Lots of charities are running a Christmas campaign. Be it an event such as carol singing, a dinner, a fun run, a Christmas fair or a ball.
Alternatively you can help them by buying a charity gift for someone this year, such as adopting an animal or bird.
For example, Operation Christmas Child collects shoe boxes for children abroad each year and The Salvation Army are asking people to donate gifts for children aged 0-16 for their Christmas Present Appeal 2008.
Christian Aid is running a Christmas Appeal and also has a list of events across the UK.
WWF are holding a Christmas raffle for the spectacled bear.
Marie Curie Cancer Care is holding many Christmas events, from bazaars and fayres to walks and lunches.
Crisis is looking for volunteers to run their Christmas centres.
As an alternative Christmas present, you can adopt a Cairngorm reindeer, adopt a species with the Devon Wildlife Trust, adopt a project with Diabetes UK, adopt an animal with the WWF or adopt a nest box for the Hawk and Owl Trust.
Don't forget to recycle your Christmas cards and wrapping paper. The more cards that are recycled, the more trees The Woodland Trust can plant.
Many charities work extra hard at Christmas and especially this year when they are suffering in the credit crunch; please make sure you add something to your Christmas list for them.
Friday 12 December 2008
Wednesday 19 November 2008
Charity Christmas cards for charities, not for profit
Just how much of the price of a charity Christmas card actually goes directly to the charity?
Well that depends on who you buy it from.
Large stores such as Harrods and Liberty of Regent Street are the worst offenders, giving just 3% of the price of the card to the charity mentioned on it. They say the percentage is negotiated between the printers and the charity and has nothing to do with them. Apparently.
Cards from other high street stores, such as Boots and Marks & Spencer, have about 10% of the price going to charity while Paperchase and Clinton Cards give up to 25%.
If you buy from the charity themselves, their net revenue on card sales can be between 35 and 80%. Oxfam say that once all costs are taken into consideration, 35% of the price is a clear profit for them.
However, selling cards through a third party such as a high street store means that the charity can benefit from increased sales due to a wider market, do not bear the production costs and do not have to worry about any leftover cards which aren't sold.
Websites which sell only charity cards from several different charities can pass on 79% of the price to the charity.
Many charities just do not have the funds to produce their own cards nor the resources to sell them.
Which is where e-cards come in.
Third party websites offering e-cards mean no production costs, little overheads and in the case of Everyclick, a whopping 121% of the price of the Christmas card goes to charity.
How do they do this?
The user makes a single donation (minimum of £5) to the charity of their choice available on the website in exchange for as many personalised Christmas e-cards they wish to send, on the date that they choose.
If they are a UK tax payer and they choose to Gift Aid their donation, then 121% of the donation will go to charity.
The charity benefits much more than from any other form of charity Christmas card and a few trees are saved in the process. Less waste goes into landfill and everyone benefits.
Over 200,000 UK charities are available to support on Everyclick, which means that even the smallest charities who would not even have thought of producing Christmas cards can actually benefit from e-cards.
We're all going to buy Christmas cards anyway this year, and with belts being tightened and Christmas budgets shortened what better way to do it than send as many cards as you like for a donation to charity. Charities will be hard hit during this recession, suffering from fewer donations as donors save their cash, just at the time when they will have more people coming to them for help.
Buy charity Christmas cards on Everyclick.com and help any one of 200,000 UK charities.
Well that depends on who you buy it from.
Large stores such as Harrods and Liberty of Regent Street are the worst offenders, giving just 3% of the price of the card to the charity mentioned on it. They say the percentage is negotiated between the printers and the charity and has nothing to do with them. Apparently.
Cards from other high street stores, such as Boots and Marks & Spencer, have about 10% of the price going to charity while Paperchase and Clinton Cards give up to 25%.
If you buy from the charity themselves, their net revenue on card sales can be between 35 and 80%. Oxfam say that once all costs are taken into consideration, 35% of the price is a clear profit for them.
However, selling cards through a third party such as a high street store means that the charity can benefit from increased sales due to a wider market, do not bear the production costs and do not have to worry about any leftover cards which aren't sold.
Websites which sell only charity cards from several different charities can pass on 79% of the price to the charity.
Many charities just do not have the funds to produce their own cards nor the resources to sell them.
Which is where e-cards come in.
Third party websites offering e-cards mean no production costs, little overheads and in the case of Everyclick, a whopping 121% of the price of the Christmas card goes to charity.
How do they do this?
The user makes a single donation (minimum of £5) to the charity of their choice available on the website in exchange for as many personalised Christmas e-cards they wish to send, on the date that they choose.
If they are a UK tax payer and they choose to Gift Aid their donation, then 121% of the donation will go to charity.
The charity benefits much more than from any other form of charity Christmas card and a few trees are saved in the process. Less waste goes into landfill and everyone benefits.
Over 200,000 UK charities are available to support on Everyclick, which means that even the smallest charities who would not even have thought of producing Christmas cards can actually benefit from e-cards.
We're all going to buy Christmas cards anyway this year, and with belts being tightened and Christmas budgets shortened what better way to do it than send as many cards as you like for a donation to charity. Charities will be hard hit during this recession, suffering from fewer donations as donors save their cash, just at the time when they will have more people coming to them for help.
Buy charity Christmas cards on Everyclick.com and help any one of 200,000 UK charities.
Thursday 30 October 2008
How to have an ethical Christmas
If Christmas really is the season of peace and goodwill why not start planning now to make it a truly ethical occasion for yourself and your loved ones?
Charitable gestures in this season of giving are so easy to make at a cost which would even have Scrooge smiling with approval.
Just what does the way you wish someone a happy Christmas say about you? Old traditions die hard and it seems that writing a few scrawled cliches on a Hallmark greetings card is still the favoured method of most Brits.
The Royal Mail delivers as many as 150 million cards per day in the pre-Christmas run up but it is a sobering thought that these cards can take up to 30 years to decompose.
So why not send an ecard (an email wishing someone well) instead? You can actually make them more personal than a shop-bought card by pasting in a scene from a famous Christmas film (what about Jimmy Stewart's It's A Wonderful Life?) and using PhotoShop to superimpose a speech bubble with your greeting.
Charity Christmas cards are a fine alternative if this idea doesn't appeal.
Cards that you receive can be recycled by organisations such as the Woodland Trust.
A compost bin can be a good Yuletide investment which will help you recycle much of the waste that the festivities generate.
If you're dreaming of a green Christmas it is best to buy presents which don't harm the environment. Buying the adoption rights to an animal can prove to be a great gift and what better time of the year can it be for adopting a reindeer?
For just £32 a year you can adopt a Cairngorm Mountain reindeer and receive photos, souvenirs and newsletters. The money will be well-spent on food and welfare (in the form of medicine and vets' fees) for these magnificent creatures.
Polar bears can be adopted even more cheaply. For as little as £3 per month the World Wildlife Fund will let you adopt one of these Arctic animals.
It doesn't take much imagination to decorate your house without ruining the planet. Plastic trees are not environmentally-friendly so you could always grow your own holly tree instead of supporting the trade in holly branches. Put seeds, a compost pellet and a terracotta pot on your Christmas list and watch your green credentials grow!
If it's too late to do this in time for the big day, you can always contact Oxfam and make a donation so that a tree can be planted in a developing country.
No decent Christmas is complete without the chance to gorge yourself on food before slumping in front of the Queen's speech with a paper crown on your head. Buying your choice of dinner locally, perhaps at farmers' markets, is a sure-fire way of ticking the right green boxes.
With time off work, Christmas is a time to reflect on those less fortunate than themselves. You can always bring some seasonal cheer by taking part in a 'Considerate Christmas' at Everyclick. Send online greetings and buy an Everyclick eVoucher to give to someone to donate to their favourite charity before the year is out.
Charitable gestures in this season of giving are so easy to make at a cost which would even have Scrooge smiling with approval.
Just what does the way you wish someone a happy Christmas say about you? Old traditions die hard and it seems that writing a few scrawled cliches on a Hallmark greetings card is still the favoured method of most Brits.
The Royal Mail delivers as many as 150 million cards per day in the pre-Christmas run up but it is a sobering thought that these cards can take up to 30 years to decompose.
So why not send an ecard (an email wishing someone well) instead? You can actually make them more personal than a shop-bought card by pasting in a scene from a famous Christmas film (what about Jimmy Stewart's It's A Wonderful Life?) and using PhotoShop to superimpose a speech bubble with your greeting.
Charity Christmas cards are a fine alternative if this idea doesn't appeal.
Cards that you receive can be recycled by organisations such as the Woodland Trust.
A compost bin can be a good Yuletide investment which will help you recycle much of the waste that the festivities generate.
If you're dreaming of a green Christmas it is best to buy presents which don't harm the environment. Buying the adoption rights to an animal can prove to be a great gift and what better time of the year can it be for adopting a reindeer?
For just £32 a year you can adopt a Cairngorm Mountain reindeer and receive photos, souvenirs and newsletters. The money will be well-spent on food and welfare (in the form of medicine and vets' fees) for these magnificent creatures.
Polar bears can be adopted even more cheaply. For as little as £3 per month the World Wildlife Fund will let you adopt one of these Arctic animals.
It doesn't take much imagination to decorate your house without ruining the planet. Plastic trees are not environmentally-friendly so you could always grow your own holly tree instead of supporting the trade in holly branches. Put seeds, a compost pellet and a terracotta pot on your Christmas list and watch your green credentials grow!
If it's too late to do this in time for the big day, you can always contact Oxfam and make a donation so that a tree can be planted in a developing country.
No decent Christmas is complete without the chance to gorge yourself on food before slumping in front of the Queen's speech with a paper crown on your head. Buying your choice of dinner locally, perhaps at farmers' markets, is a sure-fire way of ticking the right green boxes.
With time off work, Christmas is a time to reflect on those less fortunate than themselves. You can always bring some seasonal cheer by taking part in a 'Considerate Christmas' at Everyclick. Send online greetings and buy an Everyclick eVoucher to give to someone to donate to their favourite charity before the year is out.
The problems faced by small charities in an online environment
A new breed of website helps people donate online for free, even if their chosen charity doesn't have an online presence, but why is there such a demand for its services?
In this electronic age surely every charity should have a website accepting online donations?
Part of the reason for the success of fundraising platforms, such as Everyclick.com, is the fact that it is becoming understandably difficult for charities to find the funds to run their own website.
It is a cruel fact of life that some charities have more resources and higher-profile supporters than others. Not all charitable organisations can have celebrity backers like Ian Botham who has just gained much well-deserved press coverage for completing his remarkable trek across Britain in aid of Leukaemia Research.
Charities can feel that they're competing against each other to try and attract attention and donations from consumers who are finding it increasingly hard to meet the rising cost of living.
There are 200,000 charities in the UK, all, in the nicest possible way, trying to stand out from the crowd to make a difference to people's lives.
Only two per cent of the £8 billion that Britons donate to charity each year is given online, according to recent research from NFP synergy.
This makes charities the poor internet relation of sectors such as travel, banking and shopping where a significant proportion of transactions have migrated online.
It is also proof of how many charities are reluctant to invest in websites to accept online donations, considering that it is more cost-effective to pursue other methods such as employing people with clipboards to solicit direct debit contributions from passers-by.
But there is no escaping the fact that online donations are the way forward. Recent research from internet media and market research company Nielsen Online found that Britons are spending four per cent more time online per month than they did a year ago.
The relatively low proportion of online donations could also be explained by consumers' fears that their contributions might not be secure. A reticence about becoming a victim of fraud when you are trying to give cash to an honourable cause is understandable.
Which is why sites such as Everyclick can be a God-send for charities as it has a secure payment system.
While money is one factor deterring charities from setting up a website, another is time. Websites need to be maintained so that they retain their relevance and don't have outdated information or old news stories on them.
Someone could be put off from supporting a charity by seeing an unprofessional website.
The charities which don't have websites are often the smallest ones with the least resources - the very organisations that might need your support the most. So don't be put off if you can't find a website representing a cause close to your heart. Visit a fundraising site which will accept online donations for them.
In this electronic age surely every charity should have a website accepting online donations?
Part of the reason for the success of fundraising platforms, such as Everyclick.com, is the fact that it is becoming understandably difficult for charities to find the funds to run their own website.
It is a cruel fact of life that some charities have more resources and higher-profile supporters than others. Not all charitable organisations can have celebrity backers like Ian Botham who has just gained much well-deserved press coverage for completing his remarkable trek across Britain in aid of Leukaemia Research.
Charities can feel that they're competing against each other to try and attract attention and donations from consumers who are finding it increasingly hard to meet the rising cost of living.
There are 200,000 charities in the UK, all, in the nicest possible way, trying to stand out from the crowd to make a difference to people's lives.
Only two per cent of the £8 billion that Britons donate to charity each year is given online, according to recent research from NFP synergy.
This makes charities the poor internet relation of sectors such as travel, banking and shopping where a significant proportion of transactions have migrated online.
It is also proof of how many charities are reluctant to invest in websites to accept online donations, considering that it is more cost-effective to pursue other methods such as employing people with clipboards to solicit direct debit contributions from passers-by.
But there is no escaping the fact that online donations are the way forward. Recent research from internet media and market research company Nielsen Online found that Britons are spending four per cent more time online per month than they did a year ago.
The relatively low proportion of online donations could also be explained by consumers' fears that their contributions might not be secure. A reticence about becoming a victim of fraud when you are trying to give cash to an honourable cause is understandable.
Which is why sites such as Everyclick can be a God-send for charities as it has a secure payment system.
While money is one factor deterring charities from setting up a website, another is time. Websites need to be maintained so that they retain their relevance and don't have outdated information or old news stories on them.
Someone could be put off from supporting a charity by seeing an unprofessional website.
The charities which don't have websites are often the smallest ones with the least resources - the very organisations that might need your support the most. So don't be put off if you can't find a website representing a cause close to your heart. Visit a fundraising site which will accept online donations for them.
Wednesday 29 October 2008
Online corporate social responsibility and its benefits
In this new-age world where advanced technologies are all the rage with the internet at the forefront, most companies are focused on maintaining a significant online profile.
Keeping their website fresh and updated, providing the best information, showing off the snazziest homepage designs and maintaining a user-friendly interface are the order of the day.However, one of the less-known ways in which companies can make use of the internet is through their corporate social responsibility (CSR) programmes.
Although firms are still active through their community-based projects, the ease of access and widespread scope of the internet make it a perfect tool for their work.For starters, a company can clearly outline its CSR policies and activities on its website to make any charities potentially interested in a link-up aware of their approach to fundraising work.
This might include a listing of the charities it offers corporate support to or examples of individual voluntary work by the company's employees.Other resources can be used internally, such as using a charity search engine like Everyclick as the company’s intranet homepage.
One organisation which champions the benefits of using online resources to implement CSR programmes is Business in the Community (BITC), which encourages firms to improve their positive impact on society.It offers companies a tailored policy relating to the CSR opportunities in their local area, such as in schools, and helps them to action it through innovative online methods.
As John Heaslip, chief executive of the Northern Ireland branch of the organisation, explains: "They might send employees to spend an hour a week reading one-on-one with disadvantaged kids."And that might be the only time that that particular kid gets read to, and make a real difference to the child's life. But it can be immensely rewarding for the employee, too."
One such technology the BITC uses is MS Forms Server, which can be used to get feedback following charity-based events and to conduct online satisfaction surveys for anyone involved in them.In conclusion, it would appear that the message is clear - using the medium of the internet has major benefits for both parties involved in CSR programmes, the companies and the charities.
And, perhaps most importantly, it improves the process of providing much-needed funds and support to those who are the subject of their work.Online fundraising potential of social networking sites
A couple of years ago, the term 'social networking site' would have drawn blank looks from all but the technologically savviest of us. Now, websites such as Facebook and MySpace have a global currency to rival brands such as Coca-Cola and Nike.
Initially frequented by teenagers and university students, the sites are increasingly popular among people of all ages. Recently, the average age of users of Facebook was found to be 32.
The publicity potential is huge. Most celebrities have spotted an excellent avenue for self-promotion. According to a recent study by JupiterResearch, 33 per cent of European online advertisers plan to launch their own profiles on social networking sites in the next year.
And charities, quite rightly, want a piece of the pie.
Many have already got in on the act. There are countless unofficial groups dedicated to charities on Facebook but the organisations are now taking the initiative and creating their own online ventures.
Oxfam has a new online charity shop which hopes to raise £2m a year. Currently over 50,000 donated items are available, along with goods such as Fairtrade chocolate and coffee, jewellery and other gifts.
Everyclick provides an online fundraising platform where users can donate to or be sponsored for any UK charity. Everyclick is also a search engine which donates 50% of its advertising revenue to charities, chosen by the user as they search the web.
Charity blogging has also seen big growth. Oxfam has its own blog on MySpace, while visitors to Second Life, Actionaid's networking site, can tour WWF's virtual conservation island.
The Royal British Legion has taken advantage of the power of social networking and has created a virtual poppy for Facebook users. Although the poppy badge does not directly earn the charity any money, they hope it will spur people on to make a donation.
Google has also developed an application programming interface called Opensocial, which will enable the creation of Facebook-like applications, including charity badges, on any social networking site. Everyclick provides its users with a 'widget' which can be added to any website, through which people can search and donate directly to the charity chosen by the user.
Brand Control
But where there are benefits there are risks.
Networking sites can also be used to quickly spread misinformation and negative publicity, and there is always the chance people will bypass institutions altogether and locate beneficiaries themselves, recently noted in the Guardian.
Nate Elliott, senior analyst at JupiterResearch, issues the following words of warning: "As it stands, most European advertisers are jumping on the engagement marketing bandwagon without truly understanding which tactics represent the most appropriate and effective use of their marketing resources."
Will it work?
Research suggests a more personalised approach is effective at converting awareness to giving. A recent survey by Harris Interactive revealed that 61 per cent of people gave to charities because a personal connection asked them to make a contribution.
And there is an element too, however subconscious or subdued, of wanting to flaunt your goodness, as well as ask people to share in it, which should give charities hope.
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