Challenge

SU2C works relentlessly to quickly offer the newest, most effective, and most promising cancer treatments to patients, by bringing together the best minds to collaborate, innovate, and share cancer research. By galvanising the entertainment industry, SU2C generates awareness, educates the public on cancer prevention, and helps more people diagnosed with cancer become long-term survivors.

SU2C’s biennial roadblock televised fundraising special airs simultaneously on more than 60 participating media platforms across the United States and Canada, including all four major broadcast networks in the US. This event features an array of stars from film, TV, sports, and journalism, who urge viewers to “stand up” and donate to join the fight against cancer.

In the past, this mass influx in donations led to certain payment-processing challenges. “We found that the volume of donations that came in during our telecast led to intermittent processing delays,” explains Robyn Bucknam, vice president of innovation and technology at Stand Up To Cancer. “That meant if a donor entered some information incorrectly, for example, the donation could fail, instead of automatically prompting the donor to correct the information in real-time. In addition, we found that our payment system’s fraud prevention tools blocked legitimate donations in a handful of circumstances. Our priority is ensuring that our donors have a seamless experience, so we knew we needed to find a solution to address these challenges,” says Bucknam.

In order to keep up with donor demand, Stand Up To Cancer required a more sophisticated solution that would process donations in real time while minimising incorrect fraud alerts. Fortunately, Fundraise Up came knocking at just the right time.

Solution

While its existing payment solution wasn’t meeting its needs, Stand Up To Cancer had a very specific set of requirements to consider before making an entire platform change. Stand Up To Cancer found that Fundraise Up’s offering solved its most important operational challenges, while staying in budget.

Fundraise Up delivered a customised solution that addressed Stand Up To Cancer’s issues by improving fraud prevention, offering real-time processing, surfacing revenue opportunities, and providing an easy CRM integration. It achieved this by using several of Stripe’s powerful APIs and software solutions. Payments enables SU2C to accept payments on a global scale with flexible integration, while adapting to each customer’s device and location. Radar is an advanced machine-learning tool for fraud prevention that provides optimised reviews, robust insights, customised rules, and block-and-allow lists. Sigma, powered by SQL, helps Stand Up To Cancer quickly analyse its Stripe data to garner business insights.

In addition, Fundraise Up seamlessly integrated its own proprietary software with Stripe’s robust API, providing SU2C with an accelerated solution that supercharged its telecast. “Working with Fundraise Up and Stripe helped us to better serve our donors, which is always our ultimate goal,” shares Bucknam. “Their advances in technology made our lives much easier. It’s great to know that platforms can work harder for you while being cost effective.”

Results

Payment decline rate decreased to 0.97%

Stand Up To Cancer saw growth in revenue thanks to its partnership with Fundraise Up and Stripe. Stand Up To Cancer’s decline payment rate decreased to 0.97%, using Radar and Fundraise Up’s proprietary fraud-detection software. With real-time payment processing, donors could correct payment errors that would previously be marked as accepted. These new technologies enabled a faster, more accurate payment experience while easing the load on the staff.

250% increase in monthly donations

Thanks to Stripe Payments, Stand Up To Cancer saw a 250% increase in donors who transitioned from single donations to monthly donations. In addition, the cancer charity saw a 30% increase in recurring donors. This was attributed to Fundraise Up’s enterprise-grade fundraising technology, which enabled a wider range of digital wallets.

Campaign launches streamlined to six weeks

Prior to partnering with Fundraise Up and Stripe, Stand Up To Cancer was bogged down by several vendors and huge custom coding projects. This hindered campaign readiness, causing major campaigns to require three or more months to prepare. Now, with the support of Fundraise Up and Stripe’s API, the team has cut down most of its technical campaign prep to six weeks or less. This sizable change has created impactful efficiency gains within its finance, accounting, risk-management, and operations teams. Now, Stand Up To Cancer can deliver campaigns in half the time, with increased overall quality.

About Fundraise Up

Fundraise Up is a technology company that optimises the way people give by using technology. Its donation platform simplifies payment methods and increases conversion, which helps non-profits engage more supporters and grow revenue.