With gas prices rising and the housing market already in a slump, charities across the nation are bracing themselves for declining contributions this holiday season and people are looking for innovative and free ways to help their favorite causes.
There is a solution! More than 60,000 nonprofits have partnered with a new Yahoo-powered search engine called GoodSearch.com, and on-line shopping mall GoodShop.com, to enable their supporters to generate donations just by searching the Internet or shopping online. What makes the system so compelling is that it doesn’t cost the users a thing. It’s philanthropy on a shoestring!
Consumers are helping their favorite causes by shopping at GoodShop.com where they can choose from more than 700 top online retailers including Target, Apple, Macy’s, Best Buy, Barnes & Noble, and Orbitz among others. The shopping experience and the prices are exactly the same as going to the retailer directly, but by going through GoodShop, up to 37 percent of the purchase price is donated the user’s favorite cause.
Similarly, with every search conducted on GoodSearch.com, approximately one penny is donated to the user’s favorite charity. It’s used exactly like any other search engine and the pennies add up quickly–just 500 people searching four times a day will raise around $7,300 in a year and it doesn’t cost the users a thing!
GoodSearch and GoodShop have grown into a massive grassroots movement online attracting the attention of leaders in the nonprofit industry, students, bloggers, writers, and even celebrities such as Jessica Biel, Montell Williams, and Rob Thomas of Matchbox 20 who have all created videos on behalf of their favorite charities and GoodSearch.
* Supporters of the ASPCA are shopping on GoodShop and searching on GoodSearch, to date raising more than $16,000 to help animals in need!
* A single purchase placed at retailer Giaiam.com resulted in a $284 donation to the Motion Mania Dance Theater in Maryland!
* The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation has earned more than $8,500!
* An order placed at Adobe Software earned Capri Elementary School in California $191!
Internet users have found GoodSearch and GoodShop to be a compelling idea. Sarah Klein, a doctor in Los Angeles, uses GoodSearch and GoodShop in support of Locks of Love, an organization that provides hair prosthetics for children who have developed long-term medical hair loss. “There is no reason not to use it. I do so much shopping online that it makes me feel good knowing some of that money is going to help children!”
The GoodSearch and GoodShop team is revolutionizing online philanthropy so that no one is denied the opportunity to support the causes most important to them. “The response to this idea has truly been overwhelming,” said Ken Ramberg, Co-Founder of GoodSearch and former President of MonsterTRAK, the largest online career site for college students (now a division of Monster.com). “More than 100 new nonprofits and schools register daily and GoodSearch and GoodShop are helping to make a difference in communities across the country.”
