Do you think you can’t make a difference because you are too busy or you don’t have money to spare?
Click-to-give sites and on-line stores that generate donations with each purchase when you shop cost you no money. Depending on the site, it only takes a few seconds to minutes a day to make a positive impact for the welfare of others and the planet. You can click while waiting in traffic, while listening to podcasts or videos, when you have a minute to spare.
On click-to-give sites, users click a button to generate a donation to a non-profit charity or cause. Money for donations comes from sponsors whose ads are visible on the web page.
Depending on the site, donations generated may amount to one cent per click to fifty cents or more. The goal is to accumulate enough clicks to add up to a significant amount.
Below are websites that have links to organizations that receive money every time you click on them. This is a great way to do good while commuting on public transport, waiting on hold, or while listening to podcasts.
Note that you are usually only permitted to click each link once per day from your computer. Sign up for daily email reminders and watch your impact increase. Even at a penny a day, you make a difference, especially when your clicks are combined with those of thousands of other “clickers”.
Click-to-give is a great way for everyone, including children, to help people, animals, and the environment every day. Spread the word to your friends and family – this is not a deed you keep to yourself. There are plenty of opportunities for you to “give in private” (which is really an admonition about boasting, not sharing opportunities, being a role-model, and teaching).
Click to give opportunities
There are several click-to-give on-line sites. These are some of the easiest, most fun, and generous options.
The Greater Good Family of Sites
Greater Good began with the first click-to-give site, The Hunger Site, in 1999. Since then, visitors have contributed more than $60 million for charity through clicks, donations, do-good actions, and shopping. Over the past two decades, purchases from the site have allowed GG to pay more than $50 million to artisans in 25+ villages around the world for fairly traded crafted products.
GG Clicks-to-give and donations have funded Rescue Rebuild projects at animal shelters and rescues, books for children, mammograms, food and shelter for veterans and their pets, care packs for breast cancer patients, food for hungry children, diabetes and Alzheimer’s research, disaster relief, rain forest preservation, and more. For example, in 2019 clicks generated funding for
- 14, 401,202 pounds of pet food (28,802,404 bowls)
- protection for 9,333 acres of rainforest
- 68,595 meals for veterans
- 136,935 books for children in need.
Subscribe for daily email reminders from any Greater Good site. This will give you access to all the sites (as seen above). This link to the Animal Rescue Site will get you started.
Freekibble
Freekibble was created from the dream of 11-year old Mimi Ausland who believed that shelter dogs and cats needed “to be fed a good meal.” Since then, this click-to-donate site has provided 24 million meals and almost seven million scoops of kitty litter.
Food donations are generated when you answer multiple-choice questions. Litter donations are generated when you “scratch” the kitty.
Tab for a Cause
With Tab for a Cause, you raise money for charity every time you open a new tab in Chrome or Firefox. Each time you open a tab, you are taken to a tab page containing a photo, widgets, and a couple of banner ads. Each time you open a tab you are given a heart.
After you accumulate hearts (I aim for 50), you can choose from a selection of nonprofits to receive a donation. Currently, 30 percent of the revenue collected from the page is donated (the rest goes to admin salaries and expenses). I am not sure how much revenue is donated per click, but even if it is only a penny per click, that adds up over time. To date, almost $838 thousand dollars have been donated. The only expenditure of time you need to make is to set up your account and make your heart donations. Otherwise, there is no daily action required. Just open tabs as usual.
Free Rice
Founded in 2007, Free Rice is an ad-supported, free-to-play website and mobile application that allows players to donate rice to needy families by playing multiple-choice educational quiz games. For every correctly-answered question, 10 grains of rice are donated via the World Food Programme. To date, 202 billion grains have been donated. Depending on the size of the rice, a cup contains 5-10 thousand grains.
Players may answer as many questions as they like in a number of categories and difficulty levels. Login to track your progress. Categories include:
- English grammar and vocabulary
- Geography
- Language learning
- Math
- Humanities
- Science
AmazonSmile
When you shop on AmazonSmile, the AmazonSmile Foundation donates 0.5% of the purchase price of eligible products to the registered charitable organization of your choice. AmazonSmile has the same login, prime benefits, products, shopping features, and prices at Amazon.com. On eligible product pages, you will find the words “Eligible for AmazonSmile donation”.
To choose a charity to receive donations from your purchases, enter the URL smile.amazon.com in your browser. After arriving onsite, select an organization, then begin shopping. Your choice will stay the same every time you shop onsite unless you change it. That’s all you have to do.
Shop for your cause – click to donate
At Shop for your cause, you can choose from among 200+ charities to click-to-donate. Each click is worth two cents. First, choose a charity, then follow the directions to click two more times to generate the two cents. If you want to play the quiz game, choose a charity first. Each correct answer will generate three kibbles.
Once you donate 300 kibbles to your cause, the organization will be entered into the monthly drawing to win a $50 Amazon Gift Card. Each day you can be entered to win again.
If you want to raise cash for your cause, submit your request here. Then your followers and friends can click-to-donate to raise funds.
Contribute SurveyMonkey
After you sign up, you will occasionally be sent survey requests that fit your profile. Each time you complete a survey, your charity of choice will receive $0.50. There are dozens of charities to choose from. You also get to spin the wheel for additional prizes. I’ve yet to win one for my charity, but it’s still fun to spin.
Choose your favorite click-to-give sites and sites that generate donations at no cost to you. When you add your input to that of others, it adds up to a lot of money that helps non-profits fulfill their mission of helping people, animals, and the planet. Thank you.
Which free donation sites are your favorites?
My favorite is “Animal webaction”! https://www.animalwebaction.com/en/