Buy shoes, do good: Socialvest promotes charity via shopping
Socialvest, which launches its iPhone app today, lets users donate a percentage from purchases at sites like Amazon and Macy's to charity.
Socialvest, a company that says it's raised tens of thousands of dollars for nonprofits through its shopping site, has launched an iPhone app to make it easier for people to help others while shopping.
The site lets shoppers give to the charities of their choice by working with online retailers like Target, Home Depot, Macy's and Amazon. When a user buys something from a partnered shop, between 1 to 15 percent of the purchase will be donated to a nonprofit.
It seems like a great way to be a do-gooder while satisfying your commercial needs.
According to a helpful customer service rep who live chatted on the site, purchases take two weeks to show up in a user's account. The user can then donate the amount accrued in an account to one of 1.5 million nonprofits registered with Socialvest.
There's also a browser extension that lets users know when they land on a shopping site that has signed up with Socialvest, or if any of the sites in search results are partnered sites.
The socially-minded company hopes to draw in even more donations by attracting mobile users with its new iPhone app. Mobile shopping is projected to be a $119 billion market by 2015, according to Socialvest.