# Fundraising Ideas

- Link: https://fundraising.co.uk/classifieds/fundraising-ideas/
- Published: 2012-05-04T14:03:01+01:00
- Author: Howard Lake

### Fundraising Ideas | Different fundraising channels

Since the 1970s charities have become much more sophisticated in how they fundraise,
and employ a range of fundraising channels and tools. For example, direct marketing
is still the workhorse of many charities’ voluntary income, but various fundraising
and commercial ideas have been applied to make it very sophisticated. A/B testing,
list-swapping, segmentation and data overlays are just some common practices nowadays.

Charities now will often use a mix of direct marketing, events, grants, legacies,
major gifts, digital, telephone and local or community fundraising to generate ongoing
income. In so doing, they often outsource some of these activities to specialist
agencies.

**Business ideas for fundraising**

Charities also adopt and adapt ideas and practices from the commercial sector. Oxfam’s
national network of charity shops, emulated by many other charities now, is run 
as a separate trading company, which donates its profits to the charity.

Many charities generate income by selling their services to government agencies 
under contract to run and implement projects.

Many digital business ideas have been adapted for and by charities. Ideas such as
affiliate marketing, rounding up donations as micro-donations, and online shopping
are all now popular with many charities.

The idea of fundraising from mobile phones is also being tested by many charities
now, whether it is in the form of SMS text giving, regular donations from the donor’s
phone bill, or NFC (near field communication) or swiping your phone for contactless
donations.

Some of these fundraising innovative ideas have been generated from within charity
but an ever growing number are being conceived and made available as services by
those outside the sector such as marketing, telecoms, and data experts and philanthropy
enterpreneurs.

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