Show Sponsors
ServerPress
Thank you for being a preroll sponsor, ServerPress! ServerPress is the maker of DesktopServer, WPSiteSync, and so much more! Check them out at serverpress.com.
Big Orange Heart
Thank you for being mid-roll sponsor! Mental health support for remote workers. It’s our charity’s mission to support and promote positive wellbeing and mental health of the remote working communities. Become part of the supportive community.
Are you looking for brand awareness?
You could be a show sponsor. We think it is a good idea to let people know you’re still in business and supporting your products.
Rebranding and Renaming the Nonprofit
The domain for WP&UP was registered in 2014 but began operating as a charity in the UK in 2018 providing service. They always liked the idea of moving forward and up in life (as opposed to on which can feel dismissive.
“We had always intended for WP& UP to be more. …Given the current global crisis we saw more than a 310% increase in support with 90% less donations.” Dan Maby
Rebranding in 4 Weeks
Dan admitted that this shift and rebrand is 18 months ahead of schedule. Once shelter in place orders began worldwide because of COVID-19, so many people became remote workers — overnight. This new situation became a crisis; it needed to be addressed.
“Millions of people are moving to the remote working model.” Dan Maby
Dan and the Board of Trustees met twice and just knew in their hearts that this pivot’s timing was now. This pivot doesn’t abandon the WordPress Community; rather, it expands it.
“Our heart is very much in the WordPress Community.” Dan Maby
Rebranding and Relaunching
In order to pivot quickly, Dan and the volunteer team looked at several solutions. Donations, obviously were a high priority. But so is SEO, user access, and accessibility. They looked at a Gatsby or GraphQL solutions but that would delay the four week timeline.
Miriam Schwab talked about her product, Strattic, at WordCamp London in 2017. The team quickly decided this is the best solution.
To build an accessibility-first site, the team had to strip out all unnecessary items. The contrast is better. The site is visually and technically lighter. Things like bloated menus were getting in the way. As far as typography goes, less is more.
Rebranding and Donation Software
Before rebranding the creation of a new site (old and new are co-existing for now), Big Orange Heart (BOH for short) was using GiveWP. BOH is now using Strattic (a static site generator for WordPress) with Payhere. Payhere is a front-end wrapper for Stripe which was previously used with GiveWP.
The site is wicked fast and simple on both mobile and desktop. (You can see their current donation form on the new site.
“Give people the right tool and they can do fantastic things.” Dan Maby
The Stronger #Together fundraising campaign and corresponding podcast are an emergency fundraising tool.
Another campaign for peer-to-peer fundraising is #MayYourHeartBeOrange. This is going on throughout several Facebook Groups through the month of May. It is using Donately.
Important Lessons In Rebranding
- “It’s good enough” is important when rebranding.
- Focus on accessibility & mobile users.
- Don’t do it in 4 weeks.
- Put together a brand guide.
- Plan how to transition site with 301s.
- Know your SEO will be affected, temporarily.
- Ask yourself WHY. (Is this rebrand really necessary?)
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Dan recommends Espanso for a fast text expander. It’s written in RUST.
Jason recommends Teleprompter for Video.
Bridget recommends the app ShadowNet.
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