How to use creativity and market research to “give back to the world”?

September 2013 Google and Millward Brown published a paper on digital donations called: MISSION 501(c)(3). The main question being: “How do donors pick and research charities?” What where the main findings? And what is my advice?

1. Be online! Finding: “75% of donors use online resources to look for information” & “3 of the top 4 sources donors use to understand the impact of a non-profit are digital, namely non-profit website, search engine, video, direct mailing”

2. Be mobile! “25% completed donation on mobile devices” & “1 in 4 use mobile to discover non-profits they were not previously aware of”

3. Use Youtube or online video to show impact! Because impact drives donations. Finding: “57% made a donation after watching an online video”

4. Give detail and make your competitive advantage clear!  In exploratory phase customers want details. Finding: “More than 1 in 3 donors spend over 2 weeks researching” & “47% of donors visited multiple non-profit websites before donating”

Successful and creative examples:

1) Actions against hunger’s app  “Give Your Calories“.  With this app users scan their snacks via barcode recognition. The displayed number of calories in the snack are then converted into dollars for the user to make an mobile donation.

2) The Lunchbox Fund: “Feedie“. Share a photo of your meal when dining out through your social media, and the restaurant where you are eating at makes a donation to the The Lunchbox Fund. They will provide daily meals to schoolchildren in South Africa.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=CVR3bnJ30iU