Taking donations via a website was once seen as a function exclusively for charities. But nowadays it is quite common to see informational and community websites allowing their readers and fans to donate – in order to help keep the service running. I’ve spent some time looking at the various donation options out there and I am going to talk you through some of the best options here.
1. Paypal
Paypal allows you to embed payment buttons directly into your website. It is simple to do and because Paypal is so widely used, users feel happy that it is a secure way of sending a donation. This is a simple solution if you want to take one-off donations.
2. GiveWP
If you are looking for a donations platform that will allow one-off donations, recurring donations, customisable donation forms and donor management & reporting, GiveWP is a best-in-class donations plugin for WordPress.
While GiveWP works with PayPal, this solution is able to keep donors on your website while they give. Plus, you get a full donation form and fundraising tools that PayPal doesn’t provide.
GiveWP.com
The free version will get you started, allowing you to take one-off donations via a customisable form. The free version also allows you to display the donations received on your website (anonymously or by name).
If you would like to accept recurring donations and some of the other advanced featured, you will need the Pro license at $499 per year. This is therefore for more serious fundraisers. This license includes ‘peer-to-peer’ fundraising, allowing your supporters to raise money on your behalf. Great for charities and not-for-profits or even for crowdfunding projects.
3. Ninja Forms
Most of the leading Forms plugins for WordPress can be used to accept donations too. I particularly like Ninja Forms for novice wordpress users, because it is very simple to use. While Ninja Forms is free, you would need either the Paypal or Stripe add-on (both currently $49 per year). Beginners might also want to purchase the Basic subscription in addition, because that includes the improved form builder and multi-steps forms.
4. WPForms
This is another very popular Forms plugin that can also be used to take payments/donations. WPForms is popular because of it’s easy drag-and-drop form builder, which may be easier for beginners to use. While the payment add-ons are at a higher price point than the Ninja Forms equivalent, you get a lot of extra functionality with the Pro subscription, so depending on which add-ons you need, it may work out better value.
5. DonorBox
DonorBox is a fully-fledged donation platform, similar to GiveWP. Unlike GiveWP (which has a fixed yearly fee), the pricing model is based on a percentage fee. This means that if you are starting out or don’t raise large amounts, this might work out cheaper. Plus, the forms allows donors to choose to cover the fees themselves, which is a nice touch.
DonorBox is a good choice if you don’t have a website, as you will be given a unique url for your fundraising campaign. This makes it very simple to use for all sorts of fundraising or crowdfunding needs. You will be set up and ready to start accepting donations within 15 minutes.
6. YITH Donations for WooCommerce
If you are already using WooCommerce, it’s worth looking at this add-on from renowned company YITH. It allows you to add donation options to your products/services, to the cart page or to create separate donation forms. It supports fixed donation amounts as well as variable. At €79.99 per year, it’s a reasonably priced option too. If you want to allow recurring donations, you will also need the subscription plugin.
