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Pros
My overall experience with Give Lively has been positive, and it has fulfilled my basic online giving platform needs.
I love the text to give an option that is customizable and tied into a campaign and the ability to have multiple campaigns is awesome.
I recommend Give Lively to every nonprofit that I am in touch with. You can’t beat the ability to useful and powerful features at no cost.
Cons
Does that mean I am to expect it not to work. The tech support is horrible.
If you are a faith-based organization your application will be denied. When I inquired why they denied my application, this was their response.
Some may not wish for this to be public, and once posted there is no way to reverse the visibility.
Most Recent Video User Review for Give Lively
SEE ALL VIDEO REVIEWSGive Lively Review: Free Donation Software for Non-Profits!
Svetlana I.
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Showing 11 of 11 reviews
"This is the best free fundraising software"
Overall: I love the text to give an option that is customizable and tied into a campaign and the ability to have multiple campaigns is awesome.
Pros: When I found out about this, I didn't actually believe it was free. It's pretty great to not have to pay a monthly or annual fee for a fundraising product where you can text to give and support a peer to peer fundraiser.
Cons: There are a few add ons that I think would be helpful, like a CRM integration or the ability to message out from this platform. The offerings are basic but FREE so I'm really not complaining.
"Give Lively is great, highly recommend"
Overall: I continue to use Give Lively and continue to have a good experience with their products
Pros: Love the low cost and ease of use. It integrates well with our websites.
Cons: More customization and automatic donor matchs for companies would be great.
"Free is not always free."
Overall: My biggest issue is the tech support. there was no way to find support once you are logged in. you have to go to the main page not logged in to see the chat option. I did this two different times and both times the response was the same. "I will have to send this onto an engineer" at one point I was told that "this was a fee product". Does that mean I am to expect it not to work? The tech support is horrible.
Pros: At first glance it does many of the things that the other commentators do. It is easy to set up things on a basic level.
Cons: The Events and live display is not worth wasting time on. in an event setting the text to donate makes it hard for a donor to give more than once. Although there is a check bo for saving the cc info it did not work. on top of that the Apple Pay froze on the computer and did not even show up on my phone. there is now way to just guest lists once someone has purchased a ticket, its just a stoic spread sheet. All in all the events module is not worth the effort.
"Fundraising Guru"
Overall: My overall experience with Give Lively has been positive, and it has fulfilled my basic online giving platform needs.
Pros: The platform is super easy to use and set up. It makes your giving page look professional and user-friendly.
Cons: Some features are not customizable. Not all donor data is collected on every transaction due to the payment options some donors select.
"Give Lively"
Overall: Love Give Lively! Would definitely recommend this for non-profits who are trying to fund raise.
Pros: Love this donation software. It's perfect for our small non-profit. It's great that they take only a small percentage of our donations and don't charge huge yearly fees. The donation campaigns you can design with this software look great and it's easy to connect to our website!
Cons: There's really nothing bad about this software from our perspective. Does what we need for a small non-profit and doesn't cost a ton.
Vendor Response
"Absolutely Free Fundraising!"
Overall: Originally, we had a PayPal donation page and some manual ACH monthly donors. There was no opportunity to promote our organization, and it seemed unprofessional. Donors were reluctant to go through the PayPal account process, and it was complicated to get the money into the bank. Give Lively allowed our growing organization to have a world-class donation platform, and focus on providing services instead of collecting money.
Pros: Zero cost, except the 2.2% Stripe takes. Great phone/email support and account managers that really are dedicated to your non-profit's success. Simple, but has a wide range of features. Embedded donation widgets are amazing, and the event software can handle complex ticketing structures. Live donation projection with text to donate number is something we would love to explore, and seems great.
Cons: Sometimes there is a lack of customization and flexibility. They are making some useful improvements, but I wish you could remove the peer to peer and donate in honor buttons. Those have a lot of potential, but are too complex for a simple campaign.
"Good for free but could be improved in certain ways"
Overall: Overall it was good and would recommend for smaller nonprofits or nonprofits needing a quick fix to get them out of rudimentary CRMs.
Pros: It was free and easy to deploy on our sites. People were able to make pages and we were able to put forms on our sites.
Cons: I did not like that it was a bit difficult to run reports and the integration for our walk could have been a little smoother allowing for more people to have access to their team information.
"Every Non-Profit Should Consider Give Lively"
Overall: I recommend Give Lively to every nonprofit that I am in touch with. You can’t beat the ability to useful and powerful features at no cost.
Pros: Give Lively has so many useful tools, including text-to-donate, peer-to-peer fundraising, and event ticketing. Their impact story campaign template is awesome. Support is incredible and they even respond on weekends! It’s incredible that all their fundraising technology is available for free for qualifying non-profits.
Cons: Give Lively lacks Double-the-Donation integration, but they are working on it. Also, they don’t offer CNAME functionality, which is something other donation platforms offer.
"Faith Based Organizations Beware"
Overall: If you are a faith-based organization your application will be denied. When I inquired why they denied my application, this was their response. "Hi there, Thank you for submitting an application to become a Give Lively Member. Unfortunately, we have decided not to move forward with membership at this time. We believe your organization does not align with our Value Statements, as described in our Terms of Use. We understand there are differing viewpoints and interpretations of the concept of ‘values.’ We respect and acknowledge that your organization may hold values that differ from ours, and that your values are deep, sincere, and meaningful. However, we have decided as an organization that we will only work with nonprofits that conform to our value statements, as we interpret them, and that it’s best for both of us to end our conversation here, as to avoid conflict with those values. Sincerely, [SENSITIVE CONTENT HIDDEN] Give Lively Support" Value Statement reads, (i) discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion (creed)...
Pros: What I liked most about this product was the feature "text to give"
Cons: The length of time it takes to get set up and approved.
"Payment platform that links to bank accounts"
Overall: This platform has made requesting donations easy for those who are giving. The fact that it can link directly to use a giver's bank account makes it easier for them to give quickly.
Pros: I like that this account can securely be linked to a giver's bank account and the benefactor incurs less fees as a result.
Cons: The amount of the giver's donation is automatically shown unless they opt out. Some may not wish for this to be public, and once posted there is no way to reverse the visibility.
"No catch??"
Pros: Have not used it and will not until i can find out how much it actually costs including the REQUIRED stripe.com account.
Cons: Your description is simply wrong. Free with no catch? NO! Give Lively requires the user to have a stripe.com account which charges for every transaction. Stripe.com has a nonprofit discount but, and i find this just amazing, they will not tell you what the discount is unless you first set up an account with them! Give Lively is complicit in this ridiculous setup.