#GivingTuesday: Celebrating The Unifying Power Of Giving

The hashtag #GivingTuesday continues to tap into the power of social media, creating an online community of shared good will among those who give and the nonprofits and organizations that need their contributions to further their good work. The hashtag #GivingTuesday was tweeted 754,000 times which represents a 180% increase over usage last year. During the same period (from December 1 through December 3, ET), #UNselfie was tweeted 39,700 times (183% more than 2013), and more than 7,600 #UNselfie photos were posted on Instagram.

Kathy Calvin, President and CEO of the United Nations Foundation shared:

“#GivingTuesday taps into the spirit of the holidays by harnessing the generosity of people around the world.  It uses the power of social media to bring about real change on the causes we each care about most -- locally, nationally, and globally. With a focus on volunteering, giving, and sharing, #GivingTuesday is growing in communities across the United States and globally.”

This week, on the third annual #GivingTuesday, the new “opening day” of the holiday giving season, more than 20,000 partner organizations in the United States and more than 6,700 partners in dozens of additional countries across the globe came together to give back. Partners – including multi-national corporations and global organizations, as well as small and mid-size nonprofits and local businesses– engaged their networks to support causes they care about by giving their time, energy, talents, voices, and donations. In its third year, #GivingTuesday continued to use technology as a catalyst for supporting and traditional, community-based values and promoting creativity and collaboration in the nonprofit, corporate, philanthropic and civic sectors as well as in schools, colleges and families. The movement provided participating partners with resources to leverage the #GivingTuesday opportunity, and many participated in a huge range of educational offerings in which larger, well established partners shared their expertise and experience in webinars, meetups, toolkits and other forums.