It’s a rare day indeed when I get another integral part of our team to tell me why he loves FundRazr – and he’s one of the talented people who built it!
So here’s Christian live from the PayPalX Innovate Conference. Broadscasting from our FundRazr Kiosk – no #14
Innovate 2009, SAN FRANCISCO – Nov. 3, 2009 – ConnectionPoint, launched its groundbreaking FundRazr Facebook application, built with PayPal X’s Adaptive Payments APIs, at TechCrunch 50 in September. Today they announced that FundRazr is one of the first applications to implement PayPal’s beta Adaptive Accounts APIs.
FundRazr allows anyone to quickly and easily collect fees and donations through a simple Facebook page. Customers can manage and collect membership fees, sell tickets and raise donations – all via Facebook with no need for technical skills or a merchant credit card account.
“By integrating PayPal’s new Adaptive Accounts APIs, we’re now able to provide a seamless sign up experience for our users,” said Daryl Hatton, CEO of ConnectionPoint. “Users never have to leave Facebook to quickly and easily set up a PayPal account, allowing them to carry on with making or receiving a fee or donation payment.”
ConnectionPoint has been working closely with PayPal as part of their exclusive closed beta program since July 2009. FundRazr provides unique functionality that harnesses the powerful sharing features of Facebook to help groups engage with members, supporters and donors. Unlike registration software or donation-based websites, the visitor stays within the group’s Facebook page and the administrator controls any videos, images or messages that the visitors experience.
“FundRazr is a great example of how developers can use PayPal X to do things that were simply not possible previously,” said Osama Bedier, PayPal’s vice president of Platform. “PayPal X makes it easy for developers to monetize their great ideas and we’re thrilled that ConnectionPoint is taking advantage of the new Adaptive Accounts beta APIs to improve the experience of their users on Facebook.”
Twitter: @FundRazr
1. Share Campaign
Yes it’s here! The easiest way to share your campaign to the rest of Facebook is now available. You’ll find the `Share’ button just above the video on the Campaign screen.
Simply by clicking on this you can publish a post to the live stream that says who you’re supporting and allows you to add a personal message.
This dramatically increases the visibility of your fundraising campaign as friends and supporters will see any interaction that any visitor has with your campaign.
When they click on the link on that shared post; they will be directed straight to your campaign URL.
Top tip: When you want to direct people to your campaign via email or any other method of communication, simply cut and past the URL in your browser that appears when you’re on your campaign screen.
2. Organization Data
When setting up a new organization you’ll notice there are new screens that give you more options and flexibility and require some extra information.This is because we’re in the process of bringing you the much asked for `Receipts’ option.
FundRazr Options Screen under Settings
Soon you’ll be able to provide receipts for any donation or fee payment. To make it easier for you, this organization data will be automatically transferred into the receipts created.
Appearance: You can now add an avatar to your Organization profile that will be displayed for your organization in your favourites box or when you’re accessing your organization(s) from FundRazr Navigator. (Your logo will still be used for anyone visiting your organization and at the top left of each FundRazr screen).
Location: You can now easily move your organization from one tab location to another. You may also unlink it from any tab and it’s still accessible to you.
Legal: Sounds a little scary but it’s really not. We just need your address details so that this can be added to the receipt you can choose to offer anyone who wants one for a payment they’ve made to your organization. This information is not accessible to anyone other than you, your administrators and whoever receives a receipt that you’ve authorized.
Accounts: Pretty much stays the same but if you want to create a new account from there we help you through that process with a big bad button directing you to set one up with PayPal. Easy as that.
Options: Our favorite part. Here you get to choose just what your organization can offer (see above image)
Quick Tip: All the new org set-up features can be accessed via the redesigned ‘Settings’ icon on the admin home screen.
3. Ticketing
Your feedback has shown us that you want the ability to be able to sell tickets through FundRazr. Whilst this was always part of our plan, we’re excited to bring you a simple yet easy option within the `Campaign’ function that allows you to ask for either donations or sell tickets.
This is just the start and we will be providing many more great features and tools over the coming months to make FundRazr an e-commerce platform for all your needs.
4. Communications
On the admin home screen you’ll notice a new ‘Communications’ icon. The feature isn’t operational yet, but stayed tuned for useful new options for communicating with your organization.
5. Numerous small enhancements and bug fixes
There’s been a lot of testing and bug fixing going on in the background that you likely won’t even notice, but each day there are small modifications and enhancements that are making FundRazr into the kickass application you see before you.
6. Notifications
Today Facebook have announced major changes to their platform around notifications for applications. We believe many of the changes will be of great benefit to FundRazr and therefore you as a user, including better access to and & interaction with your FundRazr organization(s).
Let us know what you think by commenting below, tweeting with us on @fundrazr or making a comment on our App Page
There are many who are trying to start a backlash against Facebook by claiming they no longer use it very much i.e. that the fad is over.
Fortunately for us, charts like the one below (supplied by Silicon Alley Insider) show this is not the case.
Time spent on Facebook continues to grow. This makes sense given the types of activities that people participate in on Facebook e.g. sharing information with friends. As the list of friends grows, the network effect kicks in and the system becomes more and more valuable to the user.
We believe bringing the value of FundRazr into people’s lives through their interest in Facebook is a great strategy for growing our business.
Posted in Social Media
So earlier this week we put out the following press release to prove it:
VANCOUVER, BC – October 20, 2009 – Following its Beta launch at TechCrunch 50 in September, FundRazr has received an overwhelming response from around the world and the first users are now raising real dollars.
“We’ve had a fantastic number of requests to access our exclusive FundRazr Closed Beta,” says Natalie Sisson, Cofounder and VP Marketing of ConnectionPoint Systems. “Every day I get emails from people visiting www.fundrazr.com that want to start using FundRazr for their teams, clubs and causes.”
Facebook has become North America’s dominant social network and creating a group page is both free and easy. Early adopters of FundRazr are now starting to use the social connectivity of Facebook to secure donations, collect fees and sell tickets.
Members of the closed beta include major universities needing to charge fees, political candidates wanting to engage with grassroots supporters through fundraising campaigns, and national nonprofits who have to improve their fundraising efforts to cope with the poor economy and recent funding cuts.
Early examples of FundRazr in use include:
Check out their campaign here and make a donation to the Women’s team while you’re at it!
“We totally believe that FundRazr can change the game of fundraising and payments in social networks by being the easiest way to collect money and manage members on Facebook,” said Daryl Hatton, CEO and President of ConnectionPoint Systems. To have people from all over the world validate that we have built a world class application, is such a humbling yet amazing feeling”.
FundRazr has been created in close partnership with PayPal, the global leader in online payment solutions with more than 153 million accounts worldwide. FundRazr is one of the first applications in the world to take advantage of PayPal’s new Adaptive Payments API for social commerce, to simplify its customers’ online payment experience. Being invited to be part of this beta program has allowed ConnectionPoint to use these new features in FundRazr prior to the official launch of PayPal X, which will take place at PayPal X Innovate developer conference on November 3-4, 2009 in San Francisco.
Yes that’s right we’re off to San Francisco for this very soon and next week we’ll be showcasing some great new features we’ve been working on for you.
Remember to email us to have your payments turned on too. A number of you people are using our application which is great but we want to hear from you when you’re ready to start receiving donations and payments.
It would prove really useful so that we could get twice as many of the great features out there that we’re building in, but there’s only so much we can get done in one day.
The great news FundRazr is off and running like bulls in the streets of Pamplona! We have over 160 closed beta codes out there now and over 60 people using our application but we want more! We also want more feedback as it’s hugely valuable to us.
We’re very excited to have customers with active organizations that can accept fee and donation payments now. Money is actually flowing through our system and we made a tiny bit of revenue! Remember to email us to be turned on to accept payments.
One campaign, set up just a few days go, has already raised over $250.
Jen’s family has been devastated by the storms in the Philippines, and this fund has been set up to support them. You show your support by visiting here.
The FundRazr team has built a fantastic new feature to make it much easier to access, navigate and manage the organization(s) you’ve set up.
We listened to the feedback from our testers and made some significant changes. Next week we’re releasing our FundRazr Navigator feature.
With one click on the FundRazr Navigator link you can see and access all of your FundRazr organizations and find out what has been happening since you last visited.
FundRazr Navigator is easily reached from these places:
1. At the bottom of the application
2. At the top of your Facebook profile favorites box
3. From your FundRazr application bookmark
4. From the application menu bar at the bottom left corner of Facebook
What does FundRazr Navigator do?
When you click on the FundRazr Navigator link you are directed to a summary page. Here you can see the most recent activity for your organization(s) such as membership invites to another organization, donations made to a campaign and fees you may owe.
The `My Organizations’ tab is where you can see and access any organization you are an administrator, member or supporter of.
We’re excited about this new feature and hope you are too.
Stay tuned for more updates on FundRazr!
Posted in Facebook Application Launch, New feature
Long hours, Facebook issues, Telus network disruptions and more coffee. On the positive side the response post TechCrunch50 has been awesome and we’ve received even more press including the front page of the bible we read diligently – Inside Facebook.
It’s hard to explain how it feels when the email delivered to my inbox daily, that I read to get the latest news, suddenly features us as as the news!
After that article was published we got a flurry of beta code requests which has kept everyone busy. I also think that Matt Holliday who wrote the article did a better job than me at summarising what we do!
“At the heart of the application, FundRazr allows any individual or organization to easily collect online payments. But there are several built-in features that expand this application functionality beyond money collection; analytic and reporting tools give users the ability to track results, and there’s even help when creating a campaign. The application can be tailored to take on unique appearances and functions, as it is designed for social sites and has no set template.
FundRazr is intended for easy money collection for a variety of purposes, such as charity events, sports teams, school clubs, social groups and more. It’s interactive, social focus makes it an excellent way to spread word of causes and campaigns through Facebook, getting out a viral message with a built-in method for collecting donations and payments.
The application is available now in Beta on Facebook; all that’s needed to sign up is a free access code. It should be beneficial to smaller businesses non-profits, school and church groups and anyone operating on a fixed budget without the funds or time to track down donations and payments.”
We’re super excited about the range of people asking to start using FundRazr from all over the world. The unique needs that they have are helping us see just how many different needs FundRazr can be a solution for. Even some we hadn’t yet considered like fraternities and collecting tenancy fees! The response from Europe has been really surprising too and we can’t wait to offer payments in international currencies and different language versions of our application.
We’re staggering giving out access codes to FundRazr so we can ensure we are fully supporting our Closed Beta Customers, so if you’re reading this and wondering where it is – don’t worry it’s on its way!
Finally, Daryl has been making movie history with his onscreen presence – yes another YouTube video which you can view below. This one was taken by the folks at PayPal in the TC50 demopit. Enjoy
