​Donate Now button set to become a massive fundraising tool for charities

UK charities have been handed a massive fundraising boost after Facebook enabled a “donate now” button for both pages and adverts.

The social media giant made the announcement following trials with selected charities in the US, including the ALS Association which was behind the worldwide fundraising phenomenon - the ice bucket challenge.

It will function in the same way as Facebook’s call-to-action buttons which were introduced for for Brand Pages in December last year.

These buttons include “Book Now,” “Shop Now” and “Contact Us” buttons, and appear right alongside the like button at the top of a Page and are designed to drive an organisation’s supporters to take further action beyond liking a page.

All these buttons link to an external page, set by the charity, with a disclaimer from Facebook saying the social media site has no responsibility for third party sites.

The donate now button will be the exact same - redirecting to the donation page on the charity’s official site.

A spokesperson for Facebook said: “Every day, people use Facebook to raise awareness and support for causes they care about and to motivate others to do the same.

“We're inspired by how much good comes from these connections, so we've added 'Donate Now' calls-to-action on pages and link ads to make those connections easier than ever."

Charities should visit Facebook for Business for further information.