NEW YORK (AP) \u2014 GoFundMe crowdfunding campaigns have generated $30 billion since 2010, the fundraising platform announced Tuesday, as younger generations look beyond institutions to make their donations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tim Cadogan, GoFundMe\u2019s CEO, said 150 million people have either sent or received money through the platform to date. Gen Z and millennial donors, as well as those who are not married and those who are less religious, are more likely to give through crowdfunding than to traditional nonprofits, according to a\u00a02021 report\u00a0by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what we\u2019re so thrilled about is that we\u2019ve helped people come together to help each other at that level of scale,\u201d Cadogan told The Associated Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
GoFundMe, a privately held, for-profit company, has annually released the total amount raised on its crowdfunding platform since its founding, but hasn\u2019t published a breakdown of funds raised in an individual year. Nevertheless, it is possible to see significant growth from 2019, when it reported a total of $9 billion in cumulative gifts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Part of that growth includes GoFundMe\u2019s acquisition of Classy in 2022, which is an online platform that facilitates giving to nonprofit organizations. Donations given through Classy are included in the reported $30 billion raised.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For comparison, charitable giving in the U.S. to nonprofit organizations reached\u00a0$499.3 billion in 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The most common donation on GoFundMe is $50, Cadogan said, and, for the most part, fundraising campaigns reach the personal networks of the people who started them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSometimes people think you put up a GoFundMe and a bunch of strangers just jump in and give you money,\u201d Cadogan said. \u201cThat\u2019s not how it really works. You put up a GoFundMe and you ask the people that you know to help you.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But sometimes campaigns capture a much broader audience, with requests around high-profile events, like disasters, garnering significant support from strangers. In 2023, GoFundMe said Jan. 2 was the \u201c\u00a0most generous day\u00a0\u201d on the platform as people donated to Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin\u2019s\u00a0fundraiser for toys\u00a0after he collapsed on live television. GoFundMe said 210,000 people donated from around the world on their platform that day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI think that was a very monumental collective show of appreciation for him and for the desire for people to say, \u2018We\u2019re with you,\u2019\u201d said Margaret Richardson, GoFundMe\u2019s Chief Corporate Affairs Officer, of the\u00a0outpouring of support for Hamlin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Hamlin\u00a0announced in May\u00a0that he would transfer the more than $9 million given to the fundraiser to his nonprofit, the Chasing M\u2019s Foundation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The day with the single largest number of donations in 2022 was May 26, two days after the\u00a0mass shooting in Uvalde, Texas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In response to high-profile events, GoFundMe monitors campaigns connected to the event, takes steps to verify them and collects authenticated fundraisers in a hub on their website. The platform also uses its extensive database of gifts to identify what it calls anomalous campaigns and Cadogan said that the payment processors and banks who actually handle the funds sent over GoFundMe also have processes to detect fraud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf you\u2019re moving money in any of the countries we operate in, we and our banking partners have to know who you are,\u201d Cadogan said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In its most basic form, crowdfunding \u2014 gathering small gifts for a cause or to help someone \u2014 isn\u2019t new. But the rise of online giving through platforms like GoFundMe coincides with the adoption of social media and the increase in ecommerce and the use of online financial services in general, said Benjamin Soskis, a senior research associate at the Center on Nonprofits and Philanthropy at the Urban Institute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s not yet clear how much giving through a crowdfunding campaign has supplanted giving to nonprofit organizations, Soskis said, in part because data about crowdfunding is less public. Nonprofit organizations have to share information about the grants they give and receive as well as donations they receive with the IRS and the public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf it\u2019s true that crowdfunding is becoming a larger part of total giving, I think that their data transparency needs to reflect that, so that we can start to integrate crowdfunding into the larger analysis of charitable giving trends,\u201d Soskis said, speaking of GoFundMe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The company does share anonymized data with the organization GivingTuesday as part of their efforts to track giving on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving in the U.S. In 2023, initial estimates showed a\u00a010% drop in the number of donors, which is a worrying trend for nonprofits. That\u2019s in addition to a decrease in the overall amount given to\u00a0nonprofits in 2022, according to Giving USA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Other platforms also facilitate online crowdfunding, besides GoFundMe. DonorsChoose, which allows public school teachers to fundraise for classroom supplies, says it\u2019s\u00a0raised $1.6 billion\u00a0for students and teachers since 2000. And Meta said in 2022, that donors had raised more than\u00a0$7 billion through fundraisers\u00a0on Facebook and Instagram.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Cadogan anticipates room for further growth in online donations in general as well as further potential for asking for help publicly to become more and more acceptable. He sees that ask as the first step to unlocking other people\u2019s generosity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA big part of what I hope that we can do over the next few years is normalize asking for help,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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