Your organisation may already have plenty of evidence about its work. Annual reports containing delivery figures, funding reports containing outcomes, evaluations containing data, and a series of case studies capturing people’s experiences. The challenge is turning all of that evidence into a clear account of what changed and why the work was valuable. Activity figures can show how much was delivered or how many people took part. Clear impact communication goes further by showing what changed for the people, communities or organisations involved.
Clear impact communication shows what your work changed, who it helped and why that change matters.
Make the change easier to see
Charities, CICs and other organisations naturally collect information about activity, including the number of people supported, sessions delivered, volunteers recruited, and resources distributed. These figures can demonstrate reach and effort. For example: ‘We delivered 80 workshops to more than 600 young people.’ That tells us what the organisation delivered. The next question should be ‘What changed for those young people?’ If your evidence shows they developed new skills, understood where to get support or felt more confident, bring that change into the story. The reader should be able to see why the activity was valuable without having to make the connection themselves.
Connect Need > Work > Change
A simple way to structure impact communication is: Need > Work > Change.
Need: What situation, problem or experience were you responding to?
Work: What did your organisation do?
Change: What became different for the people or communities involved?
If evaluation showed that, for example, regular community sessions helped people experiencing isolation build relationships and feel more connected locally, say that alongside the attendance figures. Now the reader can understand the activity and its significance. NCVO’s guidance on evaluation reporting recommends explaining outcomes alongside activities and outputs, and putting data into meaningful context rather than expecting figures to speak for themselves. That principle can also guide an annual report, funding application, case study, website page or campaign. If the connection from need, through the work, to the change is difficult to follow, the impact will be more difficult to see and understand.
Give evidence enough context
More evidence does not always create a clearer impact story. Consider: ‘86% of participants reported increased confidence.’ Now, that sounds positive, but more context would give the figure meaning. How many people responded? What did “confidence” mean within this programme? Was it one of the changes the work was intended to create? Your evidence might include evaluation data, service statistics, feedback, observations, research and people’s experiences. Choose the evidence that helps the reader understand the difference the work made. Evidence should make the story clearer and the claim easier to believe.
Be precise about your contribution
Purpose-led work rarely happens in isolation. A person’s circumstances might also be influenced by family, education, health services, housing, employment, community support and many other factors. That means language like ‘We contributed to this change’ may sometimes describe the evidence more accurately than ‘We caused this change.’ NPC’s theory of change guidance describes impact as something organisations may contribute to alongside other people, organisations and circumstances. This is particularly relevant to preventative, complex or long-term work. If your evidence shows improved confidence, stronger relationships or better knowledge, say that confidently. Keep the claim at the level the evidence genuinely supports. Precision strengthens credibility.
Let stories bring the evidence to life
Individual stories can show what an outcome actually meant for someone. They can help a reader understand what increased confidence, stronger relationships or improved wellbeing looked like in a real person’s life. One story, however, cannot represent everybody’s experience. Use stories to add human meaning to the wider evidence, while keeping dignity, consent, privacy and safeguarding at the centre of how those experiences are shared. Where stories or impact claims are used for fundraising, the current Code of Fundraising Practice requires appropriate evidence for claims likely to be taken literally. It also requires fundraising case studies to represent real situations and clear, informed permission from people who can be identified. The strongest impact communication combines wider evidence with individual stories, so people can understand both the scale of the change and what that change meant in real life.
Before you publish
Ask three questions:
You already may have the evidence you need. The communication task is to give it enough structure and context for somebody else to understand why the work matters.
If your organisation has good evidence but struggles to turn it into clear impact communication, Grinning Graphics can help shape the message, structure and stories around it.