It has been another full and fulfilling year at nfpSynergy, providing research to support a diverse range of charities with a diverse range of needs. Naturally, many of these needs reflect the ongoing climate of a competitive and relatively austere market place. In light of this, how can charities best respond? Essentially, how can they deliver more with less?

Research can support this process in three core ways. The first is by helping charities deepen their understanding of their audiences and to identify their warmest ones, while the second is helping them develop the right messages for each one. A third way is in supporting the delivery of better services and products.

Thinking about understanding and identifying audiences, a big question we tackled on behalf of a charity was how can it convert growing awareness into actual donations, particularly when the cause is languishing at the lower end of popular appeal? A necessary starting point was identifying all the possible barriers to supporting both the cause in general, and the charity in particular, so we could identify which messages would be most effective and with which particular audiences.

As an example of developing the right message for the right audience, we conducted research to help a charity develop its TV advertising, which was aimed at driving fundraising and uptake of services. This provoked much discussion about how to achieve that fine balance of urgency and need with hope and positivity. How much should an advert from a charity dwell on the problem or the solution? How can it cut through in an environment which is both increasingly cluttered, and where the creative bar is being set increasingly high?

Using research to support the delivery of services and products involved us with a disability charity looking to develop a new product. Our guiding principle for this research was to establish whether the product in question would fulfil three key criteria – does it genuinely serve beneficiaries, does it uphold the integrity of the charity and will it provide sufficient additional revenue which justifies the investment?

Away from the sharp edge of fundraising, we’ve been deepening our understanding of the consequences of a cancer diagnosis and what it means to live with it today. Improving survival rates but increasing prevalence bring into the arena all kinds of considerations about how to support people with cancer who are of working age to stay in or return to work. They are considerations which have or will have an effect on a great many of us.

These are just some of the questions we’ve been wrestling with in 2014 and we’d like to say thank you to all the organisations we have worked with this year. It is a privilege to spend time talking to your beneficiaries, supporters and potential supporters about the work you do and how it can get even better. Time after time, we see the value of using research to hear first-hand from stakeholders how to help a charity stay on course for achieving its strategic objectives.

And we love hearing or seeing that our research has made a difference. This year our research helped a disability charity secure over £1.2m in funding from Big Lottery to develop its services. In addition, as a result of our research recommendations, a grant-maker has changed its funding programme.

Personally, I can’t wait for that TV ad to launch in the new year, not just to spot how the research insight has been intertwined with the creative talent of the agency, but to experience that sensation when it transports me, for a moment, away from my own trivial worries into a place of care and empathy for the distress and wellbeing of others.

So season’s greetings to this thriving, vibrant, vital sector and we wish your causes the very best the season of goodwill has to offer.

We are looking forward to working with you in 2015 – and remember, insight is for life, not just for Christmas. 

Have we projected your viewpoint? Or is it the data disagree? Leave us a comment below.