Tim Cadogan says more than 100,000 people ran fundraisers for the American Cancer Society on GoFundMe in the past year.
“for example, American Cancer Society has had over 100,000 people do fundraisers in the last year to raise money for ACS.”
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Tim Cadogan
1 episodes · 16 quoted claims
Tim Cadogan lives in Altadena, a part of Los Angeles that largely burned down about a year and a half before the interview.
“I live in the part of LA called Altadena that mainly burnt down a year and a half ago.”
Tim Cadogan says more than 10,000 people a day start a GoFundMe, which was too many for the company's small group of human assistants.
“we have more than 10,000 people a day starting a GoFundMe, and there's just not enough people to do that.”
Tim Cadogan says a 2022 conversation with Mustafa Suleyman, then at Inflection AI, helped him see the potential of an AI assistant for GoFundMe.
“I actually had a conversation with Mustafa Solomon back, like in 2022, when he was doing inflection AI.”
GoFundMe combined its separate AI features for titles and goals into a single smart fundraising coach early in the year of the interview.
“But then early this year, we unified that into the smart fundraising coach, which kind of puts it all together.”
GoFundMe lets users choose between creating a fundraiser with the AI-powered smart fundraising coach or the traditional way.
“The first choice is, do you want to use a smart fundraising coach? It is an AI-powered assistant, or do you want to do it in the traditional way?”
Tim Cadogan says GoFundMe usually encourages people to state their ultimate goal but start the fundraiser at a lower target and raise it over time.
“we encourage people to convey their ultimate goal, but then start the fundraiser lower, build momentum and then grow it over time.”
Tim Cadogan says one-on-one texts to friends and family work better than broadcasting a fundraiser on Facebook or Instagram.
“Because the one on one relationship is so much more powerful than blasting it out on Facebook or Instagram.”
GoFundMe's coach can automatically create a short video for a fundraiser to share on social media.
“We can now, with the coach auto-create a video for you.”
Tim Cadogan says about 10 percent more people share their fundraiser when they use the GoFundMe coach.
“We now see 10% more people when you're using the coach, they're sharing.”
Tim Cadogan estimates that the coach will generate about 125 million in additional help for people in the year of the interview.
“We estimate this year alone, we'll see about 125 million more help generated for people, which is a massive number.”
Tim Cadogan says 65 to 75 percent of surveyed coach users report feeling more confident, less stressed and less alone.
“Sixty five to 75% feel more confident, less stressed, and critically, less alone.”
Tim Cadogan says GoFundMe can trace traffic and support back to each share made by a fundraiser or its supporters.
“We can essentially link back attention and support to every action.”
GoFundMe operates in twenty countries, but Tim Cadogan says people from almost every country support one another through it.
“we operate in twenty countries, but we have people from almost every country have supported each other.”
Tim Cadogan says GoFundMe's goal is for the coach to guide users through the entire process, including transferring the money, in a fully agentic way.
“our ambition is that that coach helps you through that whole process in a fully agentic way that gets smarter and smarter”
Tim Cadogan says the share of American households that give to charity has fallen from about two thirds to the forties in percent.
“Philanthropic participation in America has been declining. So the percent of households used to be about two thirds, and it's now in the forties.”