Charitable platform HopeMob has been relaunched and now offers the possibility to raise money for several issues or causes at the same time. In the past, the platform allowed raising money for a single cause. Moreover, HopeMob is now absolutely free for those using it. The fees involved by donation processing will be 100% supported by the platform.
In addition to these new elements, HopeMob becomes the first platform to allow multiple methods of payment, including PayPal, Dwolla, debit/credit card and more. According to information on Twitter, HopeMob is currently in a public BETA stage until January 8th. They are adding/removing & testing dozens of features until then.
The platform “offers optional support for people in need to help write & publish their stories in the best way,” and, most importantly, they “will be the only platform to offer an optional verification feature to fully verify the authenticity of each story told on our platform.”
The concept behind HopeMob is to “bring caring strangers together to create sudden, yet organized relief and hope all over the world.” Using the social energy of regular flash mobs, they seek to transfer it in the online environment and raise money for the causes/needs posted online. The community has over 500,000 “generous strangers” for the moment.
“We designed HopeMob originally with people in need in mind. Our goal was to just tell one story at a time, help one person at a time,” said HopeMob founder Shaun King. “That idea was really compassionate and it worked, but it created a logjam that we just didn’t foresee. Within a few months, we had thousands of stories in our queue waiting to be told. It was a real bottleneck.”
HopeMob will raise the money needed for the processing costs through an optional donation at checkout. They will also try to raise money through foundations and corporate partners.
“PayPal and Dwolla have worked with us to get the fees as little as humanly possible and we’ll just eat that cost ourselves,” King added.
There are many people in need and many causes launched regularly. A platform that brings them all together, that offers the possibility to review them, to have them prove their authenticity and that allows those interested to donate money for the stories they empathize with the most is indeed a good initiative. Going no-fee and allowing more topics to be posted at the same time is also a good strategy. With the right publicity this could really help many of those in need.
About Violeta-Loredana Pascal
