Easy hacks to get volunteers

Finding volunteers is hard, keeping them is often even harder but in this article, we will keep it simple and focus on the first problem.

If you are not a charity with a budget for TV ads or billboards, here are some really easy to implement hacks to attract volunteers. Before we dive in, we would love to hear your thoughts and what has worked for your charity.

Use social media

I mean, obvious right? But it is not just a case of just setting up your socials and posting content regularly. The social media platforms have drastically reduced what is called “organic reach”. This basically means it is really hard to grow your following through simply posting interesting content. Instead, try these things:

• Tag your volunteers in content, they will like and potentially re-share
• Get your volunteers to post content from their volunteering activities and make sure they tag you
• Follow people who could be potential volunteers, look for followers of other charities or other local businesses
• Ask local businesses to post about you, if you are doing something great in their local community, then I am sure they’d love to help
• Ask a local celeb or influencer to post about you, if you don’t ask, you don’t get.
  

Get people to bring a friend

We love hanging out with our friends and we also get FOMO (Fear of missing out). It is time to leverage these factors. When speaking to your volunteers, tell them you are struggling for volunteers and ask could they help? Volunteers are too often sheepish about telling the world about the great stuff they are doing but in this instance that isn’t helpful. Express this to them and ask them to tell everyone about what they are doing for your charity, how enjoyable it is and how good it makes them feel.

Partner with other charities

2 are stronger than one, 3 are stronger than 2… you get the drift. In the third sector it is not a zero-sum game. Building a community of local charities all doing wonderful things and all shouting about each other, that will be beneficial for the community as a whole. Why not try some of these things with a friendly local charity:

• Share something about the other in your newsletter
• Post about each other on your social media accounts
• Run a combined volunteer meet and greet or other type of event
  

Build that community, rest assured that all will benefit!

If any of these hacks prove fruitful, let us know, we would love to hear from you.

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