Today, Facebook for Business announced in a post that it has added “Donate Now” as a call-to-action button available for Brand Pages. These buttons can now appear right on a Facebook Brand Page, or directly within an ad on the site.
“Now, it’s easier than ever for nonprofits to connect with people who care about their causes and encourage them to contribute through the website of their choice.”
Facebook introduced the call-to-action button for Brand Pages in December of last year, which are designed to drive a company’s many fans to take further action beyond Liking a page. These buttons include “Book Now,” “Shop Now” and “Contact Us” buttons, and appear right alongside the Like Button at the top of a Page.
This button also seems like a more permanent iteration of the one found when Facebook rallied users to donate to the Nepal earthquake in April of this year. Facebook offered a pop-up to a blog post that had a “Donate” button, and offered to match up to $2 million. In total, the company says that Facebook users raised more than $17 million to help rescue and rebuilding efforts.
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These buttons generally link to an off-site page, so nothing is actually done within Facebook proper. This extends to donations — the “Donate Now” button available on the ALS Association Facebook Page (of Ice Bucket Challenge fame) simply redirects to the donation page on the company’s official site, with a referrer tag in the URL.
Facebook also places a disclaimer on that button, advising its users that the donations aren’t affiliated with Facebook.
This new addition is a boon for charities who are looking to use engagement to drum up donations and capitalize on viral moments, as the ALS Association did last year.
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