#References

SUCCESSFUL COOPERATIONS

I. LEEDO, Dhaka

The Organisation

The first organisation we have cooperated with is located in Dhaka, Bangladesh. LEEDO (“Local Education and Economic Development Organization”) works with street children and impoverished families. They have a unique approach to move vulnerable children from the street to a permanent accommodation or reintegrated them with their families. The heart of LEEDOs work is an orphanage called Peace Home where 54 former street children are accommodated.

1. Website Re-Do

A professional website is the foundation for a good online presence. We stripped the existing page down to the core and started to build it new from there. With a simplifed structure, high quality pictures and a layout that fits the new corporate design we gave LEEDO a new face. We created a “Donate” page and included a donation form from a parter NGO based in the UK as well as we introduced bKash as a donation channel to the website. The website is the platform that can transform interested people into enganged follower and finally into donors. That’s why we implemented a Call-to-Action on the landing page as well as highlighting the donate page in the menu.

Furthermore we made sure the website meets all the technical requirements neccassary to give visitors a flawless user experience. We enabled browser caching and gzip-compression, decreased the amount of HTTP requests and minified HTML, CSS and JavaScript code. The layout is responsive so it suits different devices like mobile phones and tablets. To keep data usage low the LEEDO page serves reduced images to mobile devices.

We set LEEDOBD.org up to be highly ranked on Google. It might take up to 12 weeks for the Google algorithm to recognize the changes made and rank the page even better (so far it is ranked 4th for “leedo dhaka”)

But why are we loosing so many words? Just see for yourself:

1. Website Re-Do

A professional website is the foundation for a good online presence. We stripped the existing page down to the core and started to build it new from there. With a simplifed structure, high quality pictures and a layout that fits the new corporate design we gave LEEDO a new face. We created a “Donate” page and included a donation form from a parter NGO based in the UK as well as we introduced bKash as a donation channel to the website. The website is the platform that can transform interested people into enganged follower and finally into donors. That’s why we implemented a Call-to-Action on the landing page as well as highlighting the donate page in the menu.

Furthermore we made sure the website meets all the technical requirements neccassary to give visitors a flawless user experience. We enabled browser caching and gzip-compression, decreased the amount of HTTP requests and minified HTML, CSS and JavaScript code. The layout is responsive so it suits different devices like mobile phones and tablets. To keep data usage low the LEEDO page serves reduced images to mobile devices.

We set LEEDOBD.org up to be highly ranked on Google. It might take up to 12 weeks for the Google algorithm to recognize the changes made and rank the page even better (so far it is ranked 4th for “leedo dhaka”)

But why are we loosing so many words? Just see for yourself:

LEEDO-Director-Forhad-NG3O-NG30I would like to express my deepest gratitude…

… to Domenic, Tom and Jojo for their generous support of LEEDO starting 5th of May 2018. Within six weeks they have done a tremendous job structuring our overall fundraising approach and online presence. Highly motivated, hardworking and communicating openly it was a pleasure to work with Tom, Jojo and Domenic. It was great for the further development of LEEDO to have three “outsider” dive deep into our organization and assist us with their take on different aspects. Thanks again – I hope you come back one day!

Forhad Hossain, Founder and Executive Director of LEEDO

2. Communication

Understanding the work of LEEDO and communicating the projects understandably has been a priority. We want everyone to understand how important the work is and why it is worth supporting. Together we developed the parachute approach making it easy to understand how the different projects of LEEDO play together to save street children from the ‘free fall’. To provide possible donors with a good impression what the programs look like we produced a series of small video clips showing different aspects of the projects. To show the street work vividly we made a clip about the School under the Sky and the Mobile School, both operated by LEEDO.

The Peace Home, an orphange for children rescued form the street, is pictured through the different activities of the children. We made a clip about a laptop lesson, an english class and a charity event held in the Peace Home.

During our visits in the field we shot thousands of pictures of which we chose the best, edited them and provided LEEDO with a library of high quality pictures they can use for presentations, social media and the blog.

2. Communication

Understanding the work of LEEDO and communicating the projects understandably has been a priority. We want everyone to understand how important the work is and why it is worth supporting. Together we developed the parachute approach making it easy to understand how the different projects of LEEDO play together to save street children from the ‘free fall’. To provide possible donors with a good impression what the programs look like we produced a series of small video clips showing different aspects of the projects. To show the street work vividly we made a clip about the School under the Sky and the Mobile School, both operated by LEEDO.

The Peace Home, an orphange for children rescued form the street, is pictured through the different activities of the children. We made a clip about a laptop lesson, an english class and a charity event held in the Peace Home.

During our visits in the field we shot thousands of pictures of which we chose the best, edited them and provided LEEDO with a library of high quality pictures they can use for presentations, social media and the blog.

LEEDO-NG3O-NG30-Proposal

3. Proposal Development

Supporting the team in locating funding and preparing applications has been a large part of our work with LEEDO. An essential part of LEEDOs parachute approach was closed in march due to a lack of funding so we prioritized the preparation of a detailed funding proposal. We collected data, wrote texts and developed a detailed budget. We identified potential partner foundations and reached out so them. To make our work as sustainable as possible, we created a proposal that can meet a variety of requirements from different foundations and large organizations. Doing so, the LEEDO staff can use this proposal as a basis for future to applications.

3. Proposal Development

Supporting the team in locating funding and preparing applications has been a large part of our work with LEEDO. An essential part of LEEDOs parachute approach was closed in march due to a lack of funding so we prioritized the preparation of a detailed funding proposal. We collected data, wrote texts and developed a detailed budget. We identified potential partner foundations and reached out so them. To make our work as sustainable as possible, we created a proposal that can meet a variety of requirements from different foundations and large organizations. Doing so, the LEEDO staff can use this proposal as a basis for future to applications.

LEEDO-NG3O-NG30-Proposal

4. Social Media

Feeding the social media channels with new information, pictures and videos keeps the followers engaged. The social media strategy we implemented for LEEDO has the target to create awareness in- and outside of Bangladesh. The main goal is to lead supporters from Facebook to LEEDOs homepage and get them to sign-up to the monthly newsletter. This will create an audience from all over the world that will be prepared to support the organisation in their work. After a few month of touching points on Facebook and the newsletter the supporters can be engaged to donate for a certain cause.

To get the strategy from paper into action we trained the staff how to produce content for social media and get the most out of the Facebook page functionalities. Because LEEDO can not pay for a salary of a social media manager we distributed responsibilities to volunteers and existing staff alike and gave the executive director a manual how to coordinate and evaluate his teams work.

Facebook-Ladder-of-Engagement-LEEDO-NG3O

4. Social Media

Feeding the social media channels with new information, pictures and videos keeps the followers engaged. The social media strategy we implemented for LEEDO has the target to create awareness in- and outside of Bangladesh. The main goal is to lead supporters from Facebook to LEEDOs homepage and get them to sign-up to the monthly newsletter. This will create an audience from all over the world that will be prepared to support the organisation in their work. After a few month of touching points on Facebook and the newsletter the supporters can be engaged to donate for a certain cause.

To get the strategy from paper into action we trained the staff how to produce content for social media and get the most out of the Facebook page functionalities. Because LEEDO can not pay for a salary of a social media manager we distributed responsibilities to volunteers and existing staff alike and gave the executive director a manual how to coordinate and evaluate his teams work.

Facebook-Ladder-of-Engagement-LEEDO-NG3O
LEEDOs volunteer Nizam makes sure the children are quite before receiving lunch.
LEEDO supports a family that is living on the streets of Dhaka.
Street Children in a slum of Dhaka

5. Fundraising Strategies

Developing ideas and identifying a long-term strategy for fundraising has been an important step for LEEDO. We have sparked the awareness for the necessity of a staff member who is fully devoted to raise funds for the operation of LEEDO. Together with the executive director Forhad we developed a job profile chose a promising member of the volunteering team to do the job. Together with him we wrote a manual about how to achieve the set-up goals, so LEEDO is not fully depend on the individual. We will continue to assist the fundraiser and Forhad with our expertise to implement and further develop the strategy.

6. Fundraising Activities

Together with the staff we have located and explored local fundraising possibilities and developed ideas how to benefit from the local donation market. A service called bKash is a Bangladeshi mobile phone payment system used by millions of inhabitants. Without transaction fees you can transfer money from your account to a different account using nothing but your phone. We believe in the potential of this payment system to drive small sums while raising awareness for LEEDOs work in the community. Due to the the short period of our stay we can not conclude whether this approach will be fruitful for LEEDO but will stay connected with the social media and fundraising team to find out more.

5. Fundraising Strategies

Developing ideas and identifying a long-term strategy for fundraising has been an important step for LEEDO. We have sparked the awareness for the necessity of a staff member who is fully devoted to raise funds for the operation of LEEDO. Together with the executive director Forhad we developed a job profile chose a promising member of the volunteering team to do the job. Together with him we wrote a manual about how to achieve the set-up goals, so LEEDO is not fully depend on the individual. We will continue to assist the fundraiser and Forhad with our expertise to implement and further develop the strategy.

6. Fundraising Activities

Together with the staff we have located and explored local fundraising possibilities and developed ideas how to benefit from the local donation market. A service called bKash is a Bangladeshi mobile phone payment system used by millions of inhabitants. Without transaction fees you can transfer money from your account to a different account using nothing but your phone. We believe in the potential of this payment system to drive small sums while raising awareness for LEEDOs work in the community. Due to the the short period of our stay we can not conclude whether this approach will be fruitful for LEEDO but will stay connected with the social media and fundraising team to find out more.

NG3O Logo with claim NG30