5 Ways Your Website Can Help You Recruit Volunteers

People who want to volunteer with social impact organizations have more options than ever, and they often turn to the internet to decide where to dedicate their time and effort. Someone in your area who cares about your organization’s cause can search for volunteer opportunities online, visit a handful of websites, and choose the nonprofit whose site makes the clearest case for getting involved. This is where an engaging, welcoming website can help your organization recruit more volunteers.

Interested visitors on your site will need some guidance. They already care about your mission, but they’ll need specific details about volunteering with your organization, such as the duties involved, the time commitment required, and the sign-up process. In this article, we’ll cover ways to use your website to answer any questions newcomers may have and encourage them to get involved.

1. Incorporate effective visual storytelling

Helping prospective volunteers picture themselves making an impact with your organization will inspire them more than a mission statement or role description can on its own. To demonstrate the difference they can make and add visual interest to your site, incorporate photos and short videos of your organization’s volunteers at work. For instance, a regional food bank might include a thirty-second clip of volunteers working together to sort produce on their volunteer page.

In addition to including visual content, consider how your website’s overall presentation invites prospective volunteers into your work. To design a compelling user experience and interface, Giant Rabbit recommends thinking about what a visitor sees first, what pulls their eye toward the sign-up page, and how much room text, photos, and videos have to breathe on the page. 

Consistency will help your organization establish a unique visual identity and stand out from other organizations that prospective volunteers may choose to give their time to. Determine what color, fonts, and general tone you will use across your site to give visitors a coherent journey from the homepage to your volunteer page to your sign-up form.

2. Make your volunteer application impossible to miss

Once you capture a prospective volunteer’s attention, make sure their next steps are as clear as possible. Highlight your volunteer registration form across your site in places like your homepage, navigation bar, footer, and testimonials page. The simpler it is to get involved, the more volunteers you will recruit.

Elements that make it easier to find your application and sign up include:

• Calls to action. Use clickable buttons and banners to guide users to the next steps. With calls to action, text like "Sign up to volunteer" works better than "Learn more" because it tells visitors what clicking will do, rather than leaving them to guess. Providing this kind of clarity prevents hesitation and helps people move from reading to acting.
• Concise forms. Keep the application short and ask only for what you need up front (e.g., personal contact details and availability times). A simple form keeps the process quick and easy, so more of the people who start signing up make it to the end.
• Mobile-friendly design: Test your form on a phone, not just a desktop. A layout that works well on a laptop can still be awkward to fill out with a thumb, and a large share of visitors will likely find your page on their phones first. Larger buttons and a single-column layout will be especially helpful for mobile users.

Streamlining your application helps interested visitors follow through and become volunteers while their enthusiasm is still fresh.

3. Build a volunteer page that answers questions

Give prospective volunteers clarity and resolve any hang-ups they may have about getting started by providing plenty of detail about how it looks to volunteer with your organization. Your volunteer landing page should include all the information volunteers need before registering, so no one loses momentum while digging around your site for answers.

A comprehensive volunteer page landing page should include the following information:

• Time commitment: For each volunteer opportunity, state whether it’s a two-hour shift, a weekly commitment, or something more flexible. Setting clear expectations can help you retain your new volunteers, since people are more likely to stick around if their actual time commitment matches what they envisioned when they signed up.
• Role descriptions: Better Impact's volunteer recruitment guide recommends describing what each role entails rather than just listing a title. A description like "Helping set up tables and greet guests at our fall fundraiser" helps people picture the work they’ll do in a given role, enabling them to match their skills and interests to the right position.
• An FAQ section: Gather the questions your team hears most often, from what to wear to where your volunteer sites are located, and answer them on your landing page.
• Requirements and next steps: If your organization requires an orientation, training session, or background check, explain what that process involves and how long it takes. Knowing this up front helps people plan around it rather than discovering it partway through the sign-up process.

Featuring important information on your volunteer page saves your team time answering questions via email and helps any volunteers you recruit start onboarding and initial shifts with a clear idea of what they’re getting into.

4. Connect your website to your CRM

Your website should connect to the system your organization uses to track and follow up with volunteers. When your sign-up form connects to your CRM, every submission creates a new contact in your system, so your team doesn’t have to copy each one over by hand. Most CRMs can also send an automatic email when someone signs up, so new volunteers know right away that your organization received their information.

Additional benefits of CRM integration include:

• Follow-up triggers: Every submission shows up in your system as a contact tagged as ready for follow-up, so your team knows who's waiting to hear back from your organization.
• Simplified segmentation: The role, interest area, and availability someone enters on your signup form carry over to your CRM, so you can segment volunteers and reach out quickly when matching opportunities open up.
• Easier tracking: Many CRMs and volunteer management platforms also include a way to log hours, so that information can live in the same system as everything else rather than in a separate spreadsheet.

As you recruit more new volunteers, keeping their data organized in your CRM will give your team a better view of who’s ready to help and what comes next for them.

5. Keep your site up to date

Prospective volunteers want confidence that the opportunities your organization lists on your volunteer page are currently available. So, your team should prioritize updating volunteer listings, swapping in new photos, and fixing problems like broken links as they arise. If your website is hard to work with, you may want help from a web developer to improve the site so it's easier to update. 

Set a regular schedule for refreshing your volunteer listings, updating role descriptions, and swapping in new testimonials from current volunteers. Assigning this to a specific person or team keeps updates happening on schedule, rather than only when something breaks. Additionally, when you keep the page up to date, you’re showing new visitors your program is thriving and letting your existing volunteers know your team is maintaining it well.

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A website that tells your story, makes signing up easy, and shares updated information gives visitors what they need to get involved. Making your site a valuable resource for prospective and current volunteers can improve your recruitment and retention efforts, helping you build a strong, growing volunteer community.