The Brief
Make-A-Wish® Ireland has one simple aim – to grant the wishes of children aged between 3 and 17 years living with life-threatening medical conditions to enrich the human experience with hope, strength and joy. Since arriving in Ireland in 1992, Make-A-Wish has granted wishes for more than 2,000 brave children.
In all possible cases Make-A-Wish ensures that all immediate family members can participate in the child’s wish.As a well-respected and popular children’s charity, they are fully committed to providing the maximum level of care and enjoyment for the children and their families. They achieve this through a combination of professionalism, attention to detail and sensitivity. They receive no government funding, and rely overwhelmingly on the kindness of the general public and corporate partners.
Their previous website was dated and basic, neither representing the size and scale of their charity nor generating huge income. The main challenge was to ensure that users felt engaged on site entry, eager to explore more and to feel compelled to support through donations, involvement and fundraising. The website needed to grasp attention from the outset and encourage immediate action.
The Process
We worked closely with the Make-A-Wish team to devise a website structure that made sense. We aimed to make the experience of browsing a pleasure, whilst also educating and demonstrating the amazing work that Make-A-Wish do.
We got rid of a lot of the fluff and focused on what was important. Getting people involved, recruiting volunteers, attracting corporate partners, and generating income through sales and donations.
We also wanted to make sure that the site was easily maintained in-house, to ensure that the site is consistently updated and refreshed with new content. We also built an eCommerce shop and new donations feature, both of which simplify the online process.
We also wanted to being some fun to the site. It’s a serious charity that helps seriously ill children, but by making their wish come true and putting some joy back into their lives. For this reason a bright, cheerful colour palette was selected and the stars that represent the brand were accented throughout. We decided to focus on images that show the children smiling, mainly to iterate how important the work that Make-A-Wish does is to them and their families.
The Result
The website is a joyful explosion of the best of what Make-A-Wish does. It is an inviting and approachable solution that provides all of the relevant information concisely, clearly and with happiness.
Through specific sections for corporate partners, volunteers, events, fundraising, donations, schools & colleges and wish children, we have provided all of the tools required to make this a truly successful charity website, while never forgetting the ‘fun’ element!
We love the Make-A-Wish charity and what they do and are proud to have been able to help them achieve a website that will see them go from strength to strength.
