Causeway was created with the purpose to examine how fandom’s function as a vehicle for charity can be further utilized in the United States through the creation of a website and social campaign.
Through my personal experiences with fandoms I often found myself encountering people doing charity work inspired by their fandom. Whether it was an actor partnering with a charity, or a fandom-run fanzine with the profits going towards charity. No matter what fandom I was in, being surrounded by people who wanted to create tangible change inspired by their love of a piece of media was a constant.
I wanted to look further into this trend and see how fans’ inclination to create tangible good can be encouraged and the process made easier. On top of the charity aspect, I wanted to find a way to introduce this to the public who may not be involved in fandoms to showcase the good that they can do.
Causeway website designed in Adobe XD
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When approaching the research for Causeway, at first I wanted to further identify what problem I was going to be solving. Through my research I found the people are donating to charity less. I also wanted to identify what would help to encourage people to donate to charity.
To do this, I conducted a survey and sent it out through fandom spaces to both establish my demographic and identify key points to address through Causeway. The survey was left open for a week and in that time I gathered over 600 responses.
Creating a survey to rely on for identifying target demographic ended up being incredibly useful. Not only was I able to see the age range of my market (Ranging from 13 to 17 but with a majority in the 15-25 age range), but I could also see what features were most important to the people using the platform.
Coming in at #1 was transparency: people wanted to make sure that they could trust the website and that their money was going to a good place.
Following that was accessibility: making sure that the website design was compliant for people with disabilities was a priority. So that translated into keeping the contrast within the color palette high to keep text legible.
I was also able to see the breakdown of how many people actually donate to charity vs. how many would be open to it when it involves fandoms. It was interesting seeing the breakdown of how many people donate to charity especially when the age range was changed from below 25 to above. With the amount of people saying they do donate increasing when it’s defined to above 25.
This information allowed me to define key characteristics and values for Causeway:
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Most people in fandom spaces are on the younger side. However creating a brand that is a culmination of what’s trending now could lead to a brand that doesn’t seem trustworthy.
People want to feel good about where their money is going. Making sure that the brand looks trustworthy and has a way to vet charities being featured or have that information accessible to users.
Making accessibility and inclusivity a key value of the company. Lots of people use fandom spaces as a community to fit in where in they’ve felt “othered” by society.
The name I landed on was Causeway: this checked off everything on my list that I felt I needed. Causeways are roads, creating that imagery of connectivity. The goal of the site is to find causes to support that are common in your fandoms. The added level of Cosplay being a popular activity in fandoms connected the name to fandom.
