How To Choose The Best Charity Fundraising Website

The most important thing is, will your charity fundraising platform or website pay you back for the time and cost in using it?  Do you have the social media reach to drive people to your page, or are there volunteers who will be undertaking challenges to raise funds, or is there are realistic chance that the platform will encourage others to find and support you?

And here are some other things to think about:   

• Cost.  Some charity fundraising websites make their income from business, or other sponsors, some charge and some might say things like 'you get 100% of every donation', but take a cut of the Gift Aid. 
• Income.  If the platform generates online income through using a web browser, of selling items, or similar, will the amount you get for each and the likely volume make it worth doing? 
• Functionality.  What is it your charity is trying to do and what platform functionality do you need to make that work really well for you? 
• Additional Benefits.  Does the website do anything else that would be valuable to you.  For example, promoting your charity, or encouraging volunteers? 
• Ease Of Use.  Is the donation platform easy to use and does it give your charity the kinds of fundraising reports it needs?  
• Donor Ease Of Use.  Is the website quick and easy for donors to use?  If it isn't welcoming, has lots of steps and/or isn't user friendly, donors will bounce (click away from the site) or abandon the donation process part way through.   
• Trust. If a lot of charities, or major charities have signed up, that may be an indicator that it's a trusted and useful donation platform. 
• Innovation.  Fundraising technology, like any other, is developing very rapidly.  You can't really tell, but something to keep under review.  If others are bringing in highly effective new technology and your donation platform provider isn't, it may be to move move to another fundraising website. 

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Charity Fundraising Websites & Online Donation Platforms

Work for Good- makes it simple for small businesses to fundraise for charities through their sales.   

Investors In Community - Free and not just fundraising, but also donations of items and services, set up a fundraiser, pro bono and volunteering.

ActionFunder - virtual funding agent for community groups and small charities enabling them to pitch to companies.

1% For The Planet - pairs businesses and individuals with approved environmental nonprofits. 

Benevity - US based, links non-profits to business funders, fees paid on any payment made. 

Maanch - global platform to link funding to high impact projects using the UN SDGs.

Big Give - matched funding platform.

CAF Donate - charges for each donation. 

Charity Saver - fundraising from corporate and individuals, plus a bulk buy service to save money and access cash-back opportunities.  A non-profit run on Quaker ethics.   

Donate Pal - donate to multiple charities in one transaction, via website or a mobile app.

Donor See - global platform to raise funds to alleviate poverty. 

Enthuse - allows charities to run their own fundraising platform on their website, and set up branded fundraising pages with their own custom branding.

Fundr - social crowdfunding platform.

Ethical Much - get people to post their good deeds and nominate you for £5 donated by an ethical business and even have the chance to win prizes themselves.

Give A Dinner Party - organise and sell tickets for mini-fundraising events; dinner parties, picnics, barbecues or cocktail evenings

Give Panel  – helps non-profits manage their Facebook fundraising.

Give Penny - charity sponsorship platform.

Give Directly - send money directly to people living in extreme poverty.

Givey – online fundraising platform, focussed on small charities.

Giveto - volunteer run, allows people to give to a different charity each month through one direct debit.

Global Giving - global crowdfunding community.

Go Fund Me – online fundraising platform.

Golden Giving - charities/social enterprises charged for online payments only. 

Charities Trust – a charity itself, takes 4% of Gift Aid to cover costs.

Chuffed - fee free crowd funding platform, run by a social enterprise.

Local Giving - fundraising campaigns, matched funding, crowd funding.

Just Giving - online fundraising.

PayPal Giving Fund - raise funds through PayPal, eBay and other platforms.

People's Fundraising - non profit - create page for a wide rnage of activities.

Tap Simple - contactless donations, virtual events and online giving.  

Tiltify– online fundraising platform.

Total Giving - use of the platform is free to charities. 

Raisely - donors invited to add optional processing fee, need to use Stripe payment service.

The Good Exchange – online charity matching platform.

Virgin Money Giving - online fundraising platform.  Note due to close in November 2021.

What Impact - uses AI to match companies and grant-makers with charities and social enterprises.

Wonderful - fee-free, online fundraising event platform and also direct donations for charities to use on their own websites.

Kindlink - organises supporters, donations and beneficiary records all on one platform.

Or, do it yourself.  GiveWP is a WordPress fundraising plugin that allows you to accept donations through your charity’s own Wordpress site.

Charity Business & Volunteer Platforms

aDoddle - a brilliant online community map that links charities to local businesses and volunteers.

Investors In Community – donate funds, gifts or volunteer.

Make Good Grow - connecting charities to volunteers, provided by businesses.

Art for Charity - uniting charities, artists and companies to raise funds.

Ethical Angel - matching charities to businesses looking to help.

Goodstead - post a ‘challenge’ to find  volunteer support.

Neighbourly – connects businesses to good causes.

Semble - bringing community groups together with businesses and volunteers.

What Charity - volunteers, goods, services and funding from the public.

Charity Fundraising Websites - Micro Donation

Micro donations can be made via a website or app and enable donors to make very small, but regular donations.  

Pledjar - free app to enable people to donate. 

Pennies - till point micro-donation platform that gives customers the opportunity to make a small, one-touch donation instore or online.  Retailers must must have the potential to raise at least £10k pa, but there are no set-up or ongoing costs.  Can be used in charity shops. 

Roundups -  rounds up card payments.  Fee 5% of all donations.

GoPoolit - monetises social media posts into micro-donations.

Auction/Sell Websites

Browsio - launched Nov 21, a buy/sell website.  A bit like E Bay, but for charities. 

Amazon Smile - donations and you can also publish wish lists for your supporters.

E-Bay for Charity - receive donations and sell items.

Givergy – mobile and tablet auctions.

Vintage Giving  - donation of old or vintage items.

Good Good Giving - participants choose an experience they want to win, and donate an amount from as little as £10 to be in with a chance.

Charity Shop Exchange - collect books and DVDs from you and sell them.

Refashion - donate clothes to be sold online.

Thrift+ - donate clothes to be sold online.

Vintage Cash Cow - turn unsold and non-saleable donations into income, including jewellery, watches, cameras and toys, in any condition.

Shopping Platforms

Amazon Smile - Amazon donates 0.5% of the price of your eligible AmazonSmile purchases to the charitable organization of your choice.

Charitable Bookings - hotel/restaurant booking site with donations to charities.

Every Click - raise money by asking your supporters to use their web browser.

Easy Fundraising - another online shopping fundraiser.

Give As You Live – yet another shopping fundraiser, but also has an I phone app

Kindred - online shopping fundraiser.

Contactless Donations

Give A Little- contactless, Chip+PIN and online donations.

National Funding Scheme – integrated text, web and contactless. 

Good Box  

Good Thyngs - QR codes.

Tap Simple - virtual events and online giving.  

Tap-On-Phone - via smart phone.  

Charity Events Fundraising Websites

Wonderful- fee-free, online fundraising event platform and also direct donations for charities to use on their own websites.

Change Star Charity Calendar – free online advertising for your events

These are paid for, but allow you to book individual places, rather than make block bookings, so can work for small charities. Alternatively, they also list events and offer some guides and resources on their websites.

Run For Charity 

Sport For Charity – walks and treks, extreme sports and triathlons.

Cycle For Charity

Do It For Charity

Charity Lottery Website

GivingLottery - a weekly lottery that enables good causes to raise funds at no cost. You get your own lottery page that you can customise with your branding.

Faith Based Fundraising Platforms

Recycling Websites

Recycle4Charity - funding for recycled printer inkjet cartridges.

RecyclingforGoodCauses - funding for whole range of items; watches, phones, stamps etc.

Terracycle - recycle hard to recycle goods to earn points for your charity.

If you're working with a commercial recycling partner, you may wish to ensure they've signed up to the TRUST registration scheme.

Fundraising Using Social Media

GoPoolit - friends, family and followers on GoPoolit have the option of giving (or ‘pooling’) between 1-10p to that post, and therefore the charity it supports. The more viral users go, the more opportunity to raise microdonations. Users can nominate a different charity for each post if they want to.

Charity Card & Voucher Websites

Charity Vouchers - recipient donates value of voucher to a UK charity of their choice.

Don't Send Me A Card - receive donations, in lieu of cards.

Making A Difference – charity cards and e cards.

Charity Worker Discounts - money saving deals and vouchers.

Impact Investing Websites

Try the Good Finance online social investment tool or;

Big Society Capital.  

Here’s a Social Impact Bond toolkit and;

Another to find investors, funds and advisers. 

Barrow Cadbury Trust - investments and grants for organisations providing support services for charities and social enterprises in England seeking social investment.

Kiva  - peer to peer lending.

CAF Online – banking, online donations, investments, loans, savings accounts.

Wadappt – using blockchain to match impact investors with companies. Very interesting concept, but I don’t know anything about them, so you need due diligence, if you were considering. Not UK based.

Crowd Funding Platforms

Crowdfunder - a crowdfunding platform for community groups, businesses, charities and social enterprises.

CrowdJustice - crowdfunding legal action and public interest law.

Ethex - making investing into projects with a social purpose easy to understand and do.

GoGetFunding - helping individuals crowdfund for the causes they care about.

Hubbub - crowdfunding university student and alumni projects.

Spacehive - crowdfunding local projects to transform public spaces.

JustGiving Crowdfunding - helping anyone raise money to fund their own good cause.

DigVentures - crowdfunding archaeology and heritage projects.

GlobalGiving UK - crowdfunding for grassroots organisations around the world.

This work was done by Nesta, not myself.  The links are to their pages, which have much more information on each.

You may also be interested in Crowd Fund List, which is a platform for sharing best pracices on digital giving, crowdfunding and peer-to-peer fundraising. 

UK Text Donation Services

The best UK text donation services from Charity Digital News.

Face-to-face Fundraising Marketplace

Formunauts - online marketplace for charities and agencies, to deliver campaigns in partnership, specialist campaign creation and software solutions, from digital pitch decks to contactless donation platforms. 

The Best And Free Fundraising Donation Websites For Charities

Here's a list of some of the best online donation platforms for charities, with some details on each.

And another on the best free fundraising donation websites. 

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