Search, Shop, Dine, Give

As a student, giving is hard. Many students don’t have very regular income, and that income is often tied up in educational and living costs and preparing to pay back those looming student loans. Well, GoodSearch is here to help! Check out this video for a quick overview on how it works.

A few years ago I briefly used GoodSearch, which donates a penny to the cause of your choice (of over 100,000 supported on their site) each time you search and at no cost to you. Back then you had to go to www.goodsearch.com each time you wanted to do a search for it to count.

Now you can install a toolbar and make it your default search engine.

The site is pretty straight forward, and after you sign up you don’t really need to go back very often. It took me a few minutes to find the list of participating organizations (I don’t like calling them charities), but other than that signing up was a breeze.

The only drawback to GoodSearch that I could find was that it is a Yahoo search (which is now powered by Bing). I will admit, I’m normally a Google-girl myself, however for at least 95% of my searches I will get the information I want either way, so I am still making the change.

There is also GoodShop, which seems great- but I haven’t had occasion to do any online shopping in the past week, so I cannot vouch for it personally.

GoodDining is the newest component. When signing up I was a little concerned that I had to provide my credit/debit card information, so I read about why. Basically, you don’t have to remember to tell your waiter that you are participating, or present a coupon, card, membership number, or anything else. By signing up your card(s), GoodSearch can automatically keep track of every donation-generating transaction you make.

These types of efforts alone won’t be enough to fully fund the truly life-changing poverty alleviation efforts that work, but it is an easy way to help those organizations you love. Just this morning I have raised $.05 for the charity I selected, without any additional effort or money on my part.

Don’t worry, we’ll update you when TDC gets our 501c3 status and can receive donations through the GoodSearch network!