In his article about aid to Haiti, Alexander Glück predicted that “Initiatives that aren’t engaged in Haiti will see a slump.” We have been discussing this question as well on our team, and analysing the impact at betterplace.org.
More donations for Haiti means more donations for other projects
What we’ve seen is actually that the opposite prognosis is the case! Compared to previous months, the numbers between the 15th and 26th of January 2010 show very clearly that many people who have donated to aid in Haiti have at the same time decided to donate to other projects at betterplace.org. Once they’re on our platform in the mood to help, they browse through other projects that may not have anything to do with emergency aid and click on the Donate button!
Apparently, engagement is not just a zero-sum-game. And that makes us happy!