There’s a lot of advice out there about creating seamless donor experiences and optimised giving journeys. And it’s good advice – making it easier for people to donate obviously matters.

But here’s what I’ve learned working with charities on their websites: the issue usually isn’t some sophisticated UX flow problem. It’s simpler than that.

The donate button doesn’t work on mobile. The page takes twelve seconds to load. The form asks for information twice. The payment processor redirects to a page that looks nothing like your site, so people think they’ve been phished.

These aren’t optimisation problems. These are just… problems.

Fix the basics first

Before you spend time and budget on webinars about donor psychology or A/B testing button colours, make sure these five things actually work:

1. Your donate button is visible and works everywhere

Sounds obvious, right? And yet.

Check your site on an actual phone. Not the preview in your browser – an actual phone. Can you find the donate button without scrolling? Does it actually work when you tap it? Does it look like a button, or could it be mistaken for a heading?

I’ve seen donate “buttons” that were just text links in the footer. I’ve seen them hidden in dropdown menus. I’ve seen them that only appeared on the homepage, so anyone landing on a campaign page had to navigate back to donate.

Your donate button should be in the same place on every page, clearly labelled, and obviously clickable.

2. Your donation form doesn’t ask for stupid things

How many fields are in your donation form? Count them.

Now halve that number. Can you still process the donation? Probably.

Every field you ask for is another chance for someone to give up. Do you really need their title? Their organisation name? Their phone number? Their postal address when they’re making a £10 online donation?

I know why these fields exist – your CRM wants them, your marketing team wants them, your fundraising team has always collected them. But your donor doesn’t want to fill them in.

Keep what you legally need. Keep what you need to process the payment. Everything else is optional or gone.

3. The thing actually works

Test your donation form. Right now, go test it.

Make a £2 donation to yourself. All the way through. On your phone and on a laptop. Use different browsers.

Does it work? Does the confirmation email arrive? Does it arrive within five minutes, or three hours later? Does the thank you page actually say thank you, or does it say “payment successful” like you’ve just bought a train ticket?

If your donation form is provided by a third party, do they make people create an account before donating? Because if they do, you’re losing people.

4. It’s clear what the money does

Vague isn’t compelling.

“Your donation helps us continue our vital work” – doing what? Helping who? How much work does £20 buy?

The charities that do this well are specific. “£15 feeds a rescue dog for a week.” “£50 funds an hour of our helpline.” “£100 pays for LGBTQ+ youth group sessions.”

You don’t need a different campaign page for every possible amount. Just tell people, clearly, what their money actually does.

5. People can give in the way that suits them

Some people want to set up a monthly direct debit. Some people want to give £5 once and never think about it again. Some people want to give a specific amount related to a specific thing.

Your donation setup should allow for all of this without making people hunt for options or feel bad about their choice.

And if you’re going to ask people to opt in to marketing, do it clearly and separately. Don’t bundle it with the donation confirmation. Don’t pre-tick it. Just ask.

After you’ve fixed the basics

Once these five things work properly – and I mean actually work, not “should work in theory” – then yes, absolutely look at deeper optimisation.

Test different suggested amounts. Try different wording. Experiment with where you place social proof. Look at your analytics and see where people drop off. All that advice about donor psychology and conversion optimisation becomes really useful once you’ve got solid foundations.

But foundations first.

Starting where you are

Every charity is working with different constraints. Different budgets, different technical setups, different levels of in-house expertise.

The good news is that most of these five fixes don’t require a complete rebuild or a massive budget. They’re about clarity, testing, and making deliberate choices about what matters.

If your website was built five years ago and you’re not sure who can make changes to it, start by just testing the donation process yourself. Note what’s confusing or broken. That list becomes your brief for whoever can help fix it.

Small improvements to the basics often have a bigger impact than sophisticated optimisation of a process that’s fundamentally unclear or difficult.

Need help fixing the basics? That’s the kind of work I do. Get in touch.