Disrupting the charity. Or, on rethinking the way people donate money to social causes.

Couple of month ago I met up for a coup of coffee with a friend and afterwards went for a walk. As we were walking in a popular pedestrian area, we were approached by a cheery guy who, as it turned out, was volunteering for Doctors without borders. His job was getting more donors on board.
The method is simple. They see you, walk up to you, and tell you all about their organisation and the good work they are doing, and finish up with how important it is to have steady influx of money from donors in order to be able to perform all their good deeds. Now, this is not a monologue, they try to engage you, get you interested and emotionally charged. At the end you are presented with sort of a sign up form where you have to commit to an amount you are willing (or able) to give on regular basis (monthly or semiannual) and fill out your information including payment information.

In our case, I had an “easy way out” since I was already a member, but my friend was not so she got the full on-boarding program. Along the way she mentioned that she does not earn a lot. At the end, as she was presented with the form and the question with how much is she willing to help Doctors without Borders she again repeated that she does not earn much, and that she cannot commit to a monthly sum, but would be glad to make a one time donation today in the amount of [she looked at her wallet] 50€. This, however was not the option. As the volunteer explained, they rely on steady influx. One-time donations do help, its the continuity that keeps them “alive”.
“How about you start with just 5€, and than you can always go up when your situation allows it” he said. “I don’t know”, she replied now slightly uncomfortable, “I may be able to put aside 3€, but even that I am not sure.” As the conversation continued, my friend was growing more and more uncomfortable. Afterwards, she explained that she felt uncomfortable having to repeatedly refuse him stating that she cannot afford to put aside some money for charity.

Later that day we went for some crêpes (french pancakes). This is a small one counter - no table - take-away kinda shop. On the counter top, next to the register there was a little glass box with some change in it and the name of the charity (SOS Kinderdorf) on it. As we payed for the pancakes, my friend took the change she got from the vendor and put it in the box.
Jokingly, I asked “And for that you have money to spare?” She turned around and said…

“Yeah, but that’s just change. It doesn’t hurt me much, and I still help when even just a bit”

This got me thinking. What if there were more people like her. People willing to help but unable to commit to a continuous donation option.
What if donating did not have to be about committing.
What if you could donate as easy a rounding a few pennies. People who help when they can, with how much they can.
And what if there were a way to connect charity organisations with these people. With a larger number of people you a steady and continuous money income would be insured.
An idea was born — Change for Change — money change for social change .

Phase one — Need finding

Psyched about the idea that could disrupt field of charity, money donation and social change I hit the streets with eyes wide open looking for all the meeting points between citizens and charity organisations. Looking for ways people donate to charity today and finding out the reason why they do or do not do it.

I tried to engage different people in the conversation about money donations. Hoping to find out about their pains, motivations, their inspirations as well as they solutions. I annoyed the hell out of them asking repeatedly “why”. To almost everything they said I followed with a “why”. But at the end it payed off. I got a pretty good idea of how things were today. Where were the pain points with the organisations as well as with their potential donor. Now I had to use all the information I gathered and ge to ideation.

Phase two — Ideation

Here’s where it gets tough tricky but creative. Everything you heard, saw, and learned needs to be distilled and turned into storyboard and first mockup. As much as this was fun, it was also unnerving. This is the first time you are confronting the world (when only a limited one in form of your peers) with your idea. I created two storyboard, one representing the troubles my friend went through, and one representing charities and their troubles.

The tricky part was trying to find a common ground, a point where the two worlds met. Where is it that potential donors move around and charities can come in? Where are they already dealing with money so they avoid filling out annoying forms? Where can they feel comfortable and practical to just leave change and feel good about their contribution?
The answer crystallized it self — on the counter top, near the register!
Well, in online and mobile world it meant in e-commerce check-out.

And in the check out, you simply donate by rounding up a few cents.

This solution has two parts. One is an add-on to the check out process that lets you round up your sum, and the other is an app that lets the user control & follow their donations as well as to get motivated and informed about by stories of successful campaigns.

Below is the solution for the user App.

Phase 3 — Prototyping & Testing

If the last step was unnerving, creating a working prototype and presenting it to total strangers — the potential future users, is nerve racking. But as much as it is scary this process is three times as rewarding. In this phase you can constantly on your fingertips, waiting for the input that is eventually going to help you create a product your users are not only gonna like, but be able to use and be happy to do it.

I developed my initial sketches into lo-fi prototype that was immediately tested with real people. Right at the beginning I was able to gain valuable feedback about the flow and some of the graphics. This helped prevent repeating same mistakes when I was transferring the simple sketches into a working prototype online. And again, just as I repeated the “whys” on the beginning I iterated versions and tested the improvements to be sure I was still on the right path.

This whole process, the need finding, the ideation, numerous design iterations, they take time. But, if you do it right, you will be solving a problem and this, let me tell you, there is no better reward for a designer than this (getting payed for your work is second best).