Smart Link - A smarter way to share a link

Welcome to this edition of Beat Behind Each and Every Product covering the latest products and features in our platform at Click and Pledge. Today, we're taking a deep dive into a feature that, I think fundamentally shifts how you manage communications. We're talking about those long life links, the ones that can haunt a fundraiser's nightmares. We're talking about SmartLink.

That's right.

And our mission here, as always, is to empower you to be a more effective fundraiser. And, you know, a lot of that comes down to engineering reliability into every single touch point with a donor.

Precisely and at its core a smart link is a dynamic link. That's really the key word.

Dynamic.

It lets you update the destination, the actual campaign, the form, the page without ever touching the original URL you published. Yeah. It, it basically separates the address from the destination.

And that idea alone has to be music to the ears of anyone who's ever hit send and then immediately felt that that cold dread wash over them.

Right. Absolutely.

You're not just eliminating the fear of a broken link, but maybe more importantly the fear of an outdated link.

Right. And to really get the value, we should probably start with the problem it was designed to solve. We really suggest looking back at the specific incident that made us realize this, well, this was non negotiable.

Okay. Let's unpack that. I always find the origin stories the best place to start. The best solutions usually come from the biggest disasters.

Right? It was a very serious situation. We had a high volume nonprofit and they launched this major fundraising push right at the end of year giving magazine.

The most critical time.

The most critical time. And they sent out 10,000 emails to their patrons.

10,000. Wow.

And because of, you know, a last minute change, the link in those emails, it went to the wrong active campaign.

Oh no. So 10,000 emails to the wrong place during the biggest giving window of the year. That's, I mean, that's catastrophic.

It is. And think about the options. They couldn't change the link in the sent emails.

Of course not.

So it was either send a mass correction email which you know looks unprofessional and confuses people.

And splits your donations.

Exactly. Or just live with it and deal with the chaos of misattributed funds internally. They couldn't just pause time and fix it.

That paints a really clear picture. So the moment wasn't about recalling the email. It was realizing the link itself shouldn't be fixed. It should be like a flexible placeholder.

That's

it. You shouldn't have to change the link you've already shared. You should just be able to change where it goes instantly.

Exactly. You send that link out today, but six months or even six years later, if you decide that form is outdated, you just go into the Smart Link Management in Connect and point it somewhere new. The update is immediate.

This brings me to what I think is the most powerful use case, future proofing. Let's talk about those things that are really hard or expensive to update, you know, print materials, QR codes, or even just those donate now buttons that are hard coded into your website.

We highly, highly suggest using a smart link for any of those fixed calls to action. So for instance, that button in your website footer that says support our mission. If you tie that to a smart link, you never have to ask your IT team to change the code again. You can switch the destination from your annual fund to a disaster relief campaign and back again, all from your fundraising command center.

I love that for print especially, the sustainability of it. Let's walk through a real scenario. Say you print 5,000 brochures in the 2024.

Okay.

And they've got a QR code for your year end campaign. Once January 2025 hits, those brochures are basically useless. Right? The campaign's over.

In the old world, yes. But with a smart link, you just change the destination. You go into that year end campaign smart link, and you retarget it to your new twenty twenty five Spring form.

So the old link instantly points to the new destination. You've just reactivated 5,000 pieces of marketing collateral.

Exactly. You've given them a new life.

That's a huge return on investment. But what about the, the granularity? Does it only go to a main campaign page or can you get more specific?

Oh, it gets quite granular, which is key. A SmartLink can redirect to a core campaign, a specific form, an individual fundraiser page, or even a team page.

Okay. So you're not just redirecting the donation goes, but who gets credit.

Right. You can shift the credit based on your organization's real time needs.

So if a team meets its goal really fast, you could pivot that same link on a flyer to boost an individual fundraiser who needs a little help.

You could without changing a single thing you've printed. It's incredibly clever. And that ties into a step in the process we really recommend adding trackers.

Okay. Why is the tracker so important if the destination can change anyway?

Because the tracker is persistent. Even if you update the destination 10 times, that original tracker stays attached to the data.

Oh, I see.

It means you can attribute all donations from say that one batch of brochures, no matter which campaign they ended up supporting. Your data stays clean.

So your tracking is tied to the asset, not the campaign of the week. That completely solves the problem of old data less links floating around out there.

It does. And setting it up in the Connect platform is extremely intuitive. You just go to the fundraising command center, call it SmartLink, and you can create an unlimited number of them.

Okay. Let's walk through creating one step by step, but, know, conversationally, what's the first thing I do?

Absolutely. So step one, click, create a new SmartLink and give it a name. This is just for you internally. Something like homepage footer button or annual brochure QR code.

Right. So you know exactly which asset it belongs to. That's crucial. What's next?

Step two, you select the campaign you initially wanted to point to. Step three, you pick the specific target inside that campaign. So a form, a fundraiser, or a team page. Okay. And then step four is selecting the desired landing page style.

Wait. Hold on. What do you mean by landing page there?

Good question. That's about the visual template. You might want the link to go to the same campaign, but maybe you have a different form design for a matching gift weekend.

Ah. So you can swap the visual style on the fly too. That's another layer of flexibility. Okay, so after that we get to the tracker we just talked about.

Yes. Step five is adding that tracker which again we strongly recommend. And step six is customization. This is where we automatically generate a QR code for you.

And you can brand it. Right.

You can. You can upload your logo and it'll sit right in the center of the QR code.

That's a great touch for physical media. It just reassures the donor that they're in the right place and reinforces your brand.

It makes those posters and signs perpetually useful. You point it once with the branded code, and then you just change the destination as your needs change throughout the year.

And the power of updating it is the real magic. An emergency strikes, you need to switch from a general fund to an urgent relief campaign.

You just open the SmartLink entry, designate the new campaign and landing page, click update, and it's done. That link you shared everywhere now instantly redirects to the critical page.

And I'd imagine that flows through the whole system.

It does. If you're using our integrations, even the auto responder in your CRM like Salesforce, it will change based on the updated campaign. So your thank you notes are always relevant.

Okay. So we've solved the wrong link problem and the outdated link problem. Let's tackle the final layer. The worst case scenario.

The fail safe.

Right. What happens if someone accidentally deletes a campaign or form? SmartLink says the user will never see a four zero four page not found error.

How? It's a fail safe hierarchy. The system follows a defined set of rules, it checks where it should go, and if that place is gone, it finds the next best thing.

So what's rule number one?

Rule one is for deletion. If the specific form or campaign in the SmartLink is missing, the system automatically falls back to the default campaign and form that you've set up for your organization.

So the donor still gets to a functional donation page. You literally can't miss a donation because of a broken link.

Correct. The system prioritizes getting the donation over pointing to a now non existent page. And rule number two is for inactivity.

Okay.

If the SmartLink points to a team or a fundraiser that's been marked inactive or has met its goal, it just redirects the user up to the parent campaign.

Which means the donor still lands on a relevant active page. They can still support the overall effort. That's a powerful safety net.

It ensures total continuity. Uh-huh. And that whole adaptable structure is what really solves that original customer's problem for good.

So for you, our listener, here is a final thought to chew on. Think about how many old assets you have floating around out there. Old QR codes, printed mailers, sidebar links on your website you haven't touched in years. Mhmm. Smart link means you can suddenly bring all of those all those materials back to life instantly and point them to your next major fundraiser without spending another dime on printing or web development.

We really encourage everyone to log into your connect account and just explore this. We suggest checking out the Connect campaigns and payment forms resources. You'll find a ton of ideas for turning those old links into new opportunities.

For more information about this and all Click and Pledge products, make sure to visit clickandpledge.com and request for a one on one training or demo. Whether you are a client or curious about our platform, just ask us and we will gladly get together with you to chat. As always, this feature is absolutely free and is already part of the connect the platform in our fundraising command center.