Facebook Fundraisers has now been expanded in eligibility to include anybody in the United States over the age of 18, and has also gained two new categories; Community, and Sports. The two new categories bring the total number of available categories up to eight. The sports category covers things like events, equipment, competitions, and team fees. This allows people to raise funds for school sports events, and local teams. Likewise, paying sports dues for a student, helping the school team get to State competitions, and paying entry fees for individual sporting events like marathons. The community category is a bit wider in scope, covering any improvements to the local environment and community, as well as neighborhood services. Such things as building a mailbox library, funding the local fire department, and even helping out local environmental efforts, like pollution cleanup.
The two new categories and the new eligibility expansion don’t change much of how the service works, at its core. Facebook’s total take is still 5-percent, nonprofit organizations and other entities raising funds still need to be verified before they can start posting fundraisers, and any and all fundraisers, whether created by an individual or an organization, will have to be individually reviewed and vetted by Facebook before they can go public. The service is still in its infancy and users can expect a few hitches or occasional delays in the process. Users obviously still cannot post any fundraisers that don’t fall into the categories listed by Facebook, though more categories will reportedly be coming in the future.
Facebook Fundraisers first rolled out back in March, but with fairly limited scope and eligibility. The tool can tie into Facebook Live video feeds via a donate button, and a user can leverage their entire Facebook network to spread the fundraiser. While a fundraiser on GoFundMe or Indiegogo, for example, could be shared across Facebook, hosting the fundraiser directly on Facebook allows full integration with the platform, and allows Facebook to control what sorts of fundraisers are being donated to and spread around its network. Reviewing and vetting of fundraisers also makes donors more confident, increasing potential donations.