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Today is International Volunteer Day. Volunteer Scotland and SCVO today launched a redeveloped volunteer search website with a new address - **[volunteer.scot](https://volunteer.scot/)**.

This has been a joint project between Volunteer Scotland and SCVO. It's a full rebuild from scratch on an in-house SCVO tech stack with a fresh new design developed in-house by Volunteer Scotland. It's taken several months of development and testing to get here.

### A shorter address

The old address was search.volunteerscotland.net. The new one, **[volunteer.scot](https://volunteer.scot)**, is considerably shorter and easier to say out loud as well as to type.

### A new look, built for browsing

We've overhauled the design from top to bottom. The old site relied mostly on text. The new one makes room for colour, graphics and images, so organisations can bring their opportunities to life rather than just describing them in a paragraph. Volunteering is often about people and place, and we wanted the site to reflect that.

### Search that works harder

The search box has had the biggest technical improvement. We've reworked how it interprets what people type, so it copes better with the way people actually search: by cause, by location, by the kind of thing they want to spend their time doing, rather than exact job titles.

### Letting organisations and volunteers add their own content

Two new self-service forms are worth mentioning from a technical point of view. Organisations can now add their own events that need volunteers, without going through Volunteer Scotland's team first. Volunteers and organisations can also upload volunteer stories directly, with header images, listing images and video if they've got them. It means less admin for Volunteer Scotland's team, opportunities can go live faster with a new simple mechanism to promote them, and stories are told in the words of the people who lived them.

### My Volunteer Account

We've also built a personalised account area, so volunteers can manage saved searches, applications and their own journey through the site in one place, rather than starting from scratch every visit.

### Part of a bigger plan

This redevelopment is one of the key actions of **[Scotland's Volunteering Action Plan](https://volunteeringactionplan.co.uk)**, and it gives that plan a platform to build on for what comes next.

When we launched the site, I said:

> ![Calum MacÙisdean](https://storage.googleapis.com/scvo-platform-assets/staff-photos/005b0000003X5QDAA0-medium.jpg)
> 
> We're delighted to present an improved service for matching volunteers with voluntary organisations across Scotland, tell their stories, and provide guidance. It's been developed very much in partnership with Volunteer Scotland and as part of SCVO's mission to support Scotland's vibrant voluntary sector. This service will help people find inspiring roles for social good.
> 
> Calum MacÙisdean

That partnership is really the story here. Volunteer Scotland knows what volunteers and voluntary organisations need from a service like this; we build and maintain the platform it runs on.

Thanks to everyone who tested the site ahead of today, and to the Volunteer Scotland team for their hard work and collaboration. You can read about the launch in more detail **[on the Volunteer Scotland news blog](https://www.volunteerscotland.net/news/launch-of-the-new-volunteer-search-site-on-international-volunteer-day)**.

If you haven't already, go and have a look for yourself: **[volunteer.scot](https://volunteer.scot/)**

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## About SCVO

SCVO (Scottish Council for Voluntary Organisations) is the national membership organisation for Scotland's voluntary sector.

Our role is to champion the role of voluntary organisations in Scotland and to support them to do work that has a positive impact.

SCVO supports members and the wider voluntary sector with all aspects of setting up and running a voluntary organisation. SCVO represents the needs and concerns of the voluntary sector to the Scottish government in Holyrood and UK government and Westminster. Through our learning and events programme SCVO offers training and development opportunities to the sector.

Members access an extensive membership benefits package including specialist, in-depth, 1-to-1 guidance from our Information Services team and from professional service partners.

Access to exclusive membership networks (including comms, employers, governance and policy) supports members to grow their connections, stay up to date, exchange ideas and views with peers, and learn through tailored, learning opportunities.

SCVO members enjoy free access to Funding Scotland Premium to stay on top of funding opportunities to support their organisation’s financial resilience.

Discounts and savings savings on SCVO products and services (including our HR service, managed IT support, payroll service and events and training) and partner offers provide members with support to allow them to focus on delivering their organisation’s goals. Further SCVO products and services include [extensive digital support](https://scvo.scot/support/digital), a climate action resource [Growing Climate Confidence](https://climateconfident.scot), a voluntary sector publication [Third Force News](https://tfn.scot) and a voluntary sector jobs and recruitment service [Goodmoves](https://goodmoves.org).

For more information on SCVO membership, visit [SCVO membership](https://scvo.scot/membership)