Deck the halls, light the menorah, prepare the feast of karamu, shop ’til you drop, then ring in the new year. Wait, something is missing.
That’s right, donate to charity, then countdown to 2015.
In the past, the season of kindness and giving was also the season of philanthropic procrastinating as many would literally wait until the clock ran out on December 31st to support the causes close to our hearts (and helpful in getting that tax deduction).
Mobile is changing the landscape however, and slowly but surely pushing the generous procrastinator to giving both early and often. The phones in our collective consumer pockets and pocketbooks are also mobile giving units, with the chance to change how and who we choose to make the holidays bright for.
1. Mobile Is Changing How People Give
From Kickstarter, to email blasts, to text to donate–the phone is the new frontier of giving, and it’s delivering real results. Mobile donations are up 71 percent from five years ago, and 15 percent (so far) when compared to previous holiday seasons.
Moreover, while mobile users don’t tend to give more during the holiday, they are far more prone to spread the wealth– mobile philanthropists donate during Christmas to an average of 8 charitable groups, as opposed to the 3 that those who tend to stick with the more conventional methods do.
Mobile donors also tend to give more consistently throughout the holiday season – though who donate through more traditional means during the most wonderful time of the year tend to heavily weight those donations toward the last three weeks of December, generally because their donations are coming in the form of a few written paper checks. Mobile givers on the other hand – tend to begin their giving around during the first week of officially holiday shopping (with Giving Tuesday showing a spike) such that they actually tend to level off by the last two weeks of the season.
2. Mobile Is Changing Who Gives (By Making Giving Social)
Did you take the ice bucket challenge this year?
It raised millions for ALS research on a very simple principle–native generosity does not always lead to giving, but peer pressure sure does. From the very famous