03/09/2026
How do you reach a younger audience without losing your heritage?
It’s a challenge for organisations with a long history.
The things that make an organisation distinctive to an older audience aren’t always the things that will connect with someone discovering it for the first time.
A name, building, tradition or familiar story can carry a lot of meaning when you’ve known it for years. But to a 20-year-old, Gen Z, looking for a course and considering their next career move, choosing an event to attend or deciding where they want to volunteer, it might not mean very much at all.
That doesn’t make the heritage less important.
It just means you can’t assume everyone arrives with the same prior knowledge.
Your website has an important role to play here. It needs to work for the people who already know and value your organisation, while also giving new audiences a reason to engage with it.
That might mean putting recruitment or applications front and centre. It might mean making events easier to discover. It might mean showing more of the people and communities involved today, rather than relying too heavily on the history of the organisation.
But what it doesn’t mean is removing the heritage altogether.
In fact, heritage can be one of your strongest assets. It gives an organisation a story, a sense of purpose and something that distinguishes it from others.
The challenge is making that story accessible to people who don’t already know it.
Several of the organisations we've partnered with have recognised the importance of this.
Cranmer Hall and Oak Hill College both have a long history, but need to speak to people considering studying with them today.
Keswick Ministries has a similarly strong heritage, while welcoming new audiences to its events and resources every year.
The same thinking applies well beyond Christian organisations.
Universities, professional bodies, charities, cultural organisations, membership organisations and other established institutions are all facing the same question:
How do you retain what makes you who you are, while making sure the next generation can see a place for themselves in it?
Perhaps it’s not about making your organisation look younger.
It’s about making sure the experience of discovering it doesn’t depend on already understanding its past.
Your heritage should be something that helps people understand where you’ve come from.
It shouldn’t be a barrier to seeing where you’re going.
If you’re thinking about how your website can do more to attract new applicants, recruits, visitors or attendees, we’d be happy to have a conversation. Sometimes a fresh perspective on the experience can highlight where the opportunities are.
