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Online Fundraising Efforts
for Hurricane Katrina Victims are Remarkable!
It is devastating to see the news about
Hurricane Katrina. My heart goes out to all who are suffering right now. It is
also moving to see how people all over the country and the world are helping
through the use of the Internet.
The ability to fundraise and the ability to get the “word out” about needs have
changed tremendously because of the Internet. Today, there are so many new ways
to help the victims then would have been in the past.
The obvious change is that we are all “plugged in” to the Internet and anywhere
you might surf to, you will find an easy way to donate money to the Hurricane
Katrina victims. Whether you visit
http://www.google.com/,
http://www.yahoo.com/ or
http://www.ebay.com/ you will find an easy way to donate money.
http://www.amazon.com/ for example, not only features the Red Cross on their
home page but has implemented their one click payment technology to make it
super easy to donate money.
If you are an eBay seller or buyer, eBay’s GivingWorks program (http://pages.ebay.com/givingworks),
with the help of MissionFish.org, has made it easy for you to sell or buy items
on eBay where a percentage of the profits will be donated to organizations that
help the Katrina victims. For more info check out
http://www.missionfish.org/promo/2005/katrina/index.jsp
Because of Hurricane Katrina hundreds of thousands of people are currently
displaced. In the “old days,” before the Internet, it would be nearly
impossible, if you had a vacant place to donate, to know who to contact or how
to connect with refugees. But, today there are numerous places where you can
offer or find housing. For example, Yahoo.com has set up a special board just
for this purpose at
http://boards.news.yahoo.com/boards/. Another very popular place is
Craigslist.org who has also set up a special page at
http://www.craigslist.org/about/help/katrina_aid.html.
Practically every news service offers a list of charities that is safe to donate
to (for example The New York Times has one at
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/30/national/hurricane-resources.html )
One of the best places that I have found for a list of legit places to donate
money, however, comes from NetworkForGood.org. They created a page that not only
has the charities listed but also a donation button that has been set up for
those charities so you can donate to any charity directly from their page. For
more info see
http://www.networkforgood.org/topics/animal_environ/hurricanes/ .
On a smaller level anyone who has a website is joining in on the act and adding
their own donation buttons. Some webmasters who are involved in affiliate
marketing are even encouraged to do so by the biggest affiliate marketplace
Commission Junction. Commission Junction (http://www.cj.com/)
set up an easy way for webmaster to add a Red Cross graphic to their sites.
Naturally, neither Commission Junction nor the webmaster receives any
commission. You can see an example of such a graphic on the site
http://www.fundraisingmom.com/.
But doing even more, here is an example of a couple of internet marketers who
built a whole site for this effort at
http://www.helpwithkatrina.com/. Not only will they work hard to get the
money to the people who needs it most they pledged that they will kickback the
2.9% that PayPal charges for donations. So here, 100% of your donation will be
used!
Even people who don’t have websites are joining in on this massive online
Hurricane Katrina help effort. People who frequent online forums and newsgroups
are creating their own incentives to encourage others to donate money. For
example, at the warriorforum.com forum you can get a huge list of ebooks about
internet marketing that would normally cost hundreds if not thousands of dollars
to purchase, free, if you donate $50!
Examples like these are popping all over the Internet.
People have always banded together during a major crisis, but the ability to
watch it unfold on a global level at your kitchen table is extraordinary! This
is just another example of how the Internet has transformed the world into a
“global village”. So what are you waiting for? Become a member of this great
village too and do your share!
Author Bio:
Frustrated with the usual unorganized school
fundraisers Suzanne Wouk turned to the internet in search of a better way. To
her amazement and delight, she found so many new and exciting ways to fundraise
that she started the site
http://www.FundraisingMom.com in order to share the information and ideas
with others.
You may reprint this article for free as long as
it is in it's entirety including the bio.
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