CanadaHelps Says Thank You!

We wanted to say thank you.

And welcome. Welcome to the first of many CanadaHelps newsletters. We felt that an appropriate theme for our first community newsletter was: thanks. And thanks is due to all of you out there. From the people who support us and the organizations we serve through gifts of your hard-earned income — we are very grateful. For those of you who work in organizations who make a difference in your communities — be they local, national or global in scope and ambition. And for the way you have supported CanadaHelps, resulting in year over year growth of 100% for the past five years in our donation stream — we couldn't have done it without you.

We're particularly gratified here at CanadaHelps to be able to support smaller organizations with limited resources, and we plan to feature some of those organizations in our communications to you. You'll be receiving these newsletters every other month, with features on online giving and fundraising in Canada, charities and the work they're doing with the funds they've raised, events in the sector and interesting facts and information about online giving in Canada.

This is also the place to stay in touch with what is happening at CanadaHelps — and there's a lot happening. We'll be making some big announcements over the next few months, including the launch of a new website and new products and services. So stay tuned. And we hope you will spread the word and encourage others to join our mailing list.

This month, we've got the results of our recent donor and charity surveys. Thanks to all of your support, we achieved extremely high response rates. The surveys were conducted by email and sent to 4000 donors and 2500 charities. A 10% response rate was anticipated. 1228 donor surveys were completed and 1031 charity surveys, response rates of 30.7% and 41.2% respectively. Your feedback is invaluable and we are very grateful for your interest and commitment. As well, we spotlight a couple of donors who use CanadaHelps for their giving, and some upcoming events including the ePhilanthropy Training Tour.

We will always welcome your comments, feedback and editorial suggestions. You can contact us at info@CanadaHelps.org.

Sincerely,

Jason Côté
Executive Director

CanadaHelps Spring Survey Results

Thank you for giving us your time!

To the many individuals and charities who responded to our survey this spring, thank you! By learning more about giving habits and how charities receive donations currently, CanadaHelps can better understand and connect the two parties we service (donors and charities) to create an easy and fulfilling relationship for both. In addition to learning the (unsurprising!) result that Canadians eat a lot of Girl Guide cookies, we also learned that Canadians give generously at the office, help the homeless and, on occasion, drop a Loonie into fundraising boxes at the cash register. Some of the interesting findings from the survey and other statistics on giving in Canada include:

• Canadians contribute approximately $24 a month to office fundraising initiatives and $67 towards holiday charity campaigns over the course of a year. Given the chance, Canadians are also very likely to donate online with 31% of donors conducting more than half of their charitable giving through the Internet.
  
  
• 91% of charities have the technological capacity to collect donations online, however 79% of charities surveyed indicate that they are raising less than 10% of their revenues via the Internet. Some industries, including travel and music, are raising 25% of their revenues online.
  
  
• 5% of donors chose 'convenience' as their main reason for using CanadaHelps to make their online donations.
  
  
• 81% of donor respondents said that they were willing to also give directly to CanadaHelps because of their unique ability to donate to charities that are unable to accept donations online otherwise.

Donor Spotlight

Donors: Susan Ledingham and Douglas Earle

Toronto-based entrepreneurs Susan Ledingham and Douglas Earle have been using CanadaHelps to make their charity donations almost since the charity's launch. "We love using CanadaHelps because of the many features it offers," says Susan. "It's fast, efficient and practically paperless. Some of our favourite features on the site are:

• The number and spectrum of charities it lists. (We give to several charities and CanadaHelps lists all of Canada's 80,000 charities.)
  
  
• It makes record-keeping easy and issues near-instant tax receipts, which means we don't have to rummage through our cheque book to see when we gave, how much and to whom, then write something on a piece of paper and put it in an envelope and pay postage to send it, and repeat this for each charity on our list.
  
  
• It allows us to give anonymously - if we wish - which reduces the number of bulk mail requests we get from other charities.

CanadaHelps really helps us manage our donations. We have our favourite charities but we get annoyed when one donation is quickly followed up by an appeal for another. We realize how very fortunate we are to be able to make these donations but our resources are not unlimited. CanadaHelps enables us to see when and how often we are giving to each charity. The receipts are all available online in our profiles ("MyCanadaHelps"), so we don't have to dig too far when tax return time comes around.

We have recommended CanadaHelps to colleagues and friends and will certainly continue to do so."

News & Events

MyVolunteerPage.com
MyVolunteerPage.com is a website by Volunteer Energy, a national nonprofit organization that works to strengthen Canada's voluntary sector. CanadaHelps and Volunteer Energy are working together by linking opportunities to donate and volunteer into charities profiled at CanadaHelps.org and MyVolunteerPage.com. » To learn more

September and October 2006
The Nonprofit Internet Strategies ePhilanthropy Training Tour Presented by the ePhilanthropy Foundation, the eTour teaches you how to utilize the Internet to get individuals and major donors to send their support to your charitable organization. Sessions will be held in Toronto, Calgary, and Vancouver in September and October. » To learn more and register

Toronto, September 28, 2006
Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and the ICT Sector Canadian Business for Social Responsibility (CBSR), the Information Technology Association of Canada (ITAC), Electronics Product Stewardship Canada (EPSC), and Imagine Canada are hosting an introductory event on CSR issues and the ICT sector. If you are involved in a "company that cares", this conference is for you. » To learn more and register

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Connect With CanadaHelps

Between June 2005 and 2006, 34,000 donors donated $10 million to 3,700 charities through CanadaHelps. We consider that a good start.

CanadaHelps is the only online portal that provides access to all of Canada's 80,000 charities. From national organizations like national cancer charities to smaller groups like local animal shelters and soup kitchens, CanadaHelps reaches all Canadians who want to give and connects them with their charity of choice.

Help us keep you informed as we engage donors and enhance the fundraising potential for charities. Subscribe to the CanadaHelps newsletter and/or forward to a friend, colleague or charity who you think would benefit from the knowledge and experiences CanadaHelps gains each month from both donors and charities.