TLDR: the website is here: whowillmatchmydonation.com

Your dollars are precious. And when you make a donation, we bet you want your donation to go the farthest, leave the biggest impact, and make the most difference.

The best way to do that, whether you’ve got $5 to give or $500, is to make your donation to an organization when it is hosting a matching campaign.

The challenge is, these campaigns are fleeting, short-lived, and hard to find out about. They’re not advertised on organizations’ websites and only get announced on social media and via email blasts. Plus, even if you are totally engaged with your fave nonprofits, chances are you’ll never learn about matching campaigns from other, new nonprofits that support causes you’re passionate about.

So, if you’re anything like us — yeah, we admit that we have few dollars to donate AND don’t follow even our fave nonprofits on social AND almost always click unsubscribe when we get too many emails— it is hard to maximize our donations because we never know when a nonprofit has a matching campaign.

That’s why we built whowillmatchmydonation.com. We think you’ll like it if you:

• Are in the market for making a donation to a nonprofit organization.
• Want to do more with less and double your impact.
• Are cool with discovering and supporting new nonprofits.

What is a donation match?

These are kind of like that memory game you played as a child, but instead of having to find a match or remember where one is on your own, the nonprofit you’re donating to already has it!

A matching campaign is when a nonprofit receives a very large pledge from an individual, group, or foundation on the condition that the nonprofit raises their own funds. The individual, group, or foundation, will then match, dollar-for-dollar, the total amount of smaller donations that the organization solicited. These matching campaigns usually have a limited timeframe and can last anywhere from 24 hours to 4 weeks in length.

How do you know if an organization is running a matching campaign?

That’s the tricky part. It’s hard to know when nonprofits and organizations are running a matching campaign. They’re NOT typically announced on websites, and usually are shared on social media or via email blasts. This makes it hard to find, especially if you don’t follow all your fave nonprofits on Instagram or Twitter, or if you’re like us and you hate getting all those fundraising emails.

Right now, your best bet is to check whowillmatchmydonation.com and see which organizations are currently tweeting about any current matching campaigns.

Who does the matching?

Good question because it sure isn’t us. It’s the people with the big bucks. What we really mean is that matching pledges can come from an individual, a group, or a foundation. Sometimes they come from a nonprofit’s Board of Directors, and commonly come from an outside foundation that wants to help a nonprofit leverage their donors to give give more.

How much of my gift will be matched?

All matching campaigns have a predetermined match ratio that is always announced along with the matching campaign. Usually this ratio is 1:1, meaning for every dollar you give, the larger donor will match your gift dollar for dollar. $10 becomes $20, and $100 becomes $200.

However, sometimes the match ratio is less than or greater than 1, in which case you will want to channel your inner middle school math teacher because the match gets slightly more complicated.

Less common, the matching pledge may be 50%. In this case, for every dollar you donate, the larger donor will give an additional 50 cents, so your $10 gift turns into $15).

An even better deal is when you can find a matching campaign at 200%. This means the pledging donor will donate TWICE as much as you do, so your $10 donation becomes $30, and your $100 turns into $300.

How long do matching campaigns last?

Sometimes they’re 24 hours long, and sometimes they’re a whole season. There is no set time and it depends on the agreement made between the pledging donor and the nonprofit. Most matching campaigns will almost always include the matching ratio AND the allotted time frame, so check the tweet for more details, or email the nonprofit directly.

A word to the wise: matching campaigns don’t last long and you may miss your window to double your impact. So, if you see an organization listed on whowillmatchmydonation.com, don’t wait to make your donation because you may miss that ever-elusive match window.

Is a matching campaign the same as an employee/corporate matching gift program?

Not quite, but close. Corporate matching programs allow employees to donate to a nonprofit of their choice, and the employer will then donate money to the same nonprofit at a determined match ratio (usually 1:1). Those programs are only for employees of a given company and are not available to the general public.

Further, don’t confuse any of this matching with employer matching programs that have to do with employees’ 401k and plans and retirement options.

Check with your HR department to see if your workplace offers a corporate matching program.

What we on whowillmatchmydonation.com are interested in are the matching gifts that large donors/groups/foundations pledge directly to nonprofits, that get gifted only once that nonprofit raises a specified quantity of funds. The goal of whowillmatchmydonation.com is to help you double your impact by finding nonprofits that are running matching campaigns so that those with the big bucks can double your donation.