• February 2010
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• May 2009
• April 2009
• March 2009
• February 2009
• January 2009
• December 2008

• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Meeting Facility Required - Can You Help?
• Keeping informed about MuchLoved
• A debate about the benefits of memorial websites
• Tribute Software Explained - Contribution Option

Happy New Year and welcome to MuchLoved’s first newsletter of 2010. This year we have many exciting developments planned for our service and are really looking forward to sharing them with you over the coming months.

Best wishes, Sally & Jon

"We decided to use MuchLoved because we found the site straightforward and tasteful. The benefits for us are that it is a free service, simple to set up a partnership and gives our supporters more options for in memoriam fundraising. Chloe Marchant, Legacy Officer

"Muchloved has filled a gap in our supporter care of those who already give gifts in memory of a loved one. Staff in our care homes are also looking at how it can be used to help the grieving process for staff, residents and family members when residents die."
Alison Turner, Legacy Manager

Later on in the year MuchLoved will be hosting an annual meeting, providing our partners with an opportunity to learn more about MuchLoved, network and put faces to our names. To facilitate this we need a room in central London for a couple of hours with a capacity for 50. Does your organisation have that facility or do you know of somewhere? If so, please do get in touch. Click here to email

Would you like more people in your organisation to be informed about MuchLoved, if so just email us their contact details?

The Guardian recently ran a story asking whether online tributes and the ability to grieve more publicly is a good idea. If you missed the article you can read it here and any feedback on the issues raised is much appreciated.

Family and friends visiting a tribute can easily contribute their own messages, pictures, stories, music and even video. The Tribute Guardian (creator) has the option to restrict the types of contribution that visitors can send in and also retains the ability to approve any contribution before it appears on their tribute site.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Shout it Out
• New Strapline
• MuchLoved Facebook page
• New Homepage Feature - Grief Resources

Welcome to our December MuchLoved newsletter. This month we celebrate the 1st anniversary of this publication and we would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Sally & Jon

“As a smaller charity, we have very limited time and funding to put into our in-memorial fundraising. Our Much Loved partnership has been a fantastic way of offering a personal service without incurring any cost.”
Arthur Parkinson, Fundraising Development Officer

“The Child Bereavement Charity is happy to have linked to Muchloved.com because we feel the site offers bereaved people a well established, useful and sensitive way to create an online memorial for someone special.”

Thank you for the very positive response at the Help the Hospices conference in Harrogate last week. It also brought to our attention the need to communicate across all departments as many of the delegates who complimented us were unaware that they were working for hospices already partnered with us.

Please do ensure that everyone in the hospice or charity, particularly the Bereavement Support Team, is aware of the service as support from other teams and departments is fundamental to its success. Thank you so much for your support.

MuchLoved is changing its tag line to ‘The Online Memorial Charity’ and Founding Trustee Jonathan Davies explains that “as this is what people have started calling us, it seemed a sensible change to make”.

Click on the logo to become a fan and to stay informed of all our latest developments and partner news via Facebook

We now have a special Grief Resources section for our users which is directly accessible from the Right Hand Side of our homepage.


There are sections on funeral advice and helpful services, suggested bereavement reading and UK support organisations. Do please feel free to suggest to us any additions or improvements to this resource section.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• A Fitting Tribute
• Material for Funeral Directors
• Help the Hospices Conference
• New Homepage Feature - Guest Search Facility

Welcome to our November newsletter in which we highlight our latest developments, welcome new partners and showcase a tribute as an example of how people are increasingly using the MuchLoved service.

With best wishes, Sally & Jon

“At The Sick Children's Trust we endeavour to keep families together while their children are receiving treatment in hospital. Unfortunately this does not always have the happy ending we hope for and in these cases the personalised MuchLoved tributes act as a fitting way to honour the memory of loved ones.”
Lydia Soloman, Community Fundraiser

“MuchLoved gives people a safe and dignified place to share these memories and express their love for the people they have lost. Through the link to MuchLoved on our website and the literature displayed in our offices I am confident more and more of the families we are privileged to care for will discover the benefit of MuchLoved.”
Ryan P. Squires, Son and successor of the late Peter H. Squires

http://paul.lewis.muchloved.com
This is a public tribute for Paul Lewis who died from (SUDEP) Sudden Unexpected Death in Epilepsy. Paul's family are committed to raising funds for Epilepsy Action to provide help for sufferers and their families, plus enabling a greater understanding of the condition

If you would like to suggest MuchLoved’s service to your families we can provide you with A5 leaflets to put on display in your offices. Just click here to email us your request. Please remember to include your name and address.

Are you attending the Help the Hospices conference: making life before death matter in November? We are, why not book in a time to meet us and see a demonstration of our site. Click here to email us with your preferred time and date.

Visitors can now search for a MuchLoved tribute using our new search facility by simply clicking on the “Visit a tribute” section on the homepage.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Introducing the Brand New Homepage
• Tweet Tweet
• Help us by lifting just one finger
• New Homepage Feature - Fundraise In Memory

Welcome to our September newsletter where we are delighted to reveal to you......our brand new homepage incorporating several improvements.

With our best wishes Sally & Jon

"The functionality of MuchLoved is great and the fact that it allows people to ask for donations to Saint Francis Hospice on the tribute page is a nice touch. It was really easy to sign up and add the links to our website and our supporters will find it really easy to use as well."
Esther Wakeman, Direct Marketing Executive

The reason why we chose to partner MuchLoved is that you help us to help others by providing a very special and personal way to share memories of loved ones with friends and family and so we feel we can respond to a fundamental need in the community.
Joanne Horton, Donations Development Officer

Please click on the image below to see our new updates in action. We won't go on too much about the new developments as we think it's best just to have a look but you'll see that we've added a number of new sections including 'Grief Resources' and 'Fundraising In Memory' designed to help families following a bereavement, plus a video Guided Tour to visually illustrate the main site features. These updates build upon the popular existing design but incorporate additional support information plus a clearer layout for site visitors.

We really want your feedback so click here to email us your comments. We're looking forward to hearing from you.

Are you part of the tweeting phenomenon? Our username is MuchLovedUK and do click on the logo to follow us. We promise plenty of social as well as work tweets to hopefully get to know you better.

Please help us to raise our profile on Charity Portal by casting your vote, just click here to do so. Can you help get us into the Top Ten?

There is now a fresh emphasis on fundraising highlighted on the right hand side of the homepage entitled "Fundraise in Memory". This new section explains how the In Memory Donations facility works and the optional features available. This will give users a better understanding of the fundraising aspect of their tributes and will in turn encourage and help them to raise more via their tribute. Just click on the logo to take a look at the new fundraise in memory pages.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Partner Reports
• Guide to Creating an Effective Tribute Fund Scheme
• Tribute Software Explained - The Timeline Section

At last it looks as though we are actually having a summer, or have i spoken too soon? Unfortunately not quite the heat wave we were expecting but probably just as well for us as we have been working away on our updated homepage which will be unveiled in next month's issue.

Best wishes, Sally & Jon

"Arthritis Care has been looking for a tribute fund service for some time, and MuchLoved stood out as by far the best of the services available. Not only is it designed clearly, but it also has all of the features we would hope to see from an online Tribute Fund system."
Chris Gilbert, Membership Development & Supporter Services Manager

"By working with Muchloved, the BRT can offer its growing number of In Memoriam donors the opportunity to create their own beautiful, lasting tribute to their loved one; something we wouldn't have had the resources to do ourselves."
Yasmin Ahammad, Fundraising Officer

Your unique reporting area is where you can access up to the minute information on tributes fundraising for your organisation. Detailed information on each individual donation made is also available. Please remember to look regularly at your reports to see who is using the service and how much is being raised.

Still haven't got yours? Click here to request your copy.

This is the section for recording key events such as a marriage, birth of a child or achievement such as being awarded a degree. Each event can be linked to a particular day or period and is ordered chronologically. As with the Lifestory, you can link pictures, music and video to any event, for example a wedding entry can be linked to pictures and music from the day.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• New Guide
• Cruse Conference
• How MuchLoved collect online donations

Welcome to July's newsletter in which we are delighted to welcome more new partners, show you what we have been up to and share some of our plans for the future.

Best wishes, Jon & Sally

"MuchLoved is an excellent extension of our services, allowing families to personalize pages in memory of their loved one. I'm very impressed with their support and would recommend that families wishing to remember their loved one in this way use the Muchloved site to do so."
Ashley Edwards, Director, R Millard & Son Funeral Directors

"In Memory giving is a very important and valued source of funding for the ICR and our partnership with MuchLoved not only enables us to develop this area but also provide services such as bereavement support and tribute pages for supporters; services which we are not set up to do".
Sosheila Ernestine, Donor Development Manager

"Weldmar Hospicecare Trust decided to partner with MuchLoved in order to provide a secure, easy and cost effective way for families of our patients to create a lasting online memorial."
Chris Davies, Web Manager and e-Commerce Developer

To help charities develop their In Memoriam strategies we have published a new guide to creating an effective Tribute Fund scheme. The guide has been produced in partnership with John Grain Associates and gives the definitive answers to creating a successful tribute fund scheme. The free guide is out now so please click here to request a copy.

We were delighted to attend the Cruse 50th Anniversary Conference in Warwick this month entitled 'Restoring Hope' which had an excellent programme of seminars and workshops from leading experts in bereavement care. It was a great chance to meet some of Cruse's 6,000 dedicated volunteers who deliver the practical and emotional support to bereaved people that makes Cruse the leading UK bereavement charity.

The Charities Aid Foundation collect all MuchLoved In Memory donations using their secure online donation software which is integrated with ours. This enables us to display details of all donations in real time within each tribute and also in your online partner reports.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• A Simple Way of Collecting Donations
• National Funeral Exhibition
• Tribute Software Explained - Life Story

This month we have been extremely busy welcoming new partners, developing our site and exhibiting at the National Funeral Exhibition. As usual the newsletter is packed with articles on our software, promotional ideas and also a video demonstration.

Best wishes, Sally and Jon

"We want to offer people affected by ataxia the chance to share the special memories of their loved ones with family and friends, and Much Loved is the perfect way to do this."
Kate Pearson, Fundraising Manager

"We wanted to offer our supporters a sensitive and personalised way of remembering and paying tribute to their loved ones who have lost their lives to bowel cancer"
Suzie Scaddan, Head of Patient Services

Your supporters can use their Muchloved tribute site to fundraise to your charity. It's a really simple way to increase the amount of In Memoriam donations you receive. All MuchLoved tributes can display the latest fundraising total along with donors messages of support and you can even view and download reports on all donations to keep track of progress. Click here to watch a video, demonstrating fundraising within a MuchLoved tribute.

We have just spent a great weekend exhibiting at the National Funeral Exhibition demonstrating MuchLoved to funeral directors from across the UK. We are confident that as a result you will see an increasing number of tributes created and fundraising for your charity as a direct result of funeral directors recommending MuchLoved as part of improved after-care grief support.

Each MuchLoved tribute has a Lifestory section. This is where you can add an unlimited number of stories, called life chapters, within a tribute.

In each one you can also link any images, music or video you choose. For example, a chapter about a favourite holiday could be linked to a picture slideshow, some video clips and even music that you associate with the holiday.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Would you like more donations?
• Facebook
• NFE National Funeral Exhibition
• Video Demonstration

With summer fast approaching we are busy working away at yet more MuchLoved developments, recruiting more partners and launching our Facebook Group. Read on to find out all.

Best wishes, Sally & Jon

"We are extremely happy to be developing a relationship with Muchloved. The site enables our supporters to create a unique and interactive online tribute to their loved ones, which I'm sure they will find very valuable."
David Adams, Fundraising Manager

"It's been wonderful to work in partnership with MuchLoved - their free and unique service means we can offer our in memory supporters a special way to remember."
Natalie Assad, Individual Giving Officer

By updating the wording that shows on the donate section of a tribute, you could increase the amount of donations made. It is the ideal place to make a specific funding request and by providing, for example, a shopping list of your charity's needs you will be giving the donor a real and tangible goal to reach.

Email us with your changes

For up to the minute information on our latest developments and to help spread the word about our service, please join MuchLoved's Facebook Group.

We will be exhibiting at the National Funeral Exhibition from 13th -15th June 2009. Over the weekend we will be National Funeral Exhibition Bannerdemonstrating our site to funeral

directors from across the UK, offering them the chance to partner with us. This will enable them to offer the service to their clients and to use it as the vehicle for collecting In Memoriam donations.

To watch a 4minute online demonstration of the main features of a MuchLoved tribute website, just click on the tribute image to the right.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Do you advertise in the Funeral Press?
• MuchLoved Facts
• More Customisations
• Video Demonstrations

With over 10,000 tributes created to date we are fast becoming the UK's leading online memorial website. As ever, this month's newsletter is packed with useful facts, figures, recent developments and in particular showcases the first of a series of MuchLoved video demonstrations.

Best wishes, Sally & Jon

"We chose MuchLoved because it is simple and easy to use yet provides a comprehensive service that is uncluttered by adverts".
Phil Russell, Lecturer Practitioner Bereavement Service

"We are delighted to be working with MuchLoved. The website is easy to use and gives people who have recently been bereaved the opportunity to create a lasting tribute to their loved ones."
Rachel Casey, Fundraising Team Leader

By advertising in association with MuchLoved in the funeral press, funeral directors will know to point their clients in our direction when they request to make In Memorial donations to your charity. This will save the funeral directors time and provide their clients with a reliable method for collecting donations for you as well as giving them the chance to create a beautiful and lasting tribute.

MuchLoved is already very well known within the funeral industry. 40 Funeral Directors have already partnered us, many others are considering it and we will be exhibiting at the National Funeral Exhibition in June.

Click here to get a MuchLoved logo to include with your advert.

Our research shows that MuchLoved tributes are created to remember people of all ages. Approximately 50% are in memory of stillborns, babies and children, 25% in memory of adults up to the age of 50 and 25% for those aged over 50.

It makes sense that more are created for those whose lives have been cut short. However, it is worth bearing in mind that people who have lived a full life are also being remembered using MuchLoved tributes. In short, online memorials are increasingly becoming a popular way of remembering people of all ages.

You can personalise your customized MuchLoved homepage even more. As well as using your own main image, you can have a bespoke welcome message written over the top that relates specifically to your organisation's tribute scheme.

Click here to send us the image and text you would like included

To see for yourself how easy it is to create a MuchLoved tribute just click here to watch our video demonstration.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Some facts for you
• Transmitting Personal Messages
• Helping users consider Fundraising In Memory
• Promotional Idea - Muchloved Leaflets

Welcome to our March newsletter and spring!
As usual our newsletter is packed with a variety of articles providing you with information about recent developments, user profiles and promotional ideas.

Best wishes, Sally and Jon

"Partnering with Muchloved enables Spinal Injuries Association supporters to set up a long lasting tribute to their loved ones. Muchloved also gives the opportunity for supporters to access bereavement services which SIA is unable to do."
Elizabeth Wright, Individual and Community Fundraising Officer

"We are delighted to be working with MuchLoved, the site is easy to use and offers a great deal of additional bereavement support to our client."
Mark Woollard, Director

Did you know that of the 10,000 Muchloved tribute websites created to date nearly 75% of them have been created by women rather than men? The reasons for this are an interesting topic of debate but it's certainly worth remembering to appeal to the fairer sex when creating any literature or promotional material about the service.

SentForever.com was established in January 2008 to enable eternal communications and they have partnered with MuchLoved to help bereaved people transmit personal messages into deep space. They are able to transmit our website memorials (including details, memories and images of the deceased) at the speed of light via a dedicated BT transmission dish situated at the historic Goonhilly earth station in Cornwall. From transmission, the message travels over the Mediterranean coast at a height of 450 miles and within five hours leaves the solar system to continue its journey through space and remains travelling across the universe for all time.

We think this is a fascinating idea and certainly many of our users have been interested in having their memorials transmitted into space in this way.

We now ask all users during the tribute creation process if they would like to have the facility for their visitors to make donations to a charity of choice. This was already a feature on our charity partners tribute service but now all users are given the option to choose to fundraise in memory. We hope that this will lead to more site creators wanting to fundraise in support of your charity.

Have you thought about including information about Muchloved in your In Memorial thank you letters or even considered writing to all those who have previously made In Mem donations to tell them about the Muchloved service. If you would like some of our leaflets to include in with your letters please email us or alternatively we can help you design your own branded information leaflet.

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Please keep us informed
• Contact your Fundraisers
• Would you like to know more?
• Public or Private
• In Celebration Giving

Welcome to our February newsletter and hopefully to less snow and an increase in temperatures, although we have to admit it was a lot of fun sledging and building snowmen!

Best wishes Sally & Jon

Lizzie Bond, Fundraising Administrator from Headway said "We are delighted to have the opportunity to work with Muchloved and offer our supporters a unique opportunity to create beautiful and lasting tributes"

We really recommend having one nominated person responsible for liasing with and thanking tribute creators. They would also act as a Muchloved Champion and be able to answer questions from users about creating their tribute and setting up donations to charity.

Please let us know who your nominated person is or register a change of person simply by emailing sally.swann@muchloved.com

Did you know the contact details for tribute creators are available in your online Muchloved Partner area. If you need your login and password resent, please just email us.

To view your fundraisers details do the following:

• Click on Reports tab
• Click on View Your Muchloved Active Fundraisers Report
• Scroll to the bottom of the page where you will see a table, detailing all tributes created that have chosen to fundraise for you including their contact details
• Click on the export button and save into an appropriate file on your system

Good Luck with your fundraising.

We offer you a 15 minute phone demonstration to re-familiarise yourself or train a new colleague with Muchloved's great functionality.

Just email us to book a time.

What a wonderful way to honor our deceased loved ones. It is a comfort knowing that there is a place to pay tribute to my deceased husband.
Monique McLean

This site gives me daily comfort; I think you all did a wonderful thing in doing this!! Thank you very much. Paula Edwards

All Muchloved tributes are initially set to private, meaning no one else can access it. Once authenticated the tribute creator can change this setting and make it public, allowing it to be viewed by anyone. However, if the creator wishes it to be kept private but would like friends and family to visit a secure email invitation can be sent via the tribute invitation manager facility.

Are you interested in developing an In Celebration Strategy

Much Loved People offer a comprehensive, modularised solution to In Celebration Giving. There are currently 3 In Celebration solutions - iCards, iBooks and Giving Heart. Each one can be branded for individual charities to run within their own website and payment mechanisms, with minimum cost and a very fast implementation. The benefits include:

• Collecting contact information through numerous opt in opportunities
• Additional revenue for supporters using iCards and iBooks
• Maximising the value of authenticated donations in lieu of gifts by donating "virtual gifts"
• Support for Fund Raisers to increase the amount they raise by using online literature with links directly to the Charity website
• Available now for implementation and rebranding

Call Viviane Morris 020 8346 7143

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Encourage exisiting tribute creators to fundraise
• Support in bereavement
• Colourful Coffins
• Public or Private
• In Celebration Giving

Happy New Year and welcome to the first charity partner newsletter for 2009.

This year we will be focusing on supporting our charity partners by providing heaps of promotional ideas, tips for increasing donations and telephone training sessions. We also have many exciting developments planned for the service and are really looking forward to sharing them with you over the coming months.

With Best wishes, Sally and Jon

"Spinal Research chose to partner with Muchloved so that we could offer our supporters the chance to have an extremely well designed tribute that is easy to create and navigate. At the same time the service gives us the opportunity to collect additional In Memorial donations securely."
Anna Coassin, Individual Giving Fundraiser, Spinal Research

As professional fundraisers I'm sure you understand the importance of building strong and personalised relationships with your supporters.

As you can see from this screen shot for the charity Grief Encounter (click on link below to see larger version of the picture), all tribute creators are asked if they wish to fundraise in memory. We strongly recommend you contact those people that select to fundraise for your charity.

We suggest that you firstly thank them for choosing your charity, then in subsequent communications they can be given tips on using their site for collecting donations and informed of any offline donations you have received on their behalf.

Whilst online donations collected by CAF (Charities Aid Foundation) are automatically updated on their site, offlline donations such as cash and cheques need to be added manually by the tribute creator. They can do this very quickly and easily in the 'Donations' section of their settings panel.

This is your opportunity to get a new and active supporter. Make it count!

MuchLoved are now partnered by Bereavement UK who offer information about death, dying, bereavement, funerals and self help counselling. Their founder Alex James is an experienced professional bereavement counsellor who has been working with bereaved individuals and families for many years. Now focusing all of her energies on creating www.bereavement.co.uk, Alex and the Bereavement UK team offer a safe place to talk and access to information including a monthly online bereavement magazine.

Did you know that over 40 funeral directors and Natural Burial Grounds are partnered with Muchloved?

The leading personalised coffin supplier, Colourful Coffins, is now working with MuchLoved. They offer to create a Muchloved tribute for all their clients in remembrance of their loved one.

Managing director, Mary Tomes, said: "For us, it's all about giving families a very personal service. Our bespoke coffins already help them with a special tribute to their loved one and now, by partnering with MuchLoved and offering an online memorial, we're taking that personal approach one step further."

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• Your MuchLoved Newsletter
• This month we welcome...
• Is YOUR link in the best place?
• Targetometer

Merry Christmas and welcome to the first Muchloved charity partner newsletter. In each edition we will be providing you with heaps of promotional tips and ideas on how to make the best use of your MuchLoved partnership.

Best Wishes, Jon and Sally

Hildegard Schneider from Barnardo's said they joined Muchloved because "through the partnership with Muchloved we can offer our supporters an opportunity to create their own personalised website in memory of a loved one, free of charge for at least 10 years"

Customised links need to be clearly placed, with a good introduction and under a relevant section. Make your link prominent and creative, inviting people to create a free Muchloved tribute and fundraise for your charity.

If you would like help with your website link position, banners and text copy, please email sally.swann@muchloved.com

Muchloved users have told us that they want to see what donations are being made through their tributes. So, as well as being able to keep a record, Muchloved tributes display all online donations in real time. A targetometer is also featured within the donate tab to encourage fundraising.

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Where to next ?

• MuchLoved News
• MuchLoved Partners
• How to become a MuchLoved Partner