Furniture Sharehouse has an active online presence across
social media and its website. Most of the
social media posts drive the viewer to the website to either learn more or to
take a specific action (i.e.: donate money, time or goods). In that respect, the digital strategy is
cohesive and utilizes the functions of each platform. Furniture Sharehouse follows best practices
with regards to naming conventions for most of their web presence which clearly
identifies the organization.
The website, www.furnituresharehouse.org,
is nicely laid out with a rotator that is updated frequently. The stories in the rotator are timely and
match what is being promoted on social media.
Next to the rotator, they have action buttons for donations of
furniture, funds and time (volunteerism); these are prominently displayed and
are static. On top, in the header row,
they have five tabs in the nav bar:
About Us; Agencies; How You Can Help; Our Supporters; and News &
Events. The nav bar along with the
buttons makes it easy for visitors to find exactly what they need. In the footer, they have a newsletter
subscription button as well as the standard links for privacy, contact us, and
logins. On the far left, they have the
share buttons for email and the popular social media sites: Google+, Facebook;
Twitter; plus an expander for more sites.
The website is on brand.
The colors, logo and purpose are all on point. As Furniture Sharehouse is a nonprofit that
focuses on needy individuals and families that are transitioning out of
shelters or who have lost their homes due to a disaster, most of the content is
informative and not ‘fun’ or amusing.
There is some interactivity with a video and many components are
clickable. Under How You Can Help, there
are many ways for people to get involved with the organization.
The Donate Furniture button takes the visitor to a page that
gives an overview of donation items and process. There are more links on that page for
Guidelines; Drop-off; Pick-up; and other organizations. All of this is useful information and using
separate links keeps the page from being cluttered. Another option which would work is to use
blinds; embed the links in overview section and have the titles be clickable
and expandable. That keeps the
information organized and streamlined as well as it keeps the visitor on the
same page which is a better experience.
They could add more interaction on the donation page;
perhaps a slider that shows what your donation buys. Example: slide the bar to $20 and a lamp
appears, slide it to $50 and a table and chairs appears; slide it to $100 and a
bed appears etc. That would make it more interesting but I’m not sure that
would serve to boost donations.
The Volunteer page shows a wealth of opportunities for
individuals and groups – both behind the scenes as well as hands-on. The Volunteer application is at the bottom
of the page after the group activities; suggest moving it up between individual
and group so that it’s more accessible.
The majority of the content on the website is original; they
do feature outside content if it relates to interviews of the founder or staff,
or if it focuses on the organization itself.
The organization does share external content more on Facebook, Twitter
and YouTube. Those channels do tend to
feature more original content as well as news articles about the organization.
While they don’t use polls or ask questions like some brands do, they encourage their fans/followers to share their experiences and photos. When a fan/follower does post, they get a prompt acknowledgement from the organization.
The content overall is
informative but also fun. Visitors can
learn about the organization and those that it serves. One of the techniques Furniture Sharehouse
uses to engage its visitors is the use of photos – while they cannot share
photos of clients, they do show staff, volunteers, donors and donated
items. They also create images such as word clouds
and banners to promote campaigns or participate in holidays.
In addition to the newsfeed, there’s a donation button on
the Facebook page which drives to PayPal; an event tab that announces furniture
drives and drop-off dates; and a map that helps guide donors and volunteers to
the Sharehouse facility.
Furniture Sharehouse also maintains a presence on Twitter
where they are very active; Google+ which is mostly reposts of Facebook items; YouTube
which contains mainly videos produced by news agencies; and LinkedIn where they
have a company page which has select posts that are versioned from Facebook
news items for the audience. Furniture Sharehouse’s cross platform strategy
seems to be to use social media to get their message out about their overall
mission and also with specific campaigns while the website is used as a
repository and an end destination for their campaigns.
To learn more about the Sharehouse, please visit their website: www.furnituresharehouse.org
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