Soapbox Engage Blog

When Action for Healthy Kids chose to move from Convio Luminate to Soapbox Engage and the Salesforce.com Nonprofit Starter Pack, the money saved in recurring monthly fees was enough fund a full website redesign with change to spare. The redesign was far more than a facelift or color refresh. It facilitated a fundamental shift in the online marketing presence of the organization and connects with their audience in entirely new, more mission-focused ways.

“We weren’t mobile-friendly. That was an obvious need that aligned with our goal of making a more modern website,” said Anthony Moss, Web and Database Manager for Action for Healthy Kids. “We really wanted to speak to a consumer audience and make it more visual. We were very copy-heavy and we wanted to communicate through images rather than text.”

The desire to speak more effectively to a consumer audience was rooted in both the traditional strengths and perceived opportunities of the organization:

“Most of our constituency has historically been health care or school professionals. They have been our strength for many years,” explained Moss. “That is great but we wanted to reach out to parents and others who believe in our mission. That’s really why we retooled our website: to make it more inspiring to potential lay volunteers.”

Within weeks of launch, the new mobile-friendly Soapbox site vaulted traffic by 180% from tablet users and 254% from mobile phones. Visitors on all devices are staying longer, too, with increases in time spent on the site of 208% for desktops, 150% for tablets, and 212% for mobile phones.

The adoption of Soapbox Engage has been transformative internally as well through site administrator tools that empower the entire staff to effectively manage their message online:

“Soapbox has really simplified site management,” said Moss. “We needed all fifteen of our staff people to make changes when they had to, and Soapbox delivers that.”

Both site text and images are easy to update, allowing for the more image-oriented presence they were after while reducing staff time needed for managing the site:

“We’re able to create beautiful slideshows on any landing page or subpage. It would have been much more time consuming in Convio. Now it takes longer to edit the images than to create the actual slideshow,” explained Moss. “With Soapbox Engage, we don’t have to make the decision to update the site based on time needed anymore. We’re able to as needed, and in ways that are much more visually appealing.”

Those powerful site administrator tools also brought some unexpected surprises that allow staff to effectively highlight engagement opportunities and drive greater support from visitors:

“The Call to Action icons the Soapbox team created have been huge for us. We have used them throughout our site to drive conversions,” explained Moss. “They weren’t something we even asked for or requested but the Soapbox platform makes it easy to drop them in where we want them just by typing a simple word.”

Want to spread the word?

Click to tweet: Learn how mobile-friendly site ‘inspires’, vaults traffic & connects w/ supporters. @Act4HlthyKids #Salesforce http://bit.ly/TCQX8E

Action for Healthy Kids fights childhood obesity, undernourishment and physical inactivity by helping schools become healthier places so kids can live healthier lives. This post is part of a weekly series highlighting their adoption of Soapbox Engage to empower their work to mobilize thousands across the country to raise healthier kids.

Download the complete Action for Healthy Kids case study >>