Crowd funding, which draws its inspiration from crowd sourcing, is gaining popularity in the non-profit sector as a way to raise money. Just like crowd sourcing, crowd funding uses media (usually the internet) to encourage a network of people to pool their money together to support a cause.
While it remains to be seen if crowd funding will replace traditional fundraising efforts, right now it is viewed as a low-key yet, powerful way to raise funds, a way to turn supporters into fundraisers. Several companies provide crowd funding platforms including Causes, Nadanu, and GoFundMe and CauseVox. CauseVox, the newest crowd-funding platform to enter the ring is a SaaS platform that helps non-profits launch a customized, branded site on their own domain. In no time, at all they can begin accepting donations.
CauseVox gives the non-profit all the tools they need to design a fully branded page, without having to know any code. For those non-profits without a tech savvy staff member or volunteer, it is simple to upload a logo, change the color scheme and presto the site is ready to go. Alternatively, for non-profits with slightly more technical skills CauseVox allows them to customize their site. By using CauseVox, mark up language (much like wordpress) users can create a custom layout and design. Changing content on CauseVox is also relatively easy, by simply cutting and pasting links users can embed YouTube/Vimeo videos and Flickr slideshows.
CauseVox also give non-profits the ability to customize their URL for more brand recognition. With CauseVox, once a non-profit’s site is up, supporters of the non profit can create fundraising pages of their own and invite their friends/family (the crowd) to support and donate to the non-profit. http://www.causevox.com/
