What are Clusters?

Created by Brittany Crow, Modified on Wed, Sep 4 at 1:33 PM by Brittany Crow

❖ Heads up! This article is intended for Site Managers. If you're an Agency Manager looking for information about managing your Agencies, click here.

You can create special tags for Agency Managers to apply to their Agencies and Needs. These special tags are called Clusters. Clusters add another level of categorization outside of the available, standard Interests and Causes. This is great for internal organization! Here we cover:

How to create Clusters
Agency Manager perspective
The volunteer perspective

ⓘ So you know:

You can create custom Interests and Causes if the standard ones don't meet your specified criteria—click here for more information about creating custom Interests or click here for creating custom Causes.
Clusters are not visible to volunteers unless you share a direct link to a Cluster in a Spotlight. Because of this, we typically recommend using this feature to categorize Needs for agency managers and site managers only.
Only you, or another site manager, can create Agency Clusters and Need Clusters.
Clusters can be applied by you or the agency managers when setting up or editing an agency profile or Need.
- These allow you to feature agencies and their Needs that meet criteria not specified in the standard Interests and Causes.
Volunteers can filter and search for agencies and Needs by Cluster.
Don't like the term "cluster"? Contact us to request a language override for your site!

How to create Clusters

Agency Clusters

1. Go to Volunteerism > Agencies.

2. Select the Agency Clusters tab. 3. Type the new cluster's name in the Cluster Name field.

A Cluster name can include letters, numbers, and spaces—but not special characters.
- e.g., Tutoring 1
Make sure you give your Cluster an easy-to-search-for name since volunteers can search by phrase to find them!

4. Click Add New Cluster.

The Agency Cluster is ready for use!
You can always come back to Volunteerism > Agencies > Agency Clusters to see how many and which Agencies are using the Clusters.

Need Cluster

You follow similar steps to create a Need Cluster, except you do so from the Needs area of the site:

1. Go to Volunteerism > Needs.

2. Select the Need Clusters tab.

3. Type the cluster name in the Cluster Name field.

Make sure you give your Cluster an easy-to-search-for name since volunteers can search by phrase to find them!

4. Click Add New Cluster.

The Need Cluster is ready for use!
You can always come back to Volunteerism > Needs > Need Clusters to see how many and which Needs are using the Clusters.

How to delete a Cluster

Want to delete a cluster you're not using? You can!

1. Go to either Agencies > Agency Clusters or Needs > Need Clusters.

2. Click the (X) under the Options column for the Cluster you wish to delete.

ⓘ So you know: Once you delete a Cluster, it is no longer assigned to the Agency or Need, and any associated links to it won't work.

1. Go to Volunteerism > Agencies > Agency Clusters or Needs > Need Clusters.

2. Select the number under the Agencies or Needs column for the clustered items you wish to share.

3. Copy the URL that houses those clustered items and share away!

You can share the link in emails, newsletters, social media posts, or even as a spotlight or linked to one of your rotator images!

Agency Manager perspective

Agency Managers only have the option to use Cluster if you or another Site Manager create them. Agency Managers can use the Clusters dropdown on their Agency profile page or when creating and editing Needs.