Websites make donations easy – and free of charge

The ease of online giving has spawned several websites that share similar goals, but employ various methods to raise funds. In addition to the click sites, users can make donations by changing their Web-based e-mail accounts, switching their preferred search engine, or even joining an online networking group.

The level of success among charitable click sites does vary. Freedonation.com, for example, targets several issues, including cancer and homelessness. For every click, sponsors pay a few cents to sponsored organizations. One charity listed on Freedonation.com, Mothers Supporting Daughters with Breast Cancer, received no money this year or last year, says president Charmayne Dierker. "Not enough people have been clicking," she says.

Years ago, however, Ms. Dierker used to receive annual checks from the site. "In the early days, when the first check came to us, I nearly fainted," she says. "It was something like $600. As the years have gone by, it has waned, though."

The ease of giving on the Web may seem too good to be true, but Stein says, "My skepticism doesn't matter too much if all I have to do is click. If I were donating actual funds, I would want more information."

Back when she was in high school, Laurel Fantauzzo says she clicked on The Hunger Site every day. She, too, was suspicious of the site, but kept doing it "out of the lingering hope that practically doing nothing did something."

She doesn't habitually click now. But last year, Ms. Fantauzzo, a 20-something editorial assistant for Dell Magazines, went back to one of the sites and went the extra mile. She sponsored a family's food supply in central Africa through a cash donation. "What I suspect is that maybe they have this click thing as a psychological effort to make people feel accomplished," she says. "Like, they may think, 'Giving was so easy, I can give some more, and it will still be easy.' "

1. Use a different search engine: Charitycafe.com donates money to the World Wildlife Fund, Oxfam, and Greenpeace each time a user searches through its website. The site uses Ask Jeeves and Lycos to search the Internet. The two search engines fund the donations as payment for the Web traffic sent to their sites.

The site, which calls itself the world's first "search and donate free site," launched in October 2000.

2. Switch Web-based e-mail accounts: PlanetSave offers 25 MB of free e-mail space. Every time a user logs on to his e-mail account, PlanetSave sponsors donate money to "Friends of the Calakmul," a group that conserves the Selva Maya rain forest in Mexico.

3. Join a social networking site: New York University student Marek Grodzicki created a Facebook group pledging, "For every 1,000 people who join this group, I will donate $1 for Darfur." Though Mr. Grodzicki says he is "no millionaire by any means," as this story went to press the group had already garnered more than 453,000 members. He will tally up the numbers in January 2007, then make his donation. Other students have promised to match his pledge. Grodzicki's group has also inspired other students to begin similar groups on Facebook, pledging money for issues like breast cancer or global warming.

4. Buy a product: All of the CharityUSA sites have on-site stores, the profits of which go directly to charities. Rocker Bono just launched Product Red, in coordination with partners like Gap and Converse, to support the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis, and Malaria. Buy a shirt, some shoes or shades, and you'll be donating money.

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