Easy to Give and Easy to Receive

Donating with Digital Payments

Information overload has trained us to sort through a constant stream of online ads and appeals for support in order to find the information we need. Unfortunately, this makes it easy to ignore potentially worthy causes, so donation-driven organizations are starting to incorporate digital technology and creative methods to attract donors and offer them more ways to donate.

As organizations adopt digital payment and blockchain technology, payment platforms like Uulala let users donate quickly and safely through wallet transfers, which minimizes or eliminates processing fees and encourages users to donate even small amounts that ultimately make a big difference.

Why do we donate?

Giving money away is easy. Giving money away well is fiendishly difficult.

• Warren Buffett

Practical concerns like security, financial ability, trust, and convenience do play a role in someone’s decision whether or not to give. Blockchain-supported initiatives offer transparency, informational and transactional security and blockchain decentralizes the process of giving, removing the need for intermediaries to regulate and secure transactions. Donations by wallet transfer, which are supported by blockchain, can route money directly to the intended recipient anywhere in the world.

Ultimately, though, when it comes to donating, people are ruled by their hearts over their heads, and even more so if there is a personal connection to the organization or cause. Making it easy to donate can result in ‘impulse altruism,’ especially when it comes to small donations.

Digital donors

According the 2017 Global Trends in Giving Report, 61% of over 4,000 surveyed respondents preferred to give online over traditional methods. Also in 2017, mobile traffic accounted for 40% of non-profit website visitors, up 9% from the previous year.

In the United States, 97% of people aged 18–44 have a smartphone, but only 17% have a mobile wallet. Asia and Latin America have much higher adoption rates, with India topping the list at 56% of consumers a mobile wallet.

This bodes well for the future of international giving, as countries in the developing world already have the technological means to both give and receive digital donations, and there is vast potential for charities and non-profits to streamline giving with peer-to-peer digital transfers.

Making it Easy to Make an Impact

Uulala believes in the power of digital payments to drive financial and economic inclusion for households in the developing world, but logistics of collection and distribution can be tricky.

The deputy director of financial services for the poor for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation points out that most mobile payment apps are closed-loop, which means that to transact, everyone has use the same app. Uulala is an open-loop platform, so users can transact with banks and credit cards that are outside its own ecosystem, allowing them to use their chosen platform and still receive from or send to an Uulala address.

Microdonations Make it up in Volume

Traditionally, the focus of fundraising has been on acquiring ‘sustainer donors’ who commit to a monthly credit card donation, or who donate a large amount at once. This is partly because donations have generally taken significant resources to process, making small donations seem almost pointless. With the advent of cheap digital transfer options, however, digital microdonations are making a real impact.

Creative Digital Fundraising

Charities and NGOs are finding new and creative ways to grab our attention, while also making it easy and sometimes even fun to support projects and organizations with online contributions.

The World Food Programme’s team has created an app called ShareTheMeal which allows users to make microdonations online from a digital wallet. The suggested donation is just $0.50, so by making it easy to donate and suggesting such a tiny amount, the organization has managed to distribute hundreds of millions of meals throughout the developing world

Another creative fundraising example is the Blue Cross, which started ‘Pet and Tap’ in the UK. They put contactless payment devices on service dogs so people can make a quick £2 donation while petting.

Save the Children uses a physical ‘Give Button’ which is connected to the internet through mobile data and also asks for £2. Both methods offer immediate, real-time donations for very affordable suggested amounts.

GiveDirectly, a digital-payments based organization, has a simple mandate: Send money directly to those living in extreme poverty. It is one of the few that accepts donations in cryptocurrencies that run on the Ethereum blockchain, as well as in regular currency. With a focus on funding individuals projects in the developing world, 88% of GiveDirectly donations make it to recipients, and donors can even monitor the impact of their donation through online stories and videos.

Uulala’s function as a digital account and transfer platform for both fiat currency, such as USD or pesos, so people can donate by digital wallet transfer, without parties having to accept cryptocurrency as the medium of exchange. Combined with its mobile node network reaching into outlying regions, Uulala’s services platform offers an easy way to donate and distribute funds in even the most distant regions

In donation-driven organizations, applying targeted Fintech to reach more donors worldwide and appeal to young, tech-savvy donors, is a crucial component of any sustainable financial strategy.