The best charity marketing campaigns for 2022

In 2022 the cost of living is rising for many households. With less disposable income, you could face a struggle to get donations for your charity. 

It’s more important than ever that charitable organisations continue to promote themselves, even as donations decline. You’ll look to innovate your marketing without the use of high costs yourself.

The best way to overcome the challenge? Creativity. Vital help your charity provides, your causes need now more than ever. It’s time to think about new ways to market your message and encourage donations.

This guide discusses the best charity marketing campaigns that are taking place in 2022, including:

• Hybrid events
• Remote working
• Changing social media
• VR, AR and AI
• Gaming for good

As a charity you can adapt marketing campaigns around a different way to create events. Fundraisers are often put on in local communities by smaller charities or organised across the UK by larger ones.

Even as the UK lockdown starts to ease, the advantages of partially online events will remain. These include:

• Limitless locations – ability to invite anyone from around the world.
• Flexibility – with timing and allows for last-minute events.
• Attention – highlight particular videos or images through screens.

An opportunity for your small charity is to create ‘hybrid events‘ which combine the benefits of in-person occasions with the convenience of online access. It can also cost less in event supplies for the virtual guests.

For example, Macmillan Cancer Support put on an event where people can bring cakes they bake to a fundraiser and use video calling to allow people online to show off theirs.

Example:  ‘World’s Biggest Coffee Morning‘. 

Some of the best charity marketing campaigns engage with companies’ workers, encouraging their colleagues to take part in challenges to raise money.

That means adapting your approach to be mindful of remote working. You can explore new ways to engage people and think about challenges they can do at home.

For example, Refuge shared a background for people to use on video calls with QR codes to direct to their site to get help for domestic abuse from your charity. 

During remote working, people could show support while offering their colleagues a chance to seek assistance if they suffer at home. This was a low-cost approach with a high value impact.

Example: ‘Background of support’.

The landscape of social media is continuing to change in 2022. TikTok has moved other platforms toward a focus on video content in the last few years.

Instead of planned content attempting to start a conversation on Facebook or Instagram, it might mean you use platforms like TikTok to keep an eye on emerging trends.

It means being ‘reactive’ rather than just active on social media, adapting to what’s going on. For example, if a song is trending, find a way to hijack it’s publicise your charity work at the same time.

Video content is likely to continue to rise in popularity across all platforms, so aim to create clips that are either:

• Funny and relatable
• Feel good and happy
• Sad and emotional

Users who use video platforms expect entertaining content, so tailor your message in one of those engaging ways. It’s free to create social media accounts and you only have to pay if you want promoted ads.

Example: British red cross’ TikTok.

The future adoption of the Metaverse (a virtual reality social network) points to a virtual trend that can help you create some of the best charity marketing campaigns.

• VR (Virtual reality) – use a helmet to see inside an immersive virtual world.
• AR (Augmented reality) – use a phone camera to make virtual changes in the real world.

Both technologies can prove a massive asset to your small charity. They may be more costly to use, but you’ll be able to create unique experiences that gravitate awareness to your causes.

With VR, people can place themselves in the shoes of the people who need help, for example. That could be great if you are a charity that helps those in foreign countries.

Using AR and platforms like Snapchat, you can  create your own ‘filters.’ Snapchat could feature your charity with your own lens that changes the face or environment of users in fun ways.

For example, you could use AR to show what a place will look like after the effects of climate change if you’re an environmental charity.

Example: World Health Organisation’s Snapchat ‘Solidarity fund’.

An innovative way to market your charity is through video games. Gaming is a widely interconnected industry, with the expectation of its growth to continue.

Wherever people are in the world, video games can bring them together, and that’s started to make its way into the world of charities. The term ‘gaming for good’ is when players organise and raise money for a cause.

That is something that you can welcome and actively encourage as a charity. If there are any more lockdowns in 2022 (fingers crossed there won’t be), gaming will remain unaffected.

You can hold tournaments in your local community to encourage young people to get involved and help get across causes that might affect them.

Example: Children With Cancer UK ‘Game 2 Cure’.

Whatever marketing you choose for your charity, you’ll likely have to manage  your costs. 

As a charity, you want to make sure as much of the money you raise can help your cause, so it’s vital to keep track of expenses.

Countingup is a business account with built-in accounting software that offers you features to manage costs through the app. 

One of those is a receipt capture tool. You can take a picture of a paper bill on your phone, and it’s added to your accounts with your financial information.

Get started for free.
For more information to help you run your charity, see: How to write a business plan for your small charity or Bookkeeping for small charity organisations.