Guiding Those Who Help and Those Who Need Help

The Heat and Warmth Fund (THAW) does important work in the community by helping Michiganders who need assistance in keeping their heat and electricity on. Those that visit the THAW website are there to either receive financial assistance or to donate – opposite sides of the same coin which seeks to improve the quality of life by removing energy burdens.

Challenge

Giving site visitors an understanding of what a heavy and common burden many families in Michigan face was first on the list. We also needed to streamline the user journey from the onset – give them an easy path to follow whether there to donate or receive without losing interest along the way.

Goals

– Create a website with two distinct funnels
– Pre-qualify those asking for assistance
– Create a visual that allows the user to identify with those in need

Approach

The image we chose for the homepage is simple yet effective, it helps to tell the story of a family going through a difficult situation in a cold Michigan winter, when heat and electricity are basic human needs. From there, we created a Donate Now funnel and a Get Assistance funnel. One of the most important things was to make sure we were pre-qualifying those who are asking for help so that they didn’t spend time answering questions for programs that they would not be qualified for. By creating forms and logic to only show programs that will help the specific individual, we help to save time and frustration for people who are already having a difficult time.

What did we learn?

Having the best of intentions isn’t always enough. Finding ways to personalize the visitors website journey helps to keep users engaged and the messaging clear.

Visit the THAW website