Facebook Popular With 98.2% Of Hospice Fundraisers

Facebook is now the most popular social media hub among hospice fundraisers in the UK, used by 98.2% of them to promote their activities and attract donations, software consultancy and developer The Access Group has found.

The research, which builds on Access’ first survey on the matter in 2011, reflects the views of fundraisers that attended the recent Help The Hospices Care event. The study further reveals that as a whole, social media use is gaining in importance to hospice fundraisers, given the relatively higher rates of adoption compared to 2011.

Two years ago, Facebook was used by all fundraisers who took part in the survey, which is 1.8 percentage points more than in 2013. The slight drop could be explained with fundraisers’ growing use of other channels such as Twitter, where an impressive 94.5% of them have created profiles, compared to 88% in 2011. The use of YouTube has also increased significantly, and the channel is now deployed by 50.9% of fundraisers, up from 40.3% two years ago.

The fourth most popular social media platform among hospice fundraisers is Flickr, used by 20% of respondents.

On average, hospice fundraisers have 2,642 “friends” on Facebook, nearly double the number recorded in 2011, when the figure stood at 1,334. On Twitter, fundraisers are followed by an average of 2,173 users, compared to just 534 two years earlier.

Around 96% of fundraisers also say they have added an option to their website allowing people to make one-off donations. Another 76% give supporters the opportunity to set up a regular gift through their website.