Children in Need

Over £12.9m raised for BBC Children in Need appeal through SMS donations

Posted on by Andrea Putnam-Moorcroft

Mobile payment specialist Fonix has announced that it processed over £12.9m worth of text donations for this year’s BBC Children in Need fundraiser.

Fonix said that the £12.9m that its payment platform processed surpassed the 2016 total of £7.64m and contributed to an overall total of £50.1m raised for BBC Children in Need on the night of the 2017 Appeal show.

Across a number of campaigns such as the Countryfile Ramble and the Rickshaw Challenge, as well as through a specially created fundraising campaign on the night of the show (Friday 17 November), mobile donations were gathered using a choice of three charity donation price points: £5, £10 and £20.

Karen Bass, Chief Operating Officer at BBC Children in Need said:

“We’ve been delighted by the response to this year’s Appeal and are grateful to everyone who has helped raise this amazing sum to support disadvantaged children and young people across the UK.  We want to make it as straightforward as possible for our supporters to make a donation and our ongoing relationship with Fonix has enabled us to achieve this through text-to-donate.”

Rob Weisz, Chief Executive of Fonix commented:

“When it comes to donating to charity, SMS has proven itself to be an ever-growing donation channel. Our solid working relationship over the last 3 years has really focused upon increasing the money raised from mobile, whilst making it as easy as possible for consumers to donate to this fantastic cause.

“For this year’s campaign, text-to-donate was promoted throughout the whole night to cater to growing demand.”

Children in Need is the BBC’s UK corporate charity, which raises money for disadvantaged children and young people around the country.

 

BBC Children in Need’s vision is that every child in the UK has a safe, happy and secure childhood and the chance to reach their potential.  The charity will realise this vision by supporting, promoting and publicising work that addresses the challenges that children and young people face and work that builds their skills and resilience.

 

BBC Children in Need is currently supporting over 2,600 projects in communities across the UK that are helping children and young people facing a range of disadvantages such as living in poverty, being disabled or ill, or experiencing distress, neglect or trauma.

 

Further information about BBC Children in Need can be found at bbc.co.uk/Pudsey 

 

Fonix wins at Drum MOMA Awards

Posted on by Andrea Putnam-Moorcroft

 

 

 

 

Fonix have won at the Drum MOMA Awards, in the Not-For Profit/Charity Mobile Strategy/Campaign category.

In 2016, Fonix delivered a UK first by providing Children in Need with a £20 mobile text donation solution for their campaign.

To read the full story click HERE.

Charity Text Seminar a Success!

Posted on by Andrea Putnam-Moorcroft

Charity Text Donation Seminar a Success

AIME and PhonepayPlus jointly ran a free one day Charity Text Donation Seminar in London on Friday 19th February. This was well attended by many small charities who came to learn more about how to use text donations to improve their fundraising, make sure that their marketing campaigns are compliant, learn the importance of increasing donations by Gift Aid and to ensure the audit standards are good.

As well as regulatory updates from PhonepayPlus, there were highly informative presentations from Telefonica, OpenMarket, Instagiv, Cymba, Vir2, Open Fundraising, Fonix and BBC Children in Need.

With positive feedback from the attendees it has been suggested that this event is run on an annual basis to ensure the spread of the successful intelligence sharing. A link to the presentations for the day is here.

You can also read about the event on PhonepayPlus’ blog here.

Feedback from the day:

I attend the Charity Seminar last week and I just wanted to say thank you for such a well-organised, informative day. It was really useful and I hope there will be a similar seminar next year! Samaritans

Thank you for organising Friday. It felt like a good session, let’s do it again soon. Open Fundraising

Great event. Informative, relevant and enjoyable. Can’t ask for more! OpenMarket

Well done on organising such a great day. RSM2000

 This event was so informative and useful, and should definitely be an annual event! Parkinsons UK

BBC Children in Need breaks all time text-to-donate record with Fonix

Posted on by Andrea Putnam-Moorcroft

Mobile payments and messaging specialists Fonix’s payments platform processed more than £6.6 million in text donations for last year’s BBC Children in Need fundraiser.

Donations were gathered in combination with on-screen promotion in £5 and £10 amounts, across a number of BBC flagship shows and specially created fundraising campaigns including; The One Show – Rick Shaw Challenge, Countryfile – Ramble, One Big Night and the main campaign show itself which aired on the BBC on the 13th November.

This is the second year in a row that Fonix has provided the text donation mechanic for BBC Children in Need, surpassing the 2014 total and contributing to the record breaking £37 million raised (so far) in 2015.

Rob Weisz, CEO at Fonix says: “For Fonix, BBC Children in Need is one of the highlights of our working calendar.  Supporting such an amazing charity event with our platforms and processes is so rewarding and demonstrates the importance of text to donate mechanics in providing consumers with the means to make a simple, spontaneous donation.”

Karen Bass, Director of Operations and Finance, CIN adds: “The 2015 campaign has been a record breaker for us which we’re immensely proud of. Text to donate forms a fundamentally important part of our payment option mix.  We thank key partners like Fonix, Harvest Media Group and the Mobile Operators for their support in enabling us to raise such a fantastic amount.

BBC Children in Need break text donation record with Harvest Media UK and Fonix

Posted on by Andrea Putnam-Moorcroft

Fonix’s mobile billing and campaign management platforms provided audiences with the opportunity to donate and interact via mobile. The 2014 campaign delivered a record ‘on the night total’ for BBC Children in Need, with over £5m generated over text.

“We are delighted with the record breaking results” said Susan Johnston, Director of Operations and Finance, BBC Children in Need.  “We had a very collaborative relationship with Harvest and Fonix who embraced our desire to innovate and optimize both donation levels and gift aid conversion. Working collaboratively with suppliers in this fragmented mobile ecosystem is essential”

Data-driven CRM and mobile marketing mechanics allowed BBC Children in Need to provide consumers with a tailored experience, resulting in over a third of users declaring their eligibility for Gift Aid.

Rob Weisz, CEO of Fonix Mobile commented, “The 2014 Children in Need campaign was a huge success which we were delighted to be a part of.  We understand the importance of engaging donation mechanics with high conversion of gift aid declarations, something we continue to optimize. We worked on solutions that focused on specific objectives and were thrilled with the results achieved”.

Edward Boddington, CEO of Harvest added, “ Since we started working with BBC Children in Need in 2011, the charity has always strived to innovate.  Using mobile text short codes for charity telethons is a high growth area as it allows charities to keep 100% of whatever the donor texts, in this case £5 and £10 price points.”

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Fonix Mobile is the UK’s leading mobile messaging, mobile payments and interactive services business.   For more information, please email hello@fonix.com

Harvest Media is the UK’s leading provider of participation media services and is the preferred partner for many large media companies in the industry. For more information, please visit www.hmg.tv

The BBC Children in Need Appeal is a charity registered in England and Wales (802052) and Scotland (SC039557) whose aim is to make a positive change to the lives of disadvantaged children and young people across the UK. For further information about BBC Children in Need, please visit www.bbc.co.uk/Pudsey