Google, in partnership with the Media Trust and Charity Technology Trust, today launches a new campaign to help 30,000 of Britain's smallest charities boost their fundraising through online tools and the Internet.

The 'Grow Your Charity Online' initiative will provide free training and tools for smaller charities across the country. It comprises an online learning hub, specialised training, workshops and live events.

As part of the campaign, Google will host a regular series of online educational events, allowing charities from across the UK to join advice sessions remotely, while Google UK employees will dedicate a percentage of their work time towards the project, by volunteering their expertise at workshops over the year.

Matt Brittin, vice president of Google's northern and central European operations, said: "The web is essential for charities to access new tools to share stories, help people and raise money. Britain's charities need sustainable, practical methods with which to help themselves grow and really make a difference, and Grow Your Charity Online aims to help these organisations ultimately succeed. We hope to engage with 30 000 charities through a suite of Internet tools and training, and encourage them to sign up today"

Media Trust chief executive Caroline Diehl said: "Exploring opportunities to learn new skills to manage their online presence can enable them to change the world by giving a voice to communities and inspiring more people to make a difference, to get help, volunteer and donate. We look forward to engaging a talented group of Google staff as volunteers and mentors for a diverse range of charities from across the UK."

Charity Technology Trust chief executive Richard Craig said: "Due to a lack of resources, very few of the charities we work with are able to take full advantage of what the internet has to offer to help them to achieve their missions. Without the time or money to invest in it, charities may miss out on the advantages that web analytics, online communications, promotional offers or even a YouTube page can offer them.

Google chief: Charities risk being unproductive if they aren't aware of web opportunities

Speaking exclusively to the Guardian voluntary sector network, Matt Brittin said that his experience of working with small businesses at Google suggested that those that went online grew faster, and he hoped that the same would prove to be true of charities:

"When you compare small businesses who are online with those who aren't, the small businesses that are online and are doing online marketing are growing between four and eight times faster than those that aren't.

"If you look at the business experience, there's quite a big differential in growth and in employment and in activity and we think the potential for charities is just the same.

"There are charities who are doing just as well as businesses online, but there are many who aren't because these are new skills, and like the small businesses we have dealt with over the past few years, many of them are not online or maybe they built a website several years ago and they haven't really thought about how to keep it up.

"There's a shift in how people are looking for information and engaging with charities and other organisations. If charities aren't aware of that, and don't see how much things have moved in that direction, then they do risk doing things that are unproductive and that make them less relevant in their field. It's important to get this message out there because the web is a huge opportunity for charities." Brittin said that he wanted to measure the impact of the initiative.

"We know that recent research says that charities with websites are increasing supporter interaction by over 70 per cent and saving money by around 70 per cent as well.

"It would be great if we could measure that impact and validate whether or not the web really does bring that 70 per cent uplift in interaction and money saved, and we'll be looking at how we do that as well, because the more you can tell that story, if it's true, the more other charities can benefit by becoming more efficient and putting more resources to use to help the groups that they're set up to help.

"I hope that from this we can find some case studies of small charities that start to use the web more and are more successful and act as a beacon for many others."

Brittin said that the programme was "very much not about Google products: It's introducing them to basic analytics tools, or looking at the options to use social media or that kind of thing, as well as to promote themselves through online marketing ... it's about helping educate people on the basic steps they can take to make their website work better given what they are trying to achieve as a charity."

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