GiveForward

Co-Founder Desiree Vargas was recently interviewed by Metro Green Business about the success of GiveForward, and since that interview we are excited to announce that we have raised just over $1.3 million dollars!

In the article, Desiree talks about how she decided to start GiveForward and discusses how our first success story positively affected our site.  She also talks about the evolution of our site becoming primarily focused on medical fundraising. 

MetroGREEN+Business (@MetroGreenBiz) is a comprehensive information website for green and sustainable business and real estate throughout the metro New York area.

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Normally users of GiveForward raise money for medical expenses.  However one user, Katie Waskevich, has started a fundraiser with the hopes of saving thousands of lives.  Katie’s vision is to raise enough money so that early TB testing can save lives.  Her fundraiser aims to raise $1000 for chemical testing needed to finalize a prototype. 

Katie has seen the need for this early tuberculosis testing in India and that area is her main focus.  She describes the struggles one has when realizing they are sick:

“the nearest clinic is 5 miles away… you get to the clinic… but the two nurses don’t feel comfortable diagnosing your symptoms, so they tell you to go to the regional clinic–a 2 hour bus ride away.  It’s late, so you’ll have to wait until tomorrow to journey to this clinic. 

You wake up early so that you can get to the regional clinic in time to see the doctor.  When you get there, after several hours of testing, the doctor believes that you have tuberculosis, but he can’t determine which strain.  You’re sent to a specialty clinic. 

You arrive at the specialty clinic and discover that you have a drug resistant strain of tuberculosis–they’ll do their best to treat you, but if you had sought medical help sooner your chances of survival would have been better.”

Katie believes that the lengthy process detailed above can be avoided if the proper diagnostic tools are provided to rural clinics.  If you wish to donate money to CitusMedical through Katie’s fundraiser, please visit her page here.

Recently, co-founder and second banana Ethan Austin was interviewed by Pepsi Refresh Project (@Pepsi) about GiveForward’s increasing presence in the medical fundraising world.  In the interview, Ethan details how GiveForward has shifted from a general fundraising site to a site primarily dominated by medical fundraisers. 
 
To read the interview in its entirety, please visit the Pepsi Refresh Blog here.
 
The Pepsi Refresh Project seeks people, businesses, and non-profits with ideas that have a positive impact on the community.

Over the past year at GiveForward, we’ve seen that there are often a flurry of donations in the two or three days before a fundraiser ends.  This happens because donors feel a greater sense of urgency towards the end of a fundraiser.  In other words, all those people you have asked to donate and who have procrastinated for weeks (or months) often seem to get their act together right before the proverbial  buzzer.

To help maximize the amount of money you raise for your cause, you’ll want to make sure you reach out to all your procrastinating amigos and family members in the final days before your fundraiser ends.   Here’s what we suggest you do to finish your fundraiser with a surge of donations: read more…

In previous posts on the GiveForward Fundraising blog, I’ve mentioned the importance of getting off to a good start with your personal fundrasing page.  The reason you want to get off to a good start is because people usually play follow the leader.  In other words, most people will come to your fundraising page, check out how much previous donors gave and then give a similar amount.  So if you start with a bunch of $100 or $200 donations you’ll do a lot better than if your first few donations are for $5 or $10.  As I’ve mentioned before, one way to get off to a good start is ask your 5 closest friends and family to donate a specific amount (say $100) to get the ball rolling.

However, another great way is to simply lead by example.  If you put some skin the game by making the first donation for a significant amount, others are going to follow your lead.  Think about it.  What better way is there to show people how sincere you are about your cause than by leading with your actions!

This week we have a special fundraising tip of the week.  We asked one of our users, Amy Cowin, who raised $30,000 on GiveForward for her sister’s kidney transplant to write about her experience and share with everyone how she did it.  Here’s what she had to say:

On April 2, 2009, I donated my left kidney to my one and only sister to save her life. Jessica was in renal failure, also known as kidney failure and needed a transplant. Upon completion of testing, Jessica was cleared for surgery and listed on the transplant list. In hopes that I would be a match to donate one of my kidneys, the hospital did some testing on me. Most of the testing was done, when the hospital called Jessica to let her know that the transplant process was going to be stopped. This meant that until Jessica received Medicaid, which could take at least three months to get or until we could pay for the transplant up front there would be no kidney transplant any time soon. Upon hearing this discouraging news, I jumped into action to start raising some money for the transplant.

Not knowing exactly what to do or where to go to get started raising money, I turned to Facebook. I wrote a somewhat frantic message to a small group of close friends and confidants, specifically chosen based on their various capabilities, knowledge and connections to different facets of the business world. Original message sent on Facebook:

Subject: “NEED HELP ASAP”

“Hi,
I’m sure most of you know that Jessica needs a kidney transplant and she will be taking one of mine. Unfortunately we have had some major problems with insurance and have hit another bump in the road. I need to figure out how to raise some money asap. If any of you know how to do this through Facebook or know of someone who knows how to do this let me know. The insurance will only cover $30,000 and the whole transplant will cost over $100,000. The rest we will have to pay out of pocket, which we definitely do not have. The hospital will not move forward if they don’t think we can pay for the transplant. She cannot wait another 3 months for a kidney.
PLEASE let me know!
Thanks so much,
Amy”

Within three hours I had responses from my friends, some were how they wanted to help me, times we could meet up to figure out ideas and websites to look at, including the one I chose to host my fundraiser, www.giveforward.org. The GiveForward website had everything I needed to start fundraising almost immediately. I spent three intense hours on Give Forward to make sure I had all of the information that the website required, such as a description of why I was fundraising, pictures, where the money would be going, a timeline, and much more. This process helped me strategize, organize and get excited about fundraising; because fundraising is a daunting task, especially for medical purposes.

I wanted to raise up to $100,000 in less than 90 days. In three hours of having the fundraiser published online, I had over $5,000 in donations. I didn’t raise the $100K like I set out to do, but I did raise $30,000 in less than 30 Days. Here are a few of the strategies that helped me raise $30K in 30 Days.

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Here’s an easy tip to help connect with your donors –  tell them how their donation is going to be used.  For example, if you are fundraising for a non-profit that deals with AIDS  in Africa, let them know that a $25 donation will purchase medicine for a child for three months,  a $100 donation will purchase medicine for a year and a $250 donation will purchase medicine for a child for two-and-a-half years.

Letting your donors know that their donations are going to a specific purchase, will make them feel more connected to your fundraiser because it more tangible and will make them want to give more generously. It will also help establish a suggested donation amount so they know the minimum amount they should be donating..

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If you set a high fundraising goal for yourself, ($3500+) you are likely going to have to get some donations from people outside your immediate circle of friends and family.  The way to do this is to be extraordinary.

Why be extraordinary?  Well, because being ordinary just isn’t going to cut it these days. Sure, Grandma and Grandpa may donate to your campaign simply because they like you, but let’s face it, friends of friends, and strangers are only going to donate if you can knock their socks off by showing them how dedicated you are to your fundraising effort.

So what makes someone extraordinary?  Well, being extraordinary can mean anything. It can mean participating in a physical challenge like running a marathon, or rowing across Atlantic. Or it could mean creating a heartwarming video or great description for your fundraising page.  It could even mean doing something goofy like growing a mustache or shaving your head for charity.  Whatever you decide to do, the key is showing your donors that you are passionate about what you are doing and you are willing to do whatever it takes to raise money for your cause. read more…

When you are fundraising, the great majority of your donations come from family, friends and friends of friends so it’s up to you to promote the heck out of your project.  Mostly you’re going to promote your fundraising page through emails, a Facebook group if you’ve created one and perhaps even the good old fashion way of face to face interaction.

But what do you do in those rare moments when you are not emailing/calling/facebooking the world to let them know about your awesome fundraising efforts?  Well, you should keep the fact that you are fundraising for a good cause at the forefront of your friends’ minds by adding your fundraising page’s link to your Facebook, Gchat, or AIM status message.

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