Online payments and donations: benefits of e-commerce

e-Commerce: online fundraising

For many community organisations a key focus is fundraising. Community organisations may depend largely on assistance from donors, sponsors, government grants and volunteers.

For community organisations, fundraising success is closely linked to visibility and promotion. A well-developed digital strategy offers significant new opportunities for promoting organisations and their achievements.

One of the fastest growing areas of community organisation activity is in the use of social media, and two of the fastest growing areas of community organisation fundraising are the use of the internet for ‘micro philanthropy’ and the use of mobile devices for ‘e-donations’. These methods are regarded as very efficient, as they enable large numbers of people to donate conveniently and overheads are kept to a minimum.

It is increasingly common to see community organisations and charities using the internet to promote causes with email campaigns and strategic placement of messages on the websites of other high traffic sites. Community organisations are negotiating the placement of ‘donate now’ buttons on websites such as online shopping and/or online auction websites.

In addition, donations raised via mobile payments are also possible. For example, in the aftermath of the earthquake in Haiti in early January 2010, over US$25 million was raised by text messages sent from donors on mobile phones. A number of Australian telecommunications and marketing companies provide premium SMS services that community organisations can use to solicit donations from mobile phone subscribers. Community organisations can partner with software developers to develop branded mobile applications that are sold as fundraisers or used to solicit donations.

These developments indicate some of the advantages of having an online capability to generate fundraising appeals and to process collections, especially in conjunction with a major campaign. On a smaller scale, many community organisations have begun using subscriber emails and newsletters to communicate with supporters and have added online catalogues to encourage merchandise sales. Many organisations have also established cross-linkages between their online newsletters and their website/fundraising activities. In other words, you can read a story in the online version of a weekly newsletter and click on ‘donate now’ to go directly to the donation module on the organisation’s website.

There are several support organisations that can provide advice and support for community organisations that wish to make greater use of the internet for fundraising and communications purposes, including:

• Fundraising Institute of Australia
• Pro Bono Australia
• Connecting Up Australia
• TRI Community Exchange
• Our Community