- By Buckinghamshire Business First
- 12 May, 2016
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Whether you are raising funds for your own charity or a cause close to your heart, or have a CSR mandate to meet, these apps could support your goals.
If you run a charity and are looking to expand your fundraising activity you could make use of some of these apps, or tell potential donors about them as they may make it easier for them to fundraise for you.
If you run a business and are wondering how to go about raising money for charity, or have employees who love to fundraise, these apps could also come in handy.
Before the apps…
Not an app, but more than worth a mention is this Buckinghamshire Business First member that makes it easy for charities and fundraisers to set up a page to start raising money. There are no fees and donations can be taken both online and offline.
There are plenty of ways for businesses to get involved and boost their CSR output, like through sponsorship or offering rewards to donors.
Are you a charity for whom people usually raise money by running? Are you a business that promotes fitness as a way to fundraise?
Boost My Fund is an iPhone app that integrates fundraisers’ training and campaign data with VirginMoneyGiving or JustGiving pages to automatically build campaign posters that can be shared on social media to boost donations.
If you are pounding the pavement on behalf of charity, you could also utilise Charity Miles.
For every mile users run, an amount is donated to charity by the app's corporate sponsors.
With Razoo, charities can build an online profile complete with images and videos that lets them accept donations directly, monitor progress towards their financial goals and track team member activity through a leaderboard.
Catchafire connects skilled professionals with non-profits and social enterprises that need their help. Organisations can register a profile and professionals can explore available projects to see that fits their skill-set.
This is an online social network for healthy and green living. Users earn credits, known as Butterfly Rewards, by participating on the site. The credits can be used to make donations to non-profit organisations which promote healthy and green living.
Through Causes, people can build profiles for causes important to them or assist with an existing cause.
If you are unlikely to be able to physically go to a site to volunteer in person, Sparked offers online volunteering opportunities via its “micro volunteering network”.
This app could simplify the donation process for a charity. Users can track information such as names and addresses and add notes to donor profiles. Additional features allow users to compile comprehensive reports and accept online donations.
Free digital skills toolkit for charities
The National Council for Voluntary Organisations (NCVO) has developed a free toolkit to help charities plan, design and deliver digital skills programmes for their staff.
The toolkit is called Building a Digital Workforce and includes templates, examples, tips and resources that are all free to download and adapt to each charity’s specific needs.
Download the free toolkit here >
Charities falling short on digital skills
According to the Lloyds Bank UK Business Digital Index, 58% charities lack basic digital skills, compared to 23% of SMEs. The research also found that digitally mature charities are twice as likely to see an increase in funding than those less digitally mature. Despite this, the vast majority of charities are not allocating space in their budgets for improving their digital skills.
