I am pleased to announce that I have been invited to present a workshop on developing funding strategies for technology projects for the My Charity Connects Conference taking place on June 8 and 9 2009 at Mars Discovery District in Toronto.

My Charity Connects is a conference put on by Canadahelps.org – Canada’s premier fundraising web service which simplifies online fundraising by allowing individuals to donate to charities of their choosing through Canadahelps.org. The conference will bring together over 250 non-profit leaders as well as marketing professionals who will learn and share ideas about using technology to achieve social change. Comprised of 4 keynotes and 25 workshops on various “philanthropy 2.0” topics including social networking, online fundraising campaigns, e-newsletters and blogs, attendees will walk away with decision making tips, best practices, new ideas and a greater sense of return on investment.

My Charity Connects is part of Net Change Week – a week long city wide event put on by Mars Discovery District designed to dissolve the divide between digital professionals and social change-makers. Information about other exciting Net Change Week events can be found at http://netchangeweek.ca

My Charity Connects conferences fees are: $250 (+$12.50 GST) for Ontario based charities and nonprofits and $375 (+$18.75 GST) for charities and nonprofits based outside of Ontario. The difference in price is due to the fact the Ontario Trillium Foundation is supporting Ontario based non-profits by subsidizing $125 towards the conference fee.

Registration and more detailed information can be found at http://mycharityconnects.org/conference

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According to a Kintera/Luth Nonprofit Trend Report, ¹ “65 percent of donors visit at least one of the websites of the charities they support, and 40 percent always go online before making a giving decision.”

Online fundraising has the potential to be a huge windfall for non-profit organizations. An advantage of online fundraising is that it has overall lower costs. Another key strength is that when a donor gives, metrics software can provide vital information that includes donors contact details as well as demographic and psychographic data that can help a NPOs marketing/donor relations team. The bottom line is that a non-profit organization that is not engaged in online fundraising is missing out on a major donor segment.

Why are NPOs not pursuing online fundraising? The main reasons are a lack of understanding of the value of online fundraising, not possessing the skills to implement it or believing that they don’t have the budget for it.

NPOs do not need to be experts in online fundraising, they just need to be able seek out the services of a consultant that can help them. Hiring a consultant is not as expensive as one might think. While consultants working at firms with high profile clients will be at the expensive end, independent consultants or student/interns will be at more affordable end. An independent consultant will charge approximately $4000 – $6000 for a website with online donation capability; this fee will also include coaching on how to maintain the website, staff training, plus designing a strategic plan to use the site to build better donor relations and reach fundraising targets.

Another option for NPOs is to use Canadahelps.org – a cost effective web service that simplifies online fundraising by allowing individuals to donate to charities of their choosing through Canadahelps.org. For charities it’s an easier less expensive means of raising funds online and for donors it’s a trustable, one stop shop for giving.

Canadahelps.org is a simple process. NPOs create a profile that describes their cause. In the interest of transparency, charities can even permit donors to designate their funds directly to specific projects, a capital campaign or a room in a new building, etc. Potential donors can search for any charity in Canada and donate using their credit card. Donors can donate once or through a payment schedule. Canadahelps.org also accepts cash or securities such as stocks and bonds. What Canadahelps.org does not allow are payments for non-charitable gifts such as memberships, event registration or product purchases. Since it’s a registered charitable foundation, donors are issued a tax receipt. Donations are transferred to a NPO’s bank account minus a 3% transaction fee. Charities are notified by email that their accounts have received a donation. The website also provides donor research data that can be used to foster better donor relations.

An alternative that Canadahelps.org provides is that allows a NPO to use its own website a donation portal while processing transactions through Canadahelps.org. This is accomplished by adding a simple “Donate Button” to an NPO’s existing website.

Online fundraising is constantly evolving and new trends are constantly appearing. The most important trend is that online fundraising is here to stay and will continue to grow. It should be part of any organization’s comprehensive long term and sustainable fundraising strategy.

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Donorschoose.org is an American social networking site that connects US schools in need with individuals who want to help. Welcome to the future of fundraising and approaching donors.

Generation X and the Millennial Generation are ready and willing to donate. However, traditional solicitation, where all donors give to one cause, is not the best way to engage a generation accustomed to expressing individual preferences in many aspects of their lives. Furthermore, these generations respond better to individual and community generated causes. Donor pitches have to evolve as the donor mindset changes and as technology changes the way individuals communicate.

Imagine a social networking site, where teachers can post a project that requires funding. Donors browse all the projects, then decide which to donate and how much. Once a project is completed, teachers communicate the impact of donations. Donors can see results. A donor relationship is built. That’s exactly what happens through Donorchoose.org.

The model is simple:

Donorschoose.org utilizes Crowd Sourcing – a problem solving strategy that involves asking many individuals to leverage their collective resources and group powers to solve a problem. In lieu of placing the burden on Donorchoose.org to solicit donations and allocate to projects, crowd sources allows others to share in the responsibility, for example they can ask their friends to donate and promote worthy school needs.

Sounds too unrealistic? Why would donors want to surf the internet, join yet another social networking site and donate? The answer is that many individuals want to learn about causes and, enjoy donating through the simplicity of the internet.

Donorschoose.org is very real and successful. Since its start in 2002, it has given $32,554,970 USD to 2,019,696 students, from donors in 50 states. Everything about it is innovative and it incorporates other fundraising methods such as Cause Marketing into promoting itself.

For example, in 2006 it received a $1.6 million social innovation award from Amazon.com and Stanford University Business School. Instead of simply donating to projects of its choosing, Donorschoose.org followed its citizen philanthropy model. It gave some of the money to Crate & Barrel who distributed Donorschoose.org vouchers ranging from $25 to $100 to its customers. All customers had to do was just go to DonorsChoose.org and decide which project to give it to. The process was captivating and interesting to customers; it enhanced their satisfaction as well as customer experience. According to an article in Ethical Corporation ¹, “Crate & Barrel conducted a study of the gift voucher programme and found that 11% of the certificates had been redeemed at Donorschoose.org; response rates for conventional direct mail pieces typically hover around 2%. Furthermore, 75% of those who redeemed vouchers said they saw Crate & Barrel as community-minded, compared with 21% of those who did not receive vouchers. 6 months later, customers who redeemed vouchers had spent 16% more at Crate & Barrel than those without vouchers. Even those who received vouchers but didn’t redeem them had spent 5% more.”

The success has been such that other companies like Google, Yahoo and Facebook are launching Donorschoose.org gift voucher programs.

This is a brilliant example of fundraising that incorporates Web 2.0 trends, crowd sourcing and cause marketing. It’s a model that can be integrated by other organizations. For example, imagine if donors could browse the United Way website and select causes to contribute to.

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TVO airs Get Involved –a series of 25 documentary shorts that tell inspirational stories of people who are making a difference in their communities. Getinvolved.ca is a companion piece to the TVO series; however it’s much more powerful than just an ordinary website.

Specifically it’s a social network that connects the expertise of professionals, artists, passionate volunteers, grassroots groups, non-profit organizations and educational institutions who are working towards social change.

The site also allows users to create causes that others can follow, such as promising to stay informed by following news, reducing use of plastic bags, writing to a member of parliament, etc.

I use the site and I really like it.

While, it’s not the only website with this purpose, I think it’s the best of its kind. Yes, Facebook is a power house with applications that allow users to network, but it doesn’t exclusively focus on connecting social change minded individuals and organizations. Craigslist is also a favourite, but it lacks the necessary complexity to truly bring people together. Volunteering sites like Volunteer Toronto are useful but focus strictly on volunteering. I like that getinvolved.ca is filling a void and that it can complement the aforementioned sites. It’s also great that getinvovled.ca is focused on Canada.

It’s not a perfect site though. In my opinion, its user base of around 700 can be grown by better search engine optimization and marketing. Furthermore, its layout could use some improvement. Nonetheless, it’s still a great site.

Getinvolved.ca is a 2 year project funded by the Bell Broadcast & New Media Fund. This grant allocates $9 million dollars annually to fund projects that have both a broadcast component with a guaranteed broadcast licence from a Canadian broadcaster as well as a new media component such as a website.

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