Text YELE to 501501 to Donate $5

The tweet came through just two hours after the massive earthquake devastated Haiti's capital:

Please text 'Yéle' to 501501 to donate $5 to Yéle Haiti. Your money will help with relief efforts. They need our help.

(Tweeted by) Wyclef Jean, the text message went out to nearly 1.4 million followers and kicked off what has quickly become the largest text-based fundraising campaign for disaster relief in history.

"This is the first time there has been a major disaster when this type of service has been widely available," says Yéle Haiti executive director Hugh Locke, whose nonprofit will use the funds to send nutrition bars, candles, hand-cranked flashlights and blankets to Haiti on two FedEx planes this Friday. "People want a sense of participating in the response. There is an emotional need to do something," he adds.

For the Haiti crisis, Yéle's technology partners Mobile Giving and Give on the Go have waived their typical waiting period of two weeks to deposit the donations. Firms like Mobile Accord — which manages the Red Cross system, among others — pay out donations on a quarterly basis, after customers have paid their cell-phone carriers (they) forwarded the money, 100% of which goes toward relief efforts.

Source: Time Magazine
Haiti Fundraising Goes Viral: Donating by Text