tinyGive has been acquired by Give Lively!

tinyGive began as a simple concept born at the nexus of several growing trends: online charitable giving, the ubiquitousness of online social networks, and mobile connectivity. Conceived during the heady days of Twitter in late 2009, our mission from the beginning has been to democratize giving by empowering both donors and nonprofits (particularly smaller organizations without big budgets) to more easily connect and support one another in ways that are simple, social, and meaningful.

For donors, we wanted a way for people to easily give as little as $1 to an organization they cared about while also being able to recruit and enlist their peers to do the same. For nonprofits, we wanted to provide state-of-the-art tools that would allow them to meet their donors and future supporters in places where conversations were already happening. In the same way that Twitter was beginning to democratize voice, we wanted to democratize giving.

An individual’s decision to give is based primarily on relationships, the nature of the appeal, and how easy it is to follow through on the intent to give; and in that context, Twitter seemed like the perfect platform to change the way we give, and how we communicate with one another about the causes and organizations we care about.

In the same way that Twitter was beginning to democratize voice, we wanted to democratize giving.

Tweenate to tinyGive

To make that vision a reality, the initial founding team, Clarence and Garlin, built an early prototype called Tweenate. Launched in early 2011, in partnership with GlobalGiving, Tweenate enabled individuals to connect their Twitter account to a GlobalGiving gift card and make donations of as little as $1 to GlobalGiving charities.

After that initial product, the team took a bit of a break to focus on other projects, and assumed that Twitter or some other company would eventually figure out how to make charitable giving on Twitter work. Though many different companies came and went, offering a variety of different Tweet-to-Give products, no one quite seemed to crack the code.

As interest in social media fundraising and mobile giving continued to rise, Clarence revisited the project in late 2012 and recruited Karan to help build the next version of the platform — one that could finally scale thanks to the advent of Stripe’s Connect API and Twitter’s Streaming API. After a few months building out the new platform and on-boarding new partners, we officially relaunched as tinyGive in April of 2013!

Since 2013, with the help and support of many of you, we’ve worked to push the boundaries on charitable giving and what it means to give in a hyper-connected world. Beginning with Twitter-based giving as our foundation, we eventually built a suite of products and tools for donors and nonprofits alike that expanded beyond Twitter — including real-time events, narrative campaigns, branded checkout pages, custom receipting, and recurring gifts.

Working with research colleagues and supported by the Science of Philanthropy Initiative, we experimented with ways to increase giving and support for social good causes. As participants in the Points of Light Civic Accelerator, we were constantly pushed to examine our assumptions about the value we could deliver to users. Finally, with the support of New Media Ventures and our peers in the Innovation Fund portfolio, we refined our business strategy and expanded our work with progressive causes.

In all, we’ve worked with over 200 nonprofits and social good organizations helping them not only raise funds in new and innovative ways, but also reframe how they think about small donors — focusing not just on their contributions, but on the value of their social capital as well. It’s been a journey that has been both rewarding and challenging, and one that we’ve been fortunate enough to have embarked on with all of you!

tinyGive joins the Give Lively Family!

Today, we’re happy to announce the next chapter of our experiment in giving and online civic engagement: tinyGive has been acquired by Give Lively, LLC, and now joins the Give Lively family of products!

Give Lively is an incubator of digital products for social good and is the creator of both Small Token and SwearJar. Their team is approaching the charitable giving space with a vision very similar to ours — one that values small acts of kindness, draws upon the power of social and peer-based giving strategies, and creatively experiments with new apps and products to encourage folks to not only give more often, but to truly “give better”.

After spending the last few months getting to know David, Jonathan, and the rest of the team, we’re confident that we’ve found the perfect new home for tinyGive. We’re excited for what this partnership has in store, and think you will be as well. We also encourage you to check out their latest products to get a peek into what the future of giving looks like!