Giving Assistant: An Online Shopping Rewards Platform Where Everyone Wins

Dreamscape Foundation interviews Isabel Figueredo, Head of Charity Advocacy at Giving Assistant in order to understand how this shopping rewards platform works and what the benefits are for its users.
Date Posted: August 10, 2018
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Dreamscape Foundation interviews Isabel Figueredo, Head of Charity Advocacy at Giving Assistant in order to understand how this online shopping rewards platform works and what the benefits are for its users. Recently, Dreamscape Foundation wrote a blog about how you can use Giving Assistant to help us bridge the accessibility gap for individuals with disabilities. It’s an online shopping rewards platform that almost sounds too good to be true. You save money as you shop by receiving cash back at thousands of major online brands which you can then pocket, donate, or both! But how is that possible? How exactly does Giving Assistant work? Our curiosity led to us getting the scoop from Isabel Figueredo, Head of Charity Advocacy at Giving Assistant. Responsible for overseeing their free platform and their relationships with the nonprofits who benefit, she gave us insight into how this awesome platform works in a way where everybody wins.

With a plethora of competing discount tools, how does Giving Assistant rise above its competition?

Isabel Figueredo: Giving Assistant offers cash back opportunities with over 4,000 stores, including The Home Depot, Macy’s, Nike—you name it. We also offer monthly double cash back events. Shoppers can select to give their earnings to any 501c3 nonprofit of their choosing. They can donate as much or as little of their cash back as they like and have the ability to update that amount whenever they choose. Lastly, shoppers can change their nonprofit of choice at any time, so if you’re passionate or involved with multiple nonprofits, you have the ability to support them all with Giving Assistant.

Do you have a favorite success story through Giving Assistant?

IF: Yes, absolutely! It’s hard to pick. Overall, I love every nonprofit’s success story on our platform. I highly recommend reading some of them on our blog when you have the time. With that said, if I had to highlight one, I would highlight Pencils of Promise’s success story with Giving Assistant. Pencils of Promise, also known as PoP, is a nonprofit that believes every child should have access to quality education. They work with communities across the globe to create schools and programs that provide educational opportunities for children, no matter where they were born or what resources they have. They have built over 460 schools and are providing education to over 88,000 students. But what’s incredible about that is Giving Assistant shoppers have donated close to $56,000 to date, sending over 740 students to school through PoP by simply shopping online! Watching a small, everyday action like shopping online contribute to something bigger, like making this world a better place, is my job’s biggest reward. PoP’s success on our platform reminds me of that.

How does Giving Assistant work exactly?

IF: Giving Assistant is a Certified B Corp and shopping rewards platform that makes it easy for shoppers to both save money and also give back for free. How we work is we have millions of users who can shop at over 4,000 of those biggest online brands that I had mentioned before—The Home Depot, Macy’s, Nike, etc. Those shoppers are able to earn cash back on their purchases, which is essentially the commission Giving Assistant receives from the brand for originating that purchase. Shoppers are then able to keep or donate as much or as little of their cash back to a nonprofit of their choosing.

When deciding whether to donate to charity or to keep their savings, how do users typically use your platform?

IF: It entirely depends on the user. I think the beauty of our platform is that users have the flexibility to do both and are able to change their preferences at any time. For example, our shoppers love to know during the holiday season they can give back a bit more, but that they have the option to dial back if they need to once the new year begins. Our shoppers can donate to over 1.2 million nonprofits on our platform and they’ve raised over 4.4 million dollars in donations to date. We want them to have that opportunity to select what they’re willing to give so that they have that empowerment.

There are a lot of popular retailers on your list. Will you be adding more online retailers in the future?

IF: We introduce new, trending stores into our Giving Assistant platform weekly. Some weeks we add one to two stores where other weeks we add a dozen more. The easiest way to know which stores we’ve added is to check out our website or to download the Giving Assistant button [on your browser] and immediately be notified if you’re able to earn cash back from the retailer’s page you’re on.

What’s the easiest way to get the button for browsers?

IF: If you go to GivingAssistant.org/button, it’s an entire page on our website that specifies what the browser button is and offers a one-time download for it as well.

What are your hopes for the future of Giving Assistant?

IF: That’s a great question! What I would say is we believe everyone from all walks of life deserves the reward of regular, long-term involvement with the charitable causes they love, value, and depend on. Online shopping rewards platforms have never made it easy enough to support nonprofits with their shopping, resulting in nonprofits losing out on billions of dollars in recurring donations every year. My hope, and our hope, is to see Giving Assistant become the solution to that by being the best online shopping rewards platform where shoppers can donate to any nonprofit for free just by clicking the checkout button.

What can nonprofits like Dreamscape Foundation do to promote their Giving Assistant partnership?

IF: Our nonprofits’ proven, main tactic for raising more donations is displaying their custom Giving Assistant fundraising page link, banner, or icon on their organization’s website. Nonprofits can also share the URL to their Giving Assistant fundraising page on social media, emails, blogs, newsletters, and even in email signatures. You know your audience best, and we want to provide tools that can help you communicate how to use Giving Assistant to your supporters in both future and current campaigns at little to no extra time. To take advantage of our free fundraising marketing tools, nonprofits should sign into their free, Giving Assistant fundraising dashboard. Once on the dashboard, you can click “Fundraising Tools” on the left-hand menu to explore all the pre-populated marketing collateral and communications available. We also have our communications team on standby in case you want something even more customized. Also, keep in mind that we offer a Double Cash Back, Double Giving Event monthly. Double cash back equals double donations for your nonprofit, so really take advantage and let your supporters know when those events are occurring—especially during the holiday season when we focus on specific events like Giving Tuesday! If you ever need more materials or have a question about best practices, our Nonprofit Partnerships Team is available and ready to help.  Feel free to reach out to us and we can make sure that you’re supported in your initiative every step of the way.

Outside of nonprofit initiatives, how can users stay in the loop about opportunities to get the most cash back through Giving Assistant’s online shopping rewards platform?

IF: They receive an email for every single event that we’re hosting. It will also be on our social media, but the main source is through email.

Is there any advice you would like to give to the Dreamscape community?

IF: Absolutely try Giving Assistant. Try our browser button and make a difference in your everyday shopping simply by checking out and giving to the nonprofit of your choosing.
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    Dena

    Sounds interesting I am disabled and willing to help others but I am also conscientious about the causes I give to. Is this giving platform non-politically aligned because I don’t want to find out otherwise in the middle of doing this.