to spend. Whether that’s through
ease of purchase journey, responsive mobile experiences, or great customer service, brands have plenty of ways to encourage their consumers to convert. But it’s not only retailers and commercial brands experiencing digital success. The non-profit sector is experimenting with ground-shaking, disruptive digital solutions to improve their services and connect with supporters. Figaro Digital caught up with Steve Armstrong, Head of Digital at Marie Curie, to find out how the charity is getting closer to its supporters than ever before.
FD: As a charity, how has Marie Curie found itself evolving in the digital age?
SA: In the last three years at Marie Curie we’ve been focussed on our digital transformation. The key challenge for any industry at the moment is the exponential growth of technology versus the ability of a brand to keep up, and in Marie Curie’s case the gap was big. Quite a large investment was authorised to rapidly bring the charity’s digital capabilities up, because our supporters were beginning to react and engage with charities and brands in ways that we were unable to accommodate. Another important area for us to consider during that transformation was how digital technology can drive relationships with our service users as well. So for us,
digital has two goals; we look at it in terms of how online and digital technology can support those relationships with our supporters, and then how can we can use technology to strengthen the reach of what we do.
FD: How does social media contribute to Marie Curie’s brand authenticity and boost engagement?
SA: Interestingly, the main interaction we have with our supporters isn’t necessarily about driving income through donations. That's a part of it, but a lot of our supporters want to interact with us and build a relationship with us after they’ve donated, so we are using technology and digital to continue that relationship with them in ways that work for them. We’re also using digital and social techniques to build audiences online. It’s not necessarily about driving people to our website, because we know people still give to charities in offline ways,
although we are trying to make the experience as frictionless as possible. The relationship on the services side is in some ways much more transactional. We operate in a very niche space, and we offer very specific information around palliative and end- of-life care, so we’re using technology to meet those needs as quickly and easily as possible. Most people who are carers or who are terminally ill access our website via mobile, so we spend a lot of time trying to make that experience as smooth as possible.
FD: How does your digital content reflect your brand purpose, and how do you connect with people digitally on such a difficult subject?
SA: So the first thing we use digital for is to build understanding. Everyone’s familiar with our daffodil; people know that we’re a charity. What they’re less understanding of is what kind of charity we are, and exactly what we do. We’re not just a cancer charity, as some think – we’re a terminal illness, end-of-life, and palliative care charity, and driving that understanding is absolutely key. Without that it’s impossible to bring people into a deeper relationship with us. We use content and storytelling to present our purpose. We’re really lucky, as a charity we’ve got a huge number of very rich, emotional stories that we can tell, of patients and carers as well, and we find moments in the year where we as a charity are able to have the authority to communicate online. One example is called Extra Hour, which
The power and reach of charities is stronger than ever as digital introduces
36 issue 31 spring 2018
Words: Ellen McHale
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