I didn't make a big announcement about it. There was no final post, no "taking a break" caption. I just deleted the apps. Instagram gone. X gone. LinkedIn gone from my phone, at least. Facebook I'd already walked away from years ago. And that was that.

The reasons had been building for a while. It wasn't one thing. It was the slow realisation that I was spending time on these platforms without really choosing to, picking up my phone out of habit, putting it down, having absorbed a load of information about people's lives that I hadn't asked for. That's what got to me in the end. Not that I was seeking it out, but that it arrived anyway. Other people's business, whether I wanted it or not.

When my second child was born I made the decision to properly put it down. I wanted to actually be there, not half there. So I deleted the apps and didn't overthink it.

What followed was a bit of a surprise. I felt calmer pretty quickly. The habit of reaching for my phone for no reason started to fade. I started leaving it outside the bedroom at night. Nothing dramatic, but the cumulative effect was noticeable. I felt less cluttered, if that makes sense.

I don't miss it the way I thought I would.

Here's the thing I keep coming back to, though. If I'm doing this, then I'm almost certainly not alone.

The people charities are trying to reach, donors, supporters, people who genuinely care about a cause, are making the same quiet exit. Not all at once, not with any fanfare. But the slow retreat from social media is real, and it's not just young people burning out on content. It's parents, it's professionals, it's people who are tired of the noise and starting to be more deliberate about where their attention goes.

This isn't social media being finished. It isn't. But the idea that a charity can build a reliable, ongoing relationship with its supporters primarily through platforms it doesn't own or control is starting to look a bit shaky.

So where do people go when they actually want to hear from an organisation they care about?

They look it up. They find the website. And somewhere on that website there's usually a sign-up form.

That moment, someone actively deciding they want more, is worth something. It doesn't happen by accident. It means something has moved that person enough to take a small action. And yet, in my experience both professionally and as someone who signs up to things personally, that moment is so often handled poorly.

The form is clunky. The confirmation is an automated single-liner. There's no welcome, no warmth, no sense that anyone was expecting you. You hand over your email address and then you wait, not quite sure if anything is going to happen.

It's a bit like knocking on a door, someone opening it slightly, and then wandering off.

At Few and Far we work exclusively with charities, and one of the things we notice consistently is that email tends to get treated as an afterthought. The website gets attention. Social gets a content plan. But the email sign-up journey, the point where someone crosses from passive observer to active subscriber, rarely gets the same thought.

That matters more now than it did. If people are stepping back from social, the email list becomes something genuinely valuable. It's direct. You own it. No algorithm decides who sees what and no platform can pull the rug overnight.

But only if you're ready for people when they arrive.

I'm not saying charities should abandon social. I'm not even sure my own break from it is permanent. What I am saying is that donor habits are shifting, and the charities that build the most resilient relationships with their supporters will be the ones paying attention to the quieter parts of their digital presence.

The sign-up page. The welcome email. What happens in those first few weeks after someone says yes.

That's where trust gets built. And for a lot of charities right now, it's where trust is quietly being lost.

We've been thinking a lot about what good email infrastructure looks like for charities and will be sharing more on this soon. If you'd like to talk about where your organisation currently stands, get in touch.

I deleted the apps. Here’s what that taught me about how charities talk to donors.