Giving Compass' Take:

• Ben Paynter explains that social media photo-sharing platform, Instagram, lets users broadcast tap-to-donate stickers on their stories, making it easy and accessible for Instagram users to participate in charitable giving. 

• This is one example of how tech companies can make giving more accessible. Philanthropists can encourage the development of technologies like this to increase overall giving. 

• Read about how social media contributes to driving social change.

Stories are Instagram’s customizable, Snapchat-like photo and short video-sharing feature. It allows users to post dispatches that evaporate within 24 hours. This drives plenty of repeat viewership by playing directly on the fear of missing something important. But for people who wanted to use that engagement for a cause, the system was poorly designed. You either had to direct viewers to a clickable link in your bio, or verified nonprofits could ask viewers to swipe through to their own donation hubs or Facebook fundraisers. But both options directed givers outside the app. With a new design for how it handles giving, Instagram is moving to control those donations, too.

The new fix is a “donation sticker” that works like an internal tap-to-donate button.

Any U.S. nonprofit can sign up to join the database, as long as they’ve signed up to accept donations on Facebook, and their Facebook is connected to their Instagram account. Many organizations, including Black Girls Code, No Kid Hungry, and ASPCA have already done so. Each organization could then obviously apply their own donation sticker to their own subsequent stories, something that’s already being tried by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, the Malala Fund, GLAAD, and the American Cancer Society.

On the donation side, viewers who tap to contribute will trigger a pop-up containing a short bio of the charity alongside different dollar amounts. Need more information? Okay, you can also click through to the group’s Instagram page. After one-time payment registration, donors can choose to give between $5 and $2,500 per transaction.

Convincing people to spend more through Instagram is a growing trend. In March 2019, the company allowed several major brands to start using a click-to-buy option for some products on its traditional photo feed.

Read the full article about Instagram helps advance charitable giving by Ben Paynter at Fast Company.