It just so happens that on my most recent birthday, December 15, 2013, Facebook announced the launch of a gift – a gift for nonprofits! This gift is a new Facebook feature called “Donate” which allows Facebook users to contribute directly to nonprofits.
How It Works
The Donate feature appears in the Facebook news feed of currently participating nonprofit organizations, next to posts and at the top of their pages. Here’s a screenshot I took from Kiva.org’s Facebook page so you can visualize the location of this feature:
- Click the “Donate Now” button next to the nonprofit’s donation call-to-action
- Choose one of the donation amounts or enter your own
- Enter payment information
- Quickly and easily donate to that specific nonprofit or cause campaign
- The Facebook donor can then share the donation opportunity with their friends to share why the cause is important to him or her, and encourage additional donations
The Donate feature was launched on just the web version of Facebook to U.S. users. According to Mashable, there is no set timetable for its availability on mobile, but a Facebook spokesperson called mobile integration a “priority”. Facebook is not charging a fee to process credit card donations and is instead covering that fee itself so 100% of donations go to nonprofits.
Nonprofits Currently Participating
Facebook partnered with 19 nonprofits during the initial rollout of the feature:
American Cancer Society
www.facebook.com/AmericanCancerSociety
ASPCA
www.facebook.com/aspca
Blue Star Families
www.facebook.com/BlueStarFamilies
Boys & Girls Clubs of America
www.facebook.com/bgca.clubs
Donors Choose
www.facebook.com/DonorsChoose
Girls Inc.
www.facebook.com/pages/Girls-Inc
Kiva
https://www.facebook.com/kiva
Leukemia & Lymphoma Society
www.facebook.com/LLSforacure
LIVESTRONG Foundation
www.facebook.com/livestrong
Malaria No More
www.facebook.com/malarianomore
Oxfam America
www.facebook.com/oxfamamerica
RAINN
www.facebook.com/RAINN01
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
www.facebook.com/stjude
The Nature Conservancy
www.facebook.com/thenatureconservancy
The Red Cross
www.facebook.com/redcross
UNICEF
www.facebook.com/UNICEF-USA
United Nations World Food Programme
www.facebook.com/WorldFoodProgrammeUsa
Water.org
www.facebook.com/water
World Wildlife Fund
www.facebook.com/worldwildlifefund
How Your Nonprofit Can Get Involved
Nonprofits interested in participating are asked to fill out and submit the following interest form, with the understanding that Facebook is “under no obligation to engage or otherwise contact you” as a result of submitting the form.
The power of modern social and global movements has most certainly enhanced by social media, as I previously detailed in this November 2013 post. According to Facebook, by leveraging its community of over one billion people, with this new Donate feature “every local cause can become a global one — and every global cause can become a personal movement”.