The Giving Machine adds shop and give reminder toolbar
Howard Lake | 11 September 2014 | News
Online shopping website TheGivingMachine, which lets shoppers raise funds for charities at no cost to themselves, has created a digital toolbar to help remind shoppers they are on a participating store’s website. In this way it should boost income for their chosen charity.
The toolbar helps identify retailers that will donate money to charities of the shopper’s choice when they shop online. A red heart icon appears next to the retailer’s name in search results. The heart also appears when a shopper visits a participating retailer’s website.
TheGivingMachine toolbar highlights participating merchants with a red heart, plus details of their donation percentage.
The toolbar works on both PC and Mac browsers.
Why the need for a reminder?
Affiliate marketing works when shoppers click on a dedicated link from the affiliate’s website to take them to the online retailer, which can then track the visit and whether and what the shopper buys anything. It can then reward the affiliate with payment.
If a shopper visits a retailer’s site directly – without going via the affiliate’s website – the affiliate will earn nothing.
This kind of toolbar is designed to reduce the chances of that happening, thereby boosting income for the affiliate, TheGivingMachine, and its charity beneficiaries.
So far, more than 1,700 retailers participate in the scheme, and TheGivingMachine has raised over £770,000 from over 1.2 million purchases.
TGM founder and managing director Richard Morris said:
“We currently have over 80,000 Givers using our portal. The new ‘Shop&Give reminder’ makes it even easier for Givers to give for free with every online purchase they make. With over 1,700 shops participating and more joining every week, it’s hard to remember them all – now you don’t have to”.
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He described the launch of the reminder toolbar as “the next step in connecting companies, customers and communities by ensuring our online shopping community has every opportunity to give for free”.
Set up in 2007, TheGivingMachine claims to be the only not-for-profit, social enterprise helping shoppers raise free cash donations for charities and causes. It was awarded The Social Enterprise mark in 2011. It donates 75% of all its commission income to charity, “higher than any other donor model”.
It also offers users the choice of up to four charities to support regularly. It says that no other scheme offers that function.
Other providers offer reminder toolbars which work in similar ways to highlight participating retailers. Easyfundraising introduced their toolbar in 2011 and report that it increases donations five-fold.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.