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May 28, 2009, 08:52 AM ET
A Search Engine Could Help Colleges Earn Money
As gifts to colleges are beginning to dwindle every penny that can be collected counts.
That’s the belief behind GoodSearch and its sister site, GoodShop, founded by real-life siblings JJ and Ken Ramberg. The sites, powered by Yahoo, will donate money to nonprofit organizations, including colleges, sororities, schools, sports teams, and charities, each time consumers search or shop. More than 80,000 organizations are listed on the GoodSearch site, and users can nominate new ones.
Both sites track and direct their advertising revenue based on the number of searches and purchases made on behalf of each organization. From GoodSearch, users can search the Internet for sites, images, maps, or videos, earning about a penny for their chosen organization each time they do. On the GoodShop site, users can shop at any of the 1,000 vendors who sponsor the site and have up to 7 percent of the price of each purchase allocated to their charity of choice.
“Particularly right now when there’s just not a lot of money in people’s pockets to be spending for donations, this is a really easy way to give without spending extra money,” JJ Ramberg said.
Delaware Technical and Community College has used GoodSearch since September 2007, said Barbara Ridgely, the college’s associate vice president for institutional advancement. By making the search engine the home page of campus computers, the college has raised $6,664 for its library. The college hopes to raise $2,000 to $3,000 per year, a goal it has met each of the past two years.
“This is just one of several of our fundraisers for the library, but It’s not difficult, and because so much of the online searching goes on in the library, it’s a good match,” she said. – Erica R. Hendry
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