0m+
Medical research volunteers recruited to Our Future Health
Social Impact & Participation
Mean more. Move people to take part.
Taking part asks more of people than buying.
Volunteering, applying, donating, fundraising, joining, giving time, taking part in research, travelling somewhere unfamiliar or supporting someone you’ve never met all ask people to give something of themselves.
That means organisations need to create greater understanding, trust and motivation before asking someone to act.
At AgencyUK, we combine brand, communications, web and tech to help purpose-led organisations reach the people who matter, give them compelling reasons to participate and make taking the next step easier, turning belief into impact.
Our participation impact
0m+
Relevant people reached for Children’s Hospice South West
0,750+
People recruited for Synexus clinical trials through social advertising in 2022
0%
Of 10 to 24-year-olds in Milton Keynes reached for Thames Valley Police
0,000
New website visitors generated for Above & Beyond, alongside 250,000+ paid-social reach and 52,000 engagements
Why is the social impact sector different?
People participate for different reasons: to make a difference, gain experience, meet people, develop skills, travel, support a cause, improve their career, contribute to science or be part of something bigger than themselves.
For younger audiences in particular, participation can sit at the intersection of purpose, experience, education, employability and identity.
That’s why we start by understanding what the opportunity means to the person you’re asking to take part, before looking at the organisation’s need for more volunteers or participants.
Then we build the proposition around where those two needs meet, so your purpose and their motivation become one reason to act.
Brand
Mean more through meaningful difference.
A worthwhile purpose needs a compelling proposition to go with it.
We help organisations define what they stand for, why their work matters and, critically, why someone should want to become part of it.
That means translating organisational purpose into something meaningful to the individual: a clear proposition that connects what you need people to do with what they want to achieve, experience or contribute.
It gives people something to believe in, and a reason to get involved.
Strategy
Positioning
Proposition
Identity
Experience
Employer Brand
Communications
Mean more to more people.
Participation starts with understanding who you’re trying to move.
We use audience intelligence, research, behavioural data and AI-enriched personas to understand different motivations, barriers and triggers, then create campaigns that build awareness and consideration and lead to action.
Young people looking for experiences, volunteers looking to make a difference and patients considering research participation all need different reasons to say yes.
Campaign Planning
Creative
Media
Social
Recruitment
Activation
Web
Mean more through better experiences.
Interest can disappear quickly when the next step feels difficult. Between initial response and active participation, the journey can include eligibility, applications, interviews, checks, onboarding, training, travel and reminders, and every step is another chance for someone to drop out.
We create digital experiences that make opportunities easier to discover, understand and act on, connecting search, content, UX and conversion around the questions people need answered before committing. We map the complete journey to find where people drop out and where content, automation or experience design can keep them moving.
Once someone takes part, CRM and community communications can help turn a first experience into advocacy, repeat participation and a longer-term relationship.
UX
Development
SEO
Content
Applications
CRO
Optimisation
Tech
Mean more by learning faster.
Participation campaigns create intelligence about what motivates people and what stops them.
We use AI and data to interrogate audience behaviour, search, campaign response and conversion, identifying the messages, audiences, channels and experiences most likely to generate action.
Technology can also make participation easier, through personalised journeys, automated communications and conversational experiences that help people find the right opportunity and answer questions faster.
AI
Audience Intelligence
Personalisation
Automation
Agents
Performance
One purpose at every touchpoint.
People need a reason to take part, and they rarely find it in a single interaction. They discover an organisation through search, social, advertising, education, friends, events and personal recommendations, then research, compare and look for reassurance before deciding whether the opportunity is right for them.
Someone deciding whether to take part sees recruitment, communications and digital as one organisation, and judges it as a whole. We connect the proposition someone discovers in a campaign with what they find online, what they’re told when they enquire and what they experience when they take the next step, so people notice, understand and get involved.
Search
Social
Content
Paid Media
Website
Events
Schools
Universities
Email
Applications
CRM
Communities
Word of Mouth
Our participation work.
“Strategic and creative as a given. Passionate, enthusiastic and driven as a bonus. They were part of the team, they sweated just as much as we did, they flexed when we flexed as priorities changed and they did all of this with grace, professionalism and good humour.”
Pete Wilson
Strategic Communications Lead, Our Future Health
Our participation experience
Give the next generation something worth joining.
Young people have more opportunities competing for their attention than ever.
Build trust before asking people to act.
People need to understand what’s being asked of them, why it matters, what will happen and whether they can trust the organisation behind it.
Our experience crosses sectors because participation does too. Recruiting students and research participants, and engaging young people, audiences, supporters and communities, has taught us what turns passive interest into active involvement, so we never treat volunteer recruitment as an isolated marketing discipline.
Turn caring into doing.
Purpose-led organisations rarely have an awareness problem alone. They have an action problem.
Frequently asked questions
How do you get people to sign up for something that isn't a purchase?
Getting someone to volunteer, participate or support a cause requires a different value exchange from selling a product. Effective volunteer recruitment starts by understanding why people might take part, what could stop them and what they need to know before committing.
If you’re considering how to recruit volunteers, we use audience insight to shape the proposition, messaging, campaign and sign-up journey around those motivations and barriers.
The action may not be a purchase, but people are still giving something valuable: their time, attention or information. The experience needs to make that commitment feel worthwhile.
How do you recruit people into health research?
Research participant recruitment needs to make a complex proposition clear, credible and relevant enough for people to choose to take part.
We use audience research to understand motivations, concerns and barriers, then connect strategy, creative, media and the recruitment journey around them. Trust, accessibility and clarity are particularly important when participation involves personal or health information.
Our work with Our Future Health has helped recruit more than 2.4 million volunteers to the UK’s largest health research programme. At that scale, recruitment isn’t just about generating awareness, but helping millions of people understand why participation matters and what they need to do next.
How do you engage young people?
Effective youth engagement starts by involving young people on their terms rather than assuming what will interest or motivate them.
We use audience insight to understand their attitudes, behaviours, barriers and media habits, then develop propositions, creative and experiences that feel relevant to the people we need to reach. The channels matter, but so does what you’re asking young people to participate in and why it should matter to them.
Good youth engagement is about understanding the audience properly and creating something that respects their perspective and earns their attention.
How do you keep people involved after they sign up?
Once someone has volunteered or signed up to participate, the experience that follows can determine whether they stay engaged. Clear communications, useful information and well-designed digital journeys can help people understand what happens next and maintain confidence in their involvement.
We look beyond the initial sign-up to consider the wider participant journey, identifying where communications, content and technology can reduce friction and strengthen engagement.
Getting someone to say yes is important. Making the experience live up to that decision is what helps turn initial participation into an ongoing relationship.
Ready to mean more?
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