I think its important to look at the bigger picture and not just Launchgood in a vacuum. Launchgood is a big contributor to what seems to be Muslim charity space thrives on a lack of transparency and seems to be circulating substantial % of donor funds amongst itself.
I share several examples below to illustrate this.
For all the examples below, lets assume that we are dealing with Sadaqah funds, not zakat (which would make things even more problematic). Therefore funds are fully fungible between admin and programmatic, and between campaigns.
Lets take Brother Abdullah's example below (and thank you very much for your detailed response):
He states:
"I paid $3,000 and raised $19,000 - my fees for marketing was $3,000 and my fees for the bank was $570 - so total $3,570. Not 50% at all." So, launchgood fees were about 19%.
Then, below he says:
"We have an admin percentage of 15%. So we would take that $2,850 top it up and then buy another package."
So, taking into account both launchgood fees and his own organization's admin fees, 34% of the donation does not go to the end user, or what was advertised to donors in the campaign. About 68%, of $12,540 (at the absolute maximum, I would imagine), goes to the end user.
Do the donors know this? Do they know if they donate $100, only about $68 at the maximum goes to the intended campaign?
My intention is not to pick on Brother Abdullah or his organization here; what he is illustrating is just standard practice for the Muslim charity space. And his organization is likely doing far better than others.
We can see this with another typical example of Islamic charity space:
Lets say I have a multimillion dollar international organization. I pay $45,000 in fees to Launchgood, and $5,000 in bank fees for an orphan sponsorship campaign. So, total costs of the campaign in Launchgood is 50%, or $50,000. In return, I make $100,000 in donations.
My organization's admin fees are 35%. So, that leaves %15 left, or $15,000.
Then, I grant this $15,000 to a local country organization that actually does the work They take another %10 in admin fees. That takes away $1,500, leaving $13,500 that actually goes to orphans, who the original advertising campaign aimed for.
So, of the original $100,000, about 86.5% is eaten away by Launchgood fees and various organizational admin costs, leaving $13.5% or $13,500 going to the intended end-users, the orphans.
If someone donates $100 in sadqah to my campaign for supporting an orphan, only $13.5 goes towards the orphan. The donor certainly does not know this, and I can only imagine would not be okay with it.
Why should any average Muslim, whose is required to pay zakat and is highly encouraged to pay sadaqah to support the poor (especially orphans) be okay with such a situation?
As someone who has donated to different campaigns on launchgood over the years, im shocked to read this. Yes, Launchgood needs to make money, but my concern here is the lack of transparency.
Up to $50k to be featured in an email on the last odd nights of Ramadan? What?
Ahmed Shaikh is the Voice of Reason that this Ummah so desperately needs . I am proud that our community produced such a champion . Bravo! The Golden Age of Truth Tellers Returns
My dear you have no clue what you are talking about!! I am a legacy with launchgood! And sadly during 2017 when they had only 6k campaigns and 38k donors, I had campaigns then I also had a campaign once where (not too long ago they charged me $3000 ongoing for example I raised 9k from that 3k marketing then they took another 3k following month!! It was a weekly or monthly charges! Following month I raised 7k then they took another 3k these are not bank fees counting yet plus Omg lol do you know even from what the DONOR donates, LG still stole money from it as I saw how much they paid and how much I received! Do the math that’s 16k minus 9k of marketing fees wow that’s over 50% well over that like 75% or more isn’t it!
and btw advertising was extra oh $1500 for extra newsletter and oh to be on our site for a week was additional $500 weekly I chose sometimes that too!
I think charitable giving should be personal and not a gamification exercise. What do you care about and who is doing good work in that area, and how do you know? If they are local, you should know or you can find out easily.
You should learn about charities from people you trust who have independently researched them. I don’t think people with a profit motive are going to be good at that. I do hope to learn more about organizations in the Muslim charitable space but I know there will be others insha Allah. The mere fact I or anyone else is critical of a charity or its practices does not mean it is not worthwhile donate to it.
Thanks Ahmed for starting this debate. As someone who's been using this for years, I'm shocked to learn about this. I plan to speak to Chris about this. I think this is becoming a lot more commercial than what was portrayed to the public.
If you were to steel man their business model, you could say that their "marketing" and "new-age" practices may actually increase the total $ of donations. We may not have a double blind study on this but seeing major charities consistently using it is some form of evidence.
One thing you could look into is the cost of LG campaigns vs using google adwords / social media / other marketing spend. This could make or break your argument, save for the transparency/ misleading practices which I agree with 100%.
Is LG contributing to the bloating of the charity sector? absolutely. If we had a choice of this vs a small lean team of <30 people funded by separate campaigns while the LG platform remained 100% fee-free, we would all choose the latter. However, if the founders did not have this in mind its fair to them. Maybe its time for a competitor to enter the ring.
The last point I wish for you to address is on the verification. I assume there is negligence in some cases but I wouldn't portray it as a free for all. You're going to need some solid evidence to make this claim. I have tried to launch a campaign and was rejected time and again because the paperwork was not enough for them to validate the efforts (majority of labor was paid in cash and the team in the Philippines was not trained on bookkeeping).
By the platform’s nature its a marketplace for attention. There are over 7000 campaigns on the platform who want it. Does Bond e shams advertising on the platform create a bigger pie? Does it drown out other perhaps more deserving campaigns unwilling to fork over six figures to LG? If anyone claims advertising in this marketplace creates a bigger pie for everyone, I would love to see the evidence for that.
I don’t know if LG is cheaper or more expensive than adwords matters much. Adwords is an auction market but does not advertise based on roi (effectively setting a commissions). Yes, organizations hire SEMs and advertise based on ROI metrics, but Google or Bing make no promises on that front. They are not charity solicitors like LG plainly is. You get an agency to select keywords and place youtube ads or whatever. Those platforms are not as easy to use or as specific to the purpose of Muslim charitable marketing as LG is, even if LG is more expensive compared to a facebook or bing if you use the right agency, it’s maybe more worth it for the charity. The best value proposition for LG is that you can advertise while pretending it’s not an advertisement with all that religious manipulation going on.
I have written about the use of zakat funds for online advertising previously and I personally don’t believe it is an acceptable use of Zakat, indeed Islamic Relief Worldwide’s zakat policy, as well as the Islamic Council of Europe explicitly prohibit it (sadaqa yes I suppose). The advertising tends to rely on sharp elbows in a competition for territory (booth space, auctions for digital advertising and such)- it is common for Muslim charities to buy adwords for their competitors names. Organizations clearly want market share dominance and are not trying to get people who were not inclined to pay zakat to pay it.
If LG disclosed all the advertising it would perhaps diminish the user experience (since several pages would be dominated by advertising) and undermine LG’s brand as do-gooders working for tips.
1. I am a Muslim and I have a Muslim Lead campaign on GOFUNDME AND they did not REMOVE. LAUNCHHOOD on the other hand did.
2. I don’t know what your problem with LGBT is but not all lgbtq people are by choice LGBTQ I am born intersex and trans by birth I’m both male and female, in Islam I am considered able to be with a woman, which thankfully I’m only attracted to a woman.
No man alhamdulilah. But launchgood does not respect that and have double standard. They allowed CAAIR and other random members of community to openly fundraiser for lgbtqia people and victims of lgbtqia discrimination
But they (LG) REJECTED my campaign where I stated that I will house and feed INTERSEX and transgender Muslims. Did not mention gay or lesbian yet wow they are this.
Blind. But for media to show them off and look good they allowed the masses to advertise and fundraise for lgbtq people non Muslims even!
Where as I want to build a shelter for all minorities but a separate home for Muslim trans and intersex. Born people like me.
Because currently legally I would be told to go to a woman’s shelter if I was homeless and at one point I did end up at many of them.
Sadly life was so hard and it’s a sin for me to be there but on the other hand had they allowed me at a man’s shelter or man’s jail I as a very marginalized Muslim community member being intersex by birth would easily be killed and or Raped.
This is why I’m Raising awareness on the importance of building a shelter for people in the middle like me! I’m a Muslim and want to help other Muslims like me..
sadly only GOFUNDME allows me. But I still have a campaign that’s separate from this it’s showing woman with hijab it’s a program for women Muslim women’s domestic violence shelter and go fund me has not removed it for months now!
So please brother before you mention something like that just know they don’t remove ALL Muslim campaigns just like launchgood doesn’t deny all lgbtq supporting campaigns but they pick the ones they feel they will make more money from…
I will share with you my life and how Islam and homosexuality impacted my life
I was born in Muslim family that was not practicing.
I used to do lot of wrong stuff as a child but I would regret it afterwards I felt regret for my bad actions.
I hated this feeling of regret that came over after I did something wrong
I wished I could reverse time that way I would know what I'm about to do is wrong and I would not do it.
I wished there was some guidance available that told me what is right and wrong.
every time my parents reprimanded me for my wrongdoings they would always say this one sentence "son what you have done is a sin in islam."
to them this may have been a casual sentence but this sentence caused me to ponder to think what is a sin in Islam
as I studied Islam I found out all the wrong things I did were sins in Islam and Islam forbade us from doing those things and that for me was shocking.
I wished I'd learn about Islam before I commited all the sins then I would have less regrets in my life.
I slowly started to practice Islam praying 5 times a day, fasting, giving charity, etc.
moving on when I was around 10 or 11 years of age I realised I am attracted to boys but homosexuality is a sin in Islam.
I had an honest inner dialogue with myself about my feelings.
remember I have understood this fact that if I do something which Allah has prohibited I'm going to regret it.
trust me that feeling of regret I hated it to my very core.
Allah gave humans natural sexual desire for opposite sex and we can only fulfil that desire with our spouse after marriage in Islam.
Allah will not give me homosexual feelings and then punish me for acting upon them.
at that young age I realised these feelings are not from Allah as Allah is just.
inner dialogue: this is my conviction this is my belief that nobody is born gay. I have submitted my will to the will of my creator and homosexuality is a sin in my religion. I will not be a homosexual I am a Muslim. I will not follow desires but I will obey Allah and his messanger Muhammad pbuh. I have chosen my path and my path is Islam.
after this inner dialogue with myself I asked Allah sincerely about my situation and asked Allah to help me resolve these feelings.
I prayed tahajjud asked Allah sincerely that Allah Is ar rahman ar raheem I don't know what went wrong how did I get these feelings ya Allah remove these homosexual feelings from me. ameen
I prayed 5 times a day held tightly onto Qur'an.
I did few things subconsciously Subhan allah when I look back I realise they were very beneficial
Allah would not give me homsexual feelings and then punish me for acting on them.
I innately knew nobody is born gay I knew Allah is just and Allah created me to worship him alone.
I put my Complete trust and tawakul in Allah.
100% of my being believed that I was not born gay and these feelings are not natural.
I stayed away from all homosexual content on news social media cartoons anywhere I saw it I actively blocked it.
I held tightly onto Qur'an and sunnah and slowly these homsexual feelings disappeared alhamdulilah.
nobody is born gay this is one of biggest lies of this era.
and your Lord treats no one with injustice al-Kahf 18:49
Nay, Allaah never commands Fahshaa (evil deeds, unlawful sexual intercourse). Do you say of Allaah what you know not? al-Araaf 7:28
Have you seen he who has taken as his god his [own] desire, and Allah has sent him astray due to knowledge and has set a seal upon his hearing and his heart and put over his vision a veil? So who will guide him after Allah ? Then will you not be reminded
Again, sadly you’re trying soooo hard to force yourself to believe that since it’s wrong that you had these desires. That if someone says one word LGBTQIA you only can recall your sexual desires lol how sad. Not once do you imagine lgbtqia being the I FOR INTERSEX. or T for trans. Like imagine I’m
Born with a penis and boobs and beard and no female eggs non! Soooo in your pretty little world who should I be “married or atttscted to? You tell me ?
I know
You have no -‘true correct answer dear brother because being raised in any religion that we read a book with only our eyes not hearts, we are blinded to only learn what we see, as in we see there’s female there’s male but faile to see the male dna male body parts born in a body a bit mixed due to a genetic make up mixup. Say it all you want Allah doesn’t make mistakes. I agree. Man makes mistakes by trying to kill babies with abortion then a child like me is born and my family 3 times tried forcing me to marry a man. And from age 2 I had zero desires for men and I’m soooo greatful. See you had sexual desires for same sex. Meanwhile I had only LOVE. Purity. And non sexual romance desires for women. Since I’m their opposite sex. I’m sorry but just because a man forgot to translate Allahs word properly or some men scholars who did not know anything about Intersex babies that it’s a whole SEX of its own!! Doesn’t mean I have to be called a girl, or be forced to marry a man due to my voice that simply sounds like a pubescent boy btw not. A girl. And hello I’m born with a males pert just not grown to the point of being able to have sex with it. But that’s why my chromosome test isn’t XY OR XX take a wild guess ? Yep!!! There’s XX-XY there’s XY-XY THERES XXY! You tell me if these are not a birth sex of its own just like female or male, then
What is this ? Or this can be a male born just under developed right ? Then why go try forcing the poor guy to marry another man?? My family now after 40 years realized that they were trying to force a boy to marry another boy wow sadly the ones claiming not to be homosexual were forcing me to be exactly that!!
Each time Allah was with me and I would escape the attempted rape, see the men were Pakistanis or afghans (famous for being 2 faced closet gay or bisexual despite having wives, so they wouldn’t care when I would say brother stop I’m
Similar to you just made a bit disabled due to some medical issues and wow they would say it’s ok there’s always another “door”
These are the sodom and Gomorrah and these are the ones Islam forbids. NOT someone born like me who’s innocently trying to survive a cold world where there are only 1% born like me by the way. Nope I’m single right now because I’m waiting to become fully male with my disabled parts being repaired. Once that’s done I will only be with 1 woman
Whom I marry some day.
So please don’t confuse my birth Sex with a gay man’s sexual desires dear bro. Thanks
Those pakistani afghan men who have wives but still want to sleep with other men is due to either them getting raped at young age or them being brainwashed to believe there is nothing wrong with having sex with men.
There are men in Pakistan who have sex with other men not because they desire men but because they don't want to do marriage as it comes with responsibility or they are too poor to get married but female prostitutes are too expensive for them so they go for cheaper male prostitute
Akhi once you fuck a man you will end up start to like having sex with men and that's why even if you eventually get married you will still secretly fuck men
homosexuality is not from Allah in sense that nobody is born with it everyone themselves choose to be homosexual.
I understand being intersex is from Allah but lesbian gay etc is not.
As for trans people they are mostly mentally ill people very small minority of them could be intersex but alhamdulilah classical scholars have done great work when it comes to intersex people and Allah knows best
Are you reading with your eyes brother or with the eyes of the devil? Do you NOT know the difference between someone saying thet are born with gay desires or even saying they are born gay, VERSUS SOMEONE LIKE ME SAYING IM
BORN INTERSEX.
Because being gay is a sexual orientation and being born by BIRTH INTERSEX is a birth SEX/And or gender but deffinetely not to be mistaken with SEXUALITY OR SEXUAL ORIENTATION.
Now before you tell me to go marry a man simple because I have a females size B cup boobs, let me remind you that I’m born not only with full beard, but I’m born with NO OVARY on one side and an ovary and testicle on the other.
This is internally. No UTERUS, and NO VAGINAL CANAL, instead I have an UNDER DEVELOPED PHALLUS/Mini penis. All of this you are right was not Allahs doing, but my parents were pregnant with TWIN BOYS, they allowed an Abortion to kill both twins, instead I was born with vanishing twin syndrome. My other brother is absorbed
Again, when you try to kill babies in middle of growth, that growth pauses and can mix two kids. I knew that there’s no way it was a girl and boy because a girl cannot be in the same sack as a boy, but untill recently medically this was proved, finally after waiting decades for my family to understand that I’m NOT BORN FEMALE! But I’m not born legally male only due to the mixing of two twins, I’m born intersex. I’m not to be confused with hermaphrodite. That is different.
Anyways there’s only 1% born like me by the way, so my conversation was that I’m PHYSICALLY BORN THIS WAY, which has zero to do with damn desires etc. you were born with a penis and still wanted to be with a same sex person. Sorry but I didn’t want to be with same sex. Because for me opposite sex is a female! So once again being born like this is still considered part of the LGBTQIA community! So nobody should only look at the first 3 letters of this community and say oh no sorry you’re not born with desires like this.
Please open your eyes and educate yourselves beyond only knowing what a male and female is. Know that sometimes when it’s attempted to kill a male baby and it survives, medically they label him an intersex baby. Because the doctors don’t know the back story of how these greedy parents try to kill innocent babies.
So here I go again to say, MY LIFE MATTERS, me being born with mini penis doesn’t make me a woman but instead makes me born a handicap man. And I’ll start HRT and surgery to fix this part of my disability. No way in hell am I going to be with a man if I don’t even have a woman’s area for a man to be with and luckily this is why my hormones naturally due to my testicle etc it’s not allowing me any attraction towards men. To me it feels like a sin and many Imams agree that since I’m one of the miracle babies I’m born slowly developed male. That I shouldn’t be forced to marry a guy.
Now. I’m sorry but my personal belief is that I don’t even want to judge gay and lesbians let Allah be the judge but all I know is that im not gay, because I do not desire a person with same body structure as mine. Nor with my parts internally, yes I have a prostate, testicle and penis, but only due to the way my growth was paused during nothing drugs, my chest is like a chubby boys or teen kids. Even then it doesn’t resemble an actual woman’s. So I’m gonna get top surgery.
Anyways once again please know the difference between intersex being a birth sex and gay being a sexual orientation 2 different worlds brother … I hope Muslims educate themselves before embarrassing in the name of Islam.
Gofundme allows my campaign that shows photos of Muslimahs with hijab, seeking money for Muslims. Yet LG, had asked me to remove the term LGBTQIA community and rejected my already approved campaign!! 1. They already openly help ltbtq campaigns! Yet mine wasn’t going to get them rich so thst didn’t want that. But remember IM NOT GAY. I’m a Muslim man born intersex so I wanted to help intersex and trans communities but in order ro do that, INTERSEX and trans are in the acronym LGBTQIA I IS FOR INTERSEX that’s how I’m
Born due to abortion attempt. Luckily my male body part is inside and will be out surgically. Anyways meaning it’s just sad that LG tried forcing me to remove my identify and for whom I’m fundraising. They wanted me to lie and say that I’m fundraising for all gay ppl too and I said although I do not judge anyone it’s for Allah to judge. I’m only trying to build a shelter for those born like me, so we don’t end up in shelters with women which is a sin in my eyes. Anyway instead of thanking me for such a beautiful idea, they allowed others lgbtq campaigns but rejected mine related to Muslims born intersex. Sadly….
No brother I have emails and phone calls where the team of marketing specifically asked me to remove the part that says I am born intersex and of that I’m helping lgbtq community. And before I could say well I’m
Not gonna help gay ppl
But only those born intersex and trans etc before even saying that, I said wait a minute, didn’t LG allow campaigns for a gay restaurant owner who’s cafe got shot by a homophobe and that Muslim man who shot and killed 50+ people at a club in Orlando, LG was running that campaign like hot cake!
So no I did not get rejected for my other campaigns but the minute I said I’m literally born intersex meaning it’s not some internal desire etc it’s a physical condition caused without any doing of mine or of God. It’s the outcome usually from different reasons but In my case it’s from abortion my mom did during her carrying two boys /twins. I was born!
Anyways, sadly each time I removed any word that said intersex or lgbtq it was approved then I would go back to add my correct words that hello I’m trying to fundraise for ppl born physically intersex suddenly I would get texts calls and emails asking me to stop.
And please don’t tell me of the costs, I have evidence of spending over $10,000 in marketing with LG in the past when my title was NOT LGBTQ intersex born etc so please know this conversation isn’t about how cheap they are etc it’s about how 2 faced they are that I have even considered a lawsuit since I have all my evidence. But sadly, I realized winning money isn’t my goal, but having LG TO STOP doing this is my goal. And I fought deadly illnesses right after they rejected my campaign. Otherwise I would have continued reporting them. CAAIR possibly might take my case since they deal with human
If people knew the history, Chris Blauvelt (Launchgood founder) was not too shy to grift with CVE, participating in the UAE’s Forum for Promoting Peace’s “Haqqathon” (and even getting first prize.) He even got a glam piece in New Yorker where he supposedly almost got “radicalized” and was “taking the internet back from ISIS” by making a picture uploading app.
I think Abdallah here is raising a very important point - and there are some very good questions that need to be explored here in relation to the early days of this platform and to what extent the US state dept had involvement (directly or indirectly). Esp in a surveillance economy and with CVE. We do remember ISNA's awful track record with financial details of Muslims during the Bush administration, right? This really does insist on many questions around LG's origin and rise.
I also want to add that though they claim to be a faith-based startup, they in fact operate as a capitalistic startup, manipulating a language of faith - if they were clear about this distinction then hey, we would all know who we're getting into bed with.
We have to be sharply critical of white male leadership in Muslim orgs and spaces - all leadership in general is held to the same accountability standards, but there is an added level of critique with white men in our current contexts. Thanks for this article Ahmed, good to see others asking good questions.
I only donate to Dawateislami. No performance marketing. It’s a 100% organic and trusted multinational non-profit, non-political Islamic organization. Look, I am literally one of their ‘word of mouth’ marketers, simply because of how transparent and Islamic they are.
I did. I will list what happened for us all. Please do take a read. We should speak to charities to understand what and how launchgood operates. I am one of those and those I speak with have similar feedback as me. Its a good business determined to support the muslim community.
1. I paid $3,000 and raised $19,000 - my fees for marketing was $3,000 and my fees for the bank was $570 - so total $3,570. Not 50% at all.
2. I was made to pay upfront - the marketing package was not allowed to come from my donations raised, they were very strict on that. They also rejected my first campaign saying its not good for donor variety and that I should present a campaign donors would want to donate
3. They offered me guidance and training to raise funds for free. No pressure to buy a marketing package. In fact, we raised a whole lot for our project using their community pages to raise funds as a team - they did not charge at all for this - muslim consultants charge $$$ for this advice.
4. I wanted to invest in marketing, just like we invest in Facebook, TikTok and Google - the model was simple, pay whatever you can afford and get more exposure when you can afford more. Not new to the sector.
5. The fees were standard - but it went to the bank processors, not launchgood, althought launchgood wants people to leave tips (makes sense, same as justgiving and gofundme). No-one has ever complained about their 15% default fee. So I accept their tip model. I'm not sure how many people leave tips. I dont get to see that,
6. In ramadan - I saw their marketing but I was rejected as they did not feel their donors would respond to my campaign as I had run it before. But below is the deal and how I saw it:
Could purchase a $10,000 package. With a no loss gurantee. Their team mentioned that this meant if the campaign raised less, they would refund my money. They expected a 2-4x. I'm not sure how many they sold but lets say they sold 100 of these - they would make about 1-2million from packages. Now, lets say they got back charities 2-4 million - thats no different to facebook (where there is no loss gurantee)
So yes it seems LaunchGood does make money. I don't think thats a bad thing. Muslim businesses should make money. Especially when they are benefitting the community. We have no issue with non muslim platforms milking our communities 15% as a default tip and then using the same funds to target our community. But we have a huge issue with a platform serving the community making millions.
Again, yes launchgood does make millions. But lets just say they made 2 million from marketing. But was able to help Muslims raise 4 million and then give them free coaching to raise another 20 million. Is that a bad thing?
I think the bigger issue is that we the consumers don't know these campaigns are advertised. The lack of transparency is concerning. There is nothing wrong with non-profits spending on marketing and launchgood has every right to make money as they please but most people were under the impression that they are fully funded by generous tips.
I don't see paid campaign tags on their website - i don't have their emails so I can't speak to that.
It doesn't matter what charities want it to say - this is for the benefit and protection of the consumers/donators. It's the reason why FTC mandates creators communicate clearly when they are being sponsored to make a video.
I agree. Emails do state they have paid campaigns. The website is a different story. I pointed this out in the article in the example of Bond e shams, where there was no such disclosure
Agreed - they can add sponsored to homepage on their site. I don't think thats too hard to do. But 1) feels like an easy ask for the public to do and 2) was it even in their pipeline? Maybe it was, maybe it was not.
1. Charity - i work for a large one so wont disclose as I probably should not be commenting for them officially.
2. Yes as it was a newsletter and it did say paid campaign
Also I am seeing your comment about charities using donation funds to pay for another package. Im not clear on what you are saying. Are you saying that charities dont use raised sadaqah funds to pay for marketing? Because damn right they do! 99% of charities take an admin percentage and then use that same percentage to pay for marketing
So where I said I raised $19,000. We have an admin percentage of 15%. So we would take that $2,850 top it up and then buy another package.
Are you saying launchgood should be held accountable for the way charities make decisions about their admin spend? That is on us as charities no?
I mean think about ads right now - did you know there are adveritisng agencies in the muslim sector that charge from the donations directly. Raise x amount and we take 10% from your donations < that is what they do.
I dont think we can hold launchgood to account for how charities decide where they pay for marketing packages. BUT lets just say we wanted them to be accountable - what would they do, ask charities to confirm these funds were not from the previous fundraiser? Audit their books?
That was about a comment someone made that was the money for campaigns came from somewhere else mysterious or as if launchgood has some special money that is not fungible. Its not really about why I wrote the article. He was reaching and I was just pointing out a flaw in his claim.
If you read this newsletter you would know that it’s animated by zakat issues. LG is essentially a commission-based (effectively though not formally) charitable solicitor but it has a zakat policy it uses for marketing and profit to make people think they have standards when they don’t, at least not when it comes to it’s profiting from zakat. I would not expect them to be a charity regulator obviously. If they did not market zakat in particular its unlikely the company would have come on my radar. If they make claims about zakat, especially how it can be used or restricted, then act in ways that undermine those policies (what I noted this year and last), it deserves notice.
What marketing agencies do you refer to and are those registered with any state AGs that you have seen?
Look, if they follow the rules and play fair with donors they can have whatever business model they want and I may not write about it. If they transparently charge high prices that’s more a problem for the charity then the agency or charitable solicitor (assuming they are not pretending to be something while being something else).
LYING please I am one of the first campaigners and LG will not only be sued by me soon, I’m speaking with my attorney in few hours. I have not slept all night after seeing how they treated me and my charity and I have evidence of all of this.
Everything brother Ahmed said is 100% accurate in fact he’s too kind about it…. These people took advantage of me when I was just a “homeless girl needs justice to them!!
They took over 75% of my donations and I slept on the street! Now I’m a nonprofit charity and due to health issues caused by LG from during the days I had to sleep in my car while LG looted my campaigns!
By taking 3k plus even if I only made 7k they would say your campaign doesn’t look great but yet sadly they had no problem taking 2-3k every 2 weeks from me for over a year!!
So please do not ever defend such monsters. I am about to take them down for minority discrimination and CAAIR attorneys will either help me on this or get sued for not taking a case just because they want to continue making money off of LG. So hopefully CAAIR is smart about this.
My media outlet connections my Celebrity PR lady will really expose LG and this is no longer about finances nor lawsuit for money, this is about saving the Muslim ummah from them! Just watch and return here as I continue to update..
In fact, he is spot on. They make millions. Check it out on your own. Do you research. This is a money making enterprise off the backs of unsuspecting, pious and generous, Muslims.
I do not agree with this at all! You have no idea how it’s works internally and how the team Intention is. It is the month of Ramadan and Allah is watching you spread false information. Please spend time with yourself and your consciousness
Okay. Please tell us how it works internally, and if that is different from what we can see, like the marketing program. If there is false information please point it out, I will be happy to correct it, with apologies?
Sensationalist title for views, we need to be better than this as Muslims. I've used LaunchGood for fundraising for my charity and they never take donations from a campaign to pay for the marketing package so this notion of 'up to half your donation is going to LaunchGood' is completely false. Charities pay for their marketing package separately from their admin pot (this could've been raised from various streams, both offline and online fundraising and on any platform) and NOT from the donations their marketing package campaign raises on LaunchGood. You can do better than this.
What charity have you been fundraising for? Please share.
As a Muslim that is apparently better than other Muslims you disclosed you were advertising to donors right?
I actually walked readers through how LG charges and hopefully they understood it fine. You agree that if an ROI of $10,000 is 2x then x = $5,000? The cost of raising that money was $5,000? I hope we agree on the basic numbers here?
Now the money to pay for this was from was from other streams you say? There is some sort of Chinese Wall between streams of donations that makes this all ethical? Please educate us about this because that is fascinating.
LG never takes donations from a marketing package as a fee? So if a charity got $10,000 from an LG campaign and wanted to give $5000 of it to LG to do another campaign, LG would refuse? Can you cite chapter and verse from the TOS because I cannot seem to find it. Is money from an LG campaign less fungible than the rest of the money supply?
Akhi go and look at classical work of scholars they have done great work when it comes to explaining intersex people. Allah is ar Rahman may Allah give you ease ameen. I want to share my life story only to enjoin good and forbid evil alhamdulilah and Allah knows best
As I explained previously, the main concern I have is not tips, which is small potatoes for Launchgood, but their marketing program. That is how they get a bigger bite out of zakat, by getting large fees from “zakat-eligible” organizations that amounts to a commission. I believe they are doing a better job disclosing advertisements now, however, where they were hiding this before.
I only donate to Dawateislami. No performance marketing. It’s a 100% organic and trusted multinational non-profit, non-political Islamic organization. Look, I am literally one of their ‘word of mouth’ marketers, simply because of how transparent and Islamic they are.
I think its important to look at the bigger picture and not just Launchgood in a vacuum. Launchgood is a big contributor to what seems to be Muslim charity space thrives on a lack of transparency and seems to be circulating substantial % of donor funds amongst itself.
I share several examples below to illustrate this.
For all the examples below, lets assume that we are dealing with Sadaqah funds, not zakat (which would make things even more problematic). Therefore funds are fully fungible between admin and programmatic, and between campaigns.
Lets take Brother Abdullah's example below (and thank you very much for your detailed response):
He states:
"I paid $3,000 and raised $19,000 - my fees for marketing was $3,000 and my fees for the bank was $570 - so total $3,570. Not 50% at all." So, launchgood fees were about 19%.
Then, below he says:
"We have an admin percentage of 15%. So we would take that $2,850 top it up and then buy another package."
So, taking into account both launchgood fees and his own organization's admin fees, 34% of the donation does not go to the end user, or what was advertised to donors in the campaign. About 68%, of $12,540 (at the absolute maximum, I would imagine), goes to the end user.
Do the donors know this? Do they know if they donate $100, only about $68 at the maximum goes to the intended campaign?
My intention is not to pick on Brother Abdullah or his organization here; what he is illustrating is just standard practice for the Muslim charity space. And his organization is likely doing far better than others.
We can see this with another typical example of Islamic charity space:
Lets say I have a multimillion dollar international organization. I pay $45,000 in fees to Launchgood, and $5,000 in bank fees for an orphan sponsorship campaign. So, total costs of the campaign in Launchgood is 50%, or $50,000. In return, I make $100,000 in donations.
My organization's admin fees are 35%. So, that leaves %15 left, or $15,000.
Then, I grant this $15,000 to a local country organization that actually does the work They take another %10 in admin fees. That takes away $1,500, leaving $13,500 that actually goes to orphans, who the original advertising campaign aimed for.
So, of the original $100,000, about 86.5% is eaten away by Launchgood fees and various organizational admin costs, leaving $13.5% or $13,500 going to the intended end-users, the orphans.
If someone donates $100 in sadqah to my campaign for supporting an orphan, only $13.5 goes towards the orphan. The donor certainly does not know this, and I can only imagine would not be okay with it.
Why should any average Muslim, whose is required to pay zakat and is highly encouraged to pay sadaqah to support the poor (especially orphans) be okay with such a situation?
As someone who has donated to different campaigns on launchgood over the years, im shocked to read this. Yes, Launchgood needs to make money, but my concern here is the lack of transparency.
Up to $50k to be featured in an email on the last odd nights of Ramadan? What?
Ahmed Shaikh is the Voice of Reason that this Ummah so desperately needs . I am proud that our community produced such a champion . Bravo! The Golden Age of Truth Tellers Returns
My dear you have no clue what you are talking about!! I am a legacy with launchgood! And sadly during 2017 when they had only 6k campaigns and 38k donors, I had campaigns then I also had a campaign once where (not too long ago they charged me $3000 ongoing for example I raised 9k from that 3k marketing then they took another 3k following month!! It was a weekly or monthly charges! Following month I raised 7k then they took another 3k these are not bank fees counting yet plus Omg lol do you know even from what the DONOR donates, LG still stole money from it as I saw how much they paid and how much I received! Do the math that’s 16k minus 9k of marketing fees wow that’s over 50% well over that like 75% or more isn’t it!
and btw advertising was extra oh $1500 for extra newsletter and oh to be on our site for a week was additional $500 weekly I chose sometimes that too!
Thank you always for these information brother Ahmed.
Loved this! Thank you for writing this and raising awareness. May Allah bless you akhi.
How would you suggest Muslims go about "discovering" charities?
I think charitable giving should be personal and not a gamification exercise. What do you care about and who is doing good work in that area, and how do you know? If they are local, you should know or you can find out easily.
You should learn about charities from people you trust who have independently researched them. I don’t think people with a profit motive are going to be good at that. I do hope to learn more about organizations in the Muslim charitable space but I know there will be others insha Allah. The mere fact I or anyone else is critical of a charity or its practices does not mean it is not worthwhile donate to it.
Thanks Ahmed for starting this debate. As someone who's been using this for years, I'm shocked to learn about this. I plan to speak to Chris about this. I think this is becoming a lot more commercial than what was portrayed to the public.
If you were to steel man their business model, you could say that their "marketing" and "new-age" practices may actually increase the total $ of donations. We may not have a double blind study on this but seeing major charities consistently using it is some form of evidence.
One thing you could look into is the cost of LG campaigns vs using google adwords / social media / other marketing spend. This could make or break your argument, save for the transparency/ misleading practices which I agree with 100%.
Is LG contributing to the bloating of the charity sector? absolutely. If we had a choice of this vs a small lean team of <30 people funded by separate campaigns while the LG platform remained 100% fee-free, we would all choose the latter. However, if the founders did not have this in mind its fair to them. Maybe its time for a competitor to enter the ring.
The last point I wish for you to address is on the verification. I assume there is negligence in some cases but I wouldn't portray it as a free for all. You're going to need some solid evidence to make this claim. I have tried to launch a campaign and was rejected time and again because the paperwork was not enough for them to validate the efforts (majority of labor was paid in cash and the team in the Philippines was not trained on bookkeeping).
Thank you for your thoughtful comment Zakaria.
By the platform’s nature its a marketplace for attention. There are over 7000 campaigns on the platform who want it. Does Bond e shams advertising on the platform create a bigger pie? Does it drown out other perhaps more deserving campaigns unwilling to fork over six figures to LG? If anyone claims advertising in this marketplace creates a bigger pie for everyone, I would love to see the evidence for that.
I don’t know if LG is cheaper or more expensive than adwords matters much. Adwords is an auction market but does not advertise based on roi (effectively setting a commissions). Yes, organizations hire SEMs and advertise based on ROI metrics, but Google or Bing make no promises on that front. They are not charity solicitors like LG plainly is. You get an agency to select keywords and place youtube ads or whatever. Those platforms are not as easy to use or as specific to the purpose of Muslim charitable marketing as LG is, even if LG is more expensive compared to a facebook or bing if you use the right agency, it’s maybe more worth it for the charity. The best value proposition for LG is that you can advertise while pretending it’s not an advertisement with all that religious manipulation going on.
I have written about the use of zakat funds for online advertising previously and I personally don’t believe it is an acceptable use of Zakat, indeed Islamic Relief Worldwide’s zakat policy, as well as the Islamic Council of Europe explicitly prohibit it (sadaqa yes I suppose). The advertising tends to rely on sharp elbows in a competition for territory (booth space, auctions for digital advertising and such)- it is common for Muslim charities to buy adwords for their competitors names. Organizations clearly want market share dominance and are not trying to get people who were not inclined to pay zakat to pay it.
If LG disclosed all the advertising it would perhaps diminish the user experience (since several pages would be dominated by advertising) and undermine LG’s brand as do-gooders working for tips.
LG is strictly a commercial enterprise. There is absolutely nothing altruistic about them.
We have many competitors in the sector. Justgiving, gofundme, mytennights, givebrite - whats the difference between these and launchgood
Justgiving - charges more as default tips, non muslim run, no support for charities, stakeholders fund drones
gofundme - support lgbtq openly, close down muslim campaigns
mytennights - 100k per charity for ramadan
givebrite - marketing packages for ramadan, no fees for platform same as launchgood
Where is information on givebright’s marketing program?
1. I am a Muslim and I have a Muslim Lead campaign on GOFUNDME AND they did not REMOVE. LAUNCHHOOD on the other hand did.
2. I don’t know what your problem with LGBT is but not all lgbtq people are by choice LGBTQ I am born intersex and trans by birth I’m both male and female, in Islam I am considered able to be with a woman, which thankfully I’m only attracted to a woman.
No man alhamdulilah. But launchgood does not respect that and have double standard. They allowed CAAIR and other random members of community to openly fundraiser for lgbtqia people and victims of lgbtqia discrimination
But they (LG) REJECTED my campaign where I stated that I will house and feed INTERSEX and transgender Muslims. Did not mention gay or lesbian yet wow they are this.
Blind. But for media to show them off and look good they allowed the masses to advertise and fundraise for lgbtq people non Muslims even!
Where as I want to build a shelter for all minorities but a separate home for Muslim trans and intersex. Born people like me.
Because currently legally I would be told to go to a woman’s shelter if I was homeless and at one point I did end up at many of them.
Sadly life was so hard and it’s a sin for me to be there but on the other hand had they allowed me at a man’s shelter or man’s jail I as a very marginalized Muslim community member being intersex by birth would easily be killed and or Raped.
This is why I’m Raising awareness on the importance of building a shelter for people in the middle like me! I’m a Muslim and want to help other Muslims like me..
sadly only GOFUNDME allows me. But I still have a campaign that’s separate from this it’s showing woman with hijab it’s a program for women Muslim women’s domestic violence shelter and go fund me has not removed it for months now!
So please brother before you mention something like that just know they don’t remove ALL Muslim campaigns just like launchgood doesn’t deny all lgbtq supporting campaigns but they pick the ones they feel they will make more money from…
This is my life story
"man was created free and mandated"
I will share with you my life and how Islam and homosexuality impacted my life
I was born in Muslim family that was not practicing.
I used to do lot of wrong stuff as a child but I would regret it afterwards I felt regret for my bad actions.
I hated this feeling of regret that came over after I did something wrong
I wished I could reverse time that way I would know what I'm about to do is wrong and I would not do it.
I wished there was some guidance available that told me what is right and wrong.
every time my parents reprimanded me for my wrongdoings they would always say this one sentence "son what you have done is a sin in islam."
to them this may have been a casual sentence but this sentence caused me to ponder to think what is a sin in Islam
as I studied Islam I found out all the wrong things I did were sins in Islam and Islam forbade us from doing those things and that for me was shocking.
I wished I'd learn about Islam before I commited all the sins then I would have less regrets in my life.
I slowly started to practice Islam praying 5 times a day, fasting, giving charity, etc.
moving on when I was around 10 or 11 years of age I realised I am attracted to boys but homosexuality is a sin in Islam.
I had an honest inner dialogue with myself about my feelings.
remember I have understood this fact that if I do something which Allah has prohibited I'm going to regret it.
trust me that feeling of regret I hated it to my very core.
Allah gave humans natural sexual desire for opposite sex and we can only fulfil that desire with our spouse after marriage in Islam.
Allah will not give me homosexual feelings and then punish me for acting upon them.
at that young age I realised these feelings are not from Allah as Allah is just.
inner dialogue: this is my conviction this is my belief that nobody is born gay. I have submitted my will to the will of my creator and homosexuality is a sin in my religion. I will not be a homosexual I am a Muslim. I will not follow desires but I will obey Allah and his messanger Muhammad pbuh. I have chosen my path and my path is Islam.
after this inner dialogue with myself I asked Allah sincerely about my situation and asked Allah to help me resolve these feelings.
I prayed tahajjud asked Allah sincerely that Allah Is ar rahman ar raheem I don't know what went wrong how did I get these feelings ya Allah remove these homosexual feelings from me. ameen
I prayed 5 times a day held tightly onto Qur'an.
I did few things subconsciously Subhan allah when I look back I realise they were very beneficial
Allah would not give me homsexual feelings and then punish me for acting on them.
I innately knew nobody is born gay I knew Allah is just and Allah created me to worship him alone.
I put my Complete trust and tawakul in Allah.
100% of my being believed that I was not born gay and these feelings are not natural.
I stayed away from all homosexual content on news social media cartoons anywhere I saw it I actively blocked it.
I held tightly onto Qur'an and sunnah and slowly these homsexual feelings disappeared alhamdulilah.
nobody is born gay this is one of biggest lies of this era.
and your Lord treats no one with injustice al-Kahf 18:49
Nay, Allaah never commands Fahshaa (evil deeds, unlawful sexual intercourse). Do you say of Allaah what you know not? al-Araaf 7:28
Have you seen he who has taken as his god his [own] desire, and Allah has sent him astray due to knowledge and has set a seal upon his hearing and his heart and put over his vision a veil? So who will guide him after Allah ? Then will you not be reminded
Qur'an 45:23
remember man was created free and mandated.
and allah knows best.
Again, sadly you’re trying soooo hard to force yourself to believe that since it’s wrong that you had these desires. That if someone says one word LGBTQIA you only can recall your sexual desires lol how sad. Not once do you imagine lgbtqia being the I FOR INTERSEX. or T for trans. Like imagine I’m
Born with a penis and boobs and beard and no female eggs non! Soooo in your pretty little world who should I be “married or atttscted to? You tell me ?
I know
You have no -‘true correct answer dear brother because being raised in any religion that we read a book with only our eyes not hearts, we are blinded to only learn what we see, as in we see there’s female there’s male but faile to see the male dna male body parts born in a body a bit mixed due to a genetic make up mixup. Say it all you want Allah doesn’t make mistakes. I agree. Man makes mistakes by trying to kill babies with abortion then a child like me is born and my family 3 times tried forcing me to marry a man. And from age 2 I had zero desires for men and I’m soooo greatful. See you had sexual desires for same sex. Meanwhile I had only LOVE. Purity. And non sexual romance desires for women. Since I’m their opposite sex. I’m sorry but just because a man forgot to translate Allahs word properly or some men scholars who did not know anything about Intersex babies that it’s a whole SEX of its own!! Doesn’t mean I have to be called a girl, or be forced to marry a man due to my voice that simply sounds like a pubescent boy btw not. A girl. And hello I’m born with a males pert just not grown to the point of being able to have sex with it. But that’s why my chromosome test isn’t XY OR XX take a wild guess ? Yep!!! There’s XX-XY there’s XY-XY THERES XXY! You tell me if these are not a birth sex of its own just like female or male, then
What is this ? Or this can be a male born just under developed right ? Then why go try forcing the poor guy to marry another man?? My family now after 40 years realized that they were trying to force a boy to marry another boy wow sadly the ones claiming not to be homosexual were forcing me to be exactly that!!
Each time Allah was with me and I would escape the attempted rape, see the men were Pakistanis or afghans (famous for being 2 faced closet gay or bisexual despite having wives, so they wouldn’t care when I would say brother stop I’m
Similar to you just made a bit disabled due to some medical issues and wow they would say it’s ok there’s always another “door”
These are the sodom and Gomorrah and these are the ones Islam forbids. NOT someone born like me who’s innocently trying to survive a cold world where there are only 1% born like me by the way. Nope I’m single right now because I’m waiting to become fully male with my disabled parts being repaired. Once that’s done I will only be with 1 woman
Whom I marry some day.
So please don’t confuse my birth Sex with a gay man’s sexual desires dear bro. Thanks
Those pakistani afghan men who have wives but still want to sleep with other men is due to either them getting raped at young age or them being brainwashed to believe there is nothing wrong with having sex with men.
There are men in Pakistan who have sex with other men not because they desire men but because they don't want to do marriage as it comes with responsibility or they are too poor to get married but female prostitutes are too expensive for them so they go for cheaper male prostitute
Akhi once you fuck a man you will end up start to like having sex with men and that's why even if you eventually get married you will still secretly fuck men
homosexuality is not from Allah in sense that nobody is born with it everyone themselves choose to be homosexual.
I understand being intersex is from Allah but lesbian gay etc is not.
As for trans people they are mostly mentally ill people very small minority of them could be intersex but alhamdulilah classical scholars have done great work when it comes to intersex people and Allah knows best
Are you reading with your eyes brother or with the eyes of the devil? Do you NOT know the difference between someone saying thet are born with gay desires or even saying they are born gay, VERSUS SOMEONE LIKE ME SAYING IM
BORN INTERSEX.
Because being gay is a sexual orientation and being born by BIRTH INTERSEX is a birth SEX/And or gender but deffinetely not to be mistaken with SEXUALITY OR SEXUAL ORIENTATION.
Now before you tell me to go marry a man simple because I have a females size B cup boobs, let me remind you that I’m born not only with full beard, but I’m born with NO OVARY on one side and an ovary and testicle on the other.
This is internally. No UTERUS, and NO VAGINAL CANAL, instead I have an UNDER DEVELOPED PHALLUS/Mini penis. All of this you are right was not Allahs doing, but my parents were pregnant with TWIN BOYS, they allowed an Abortion to kill both twins, instead I was born with vanishing twin syndrome. My other brother is absorbed
Again, when you try to kill babies in middle of growth, that growth pauses and can mix two kids. I knew that there’s no way it was a girl and boy because a girl cannot be in the same sack as a boy, but untill recently medically this was proved, finally after waiting decades for my family to understand that I’m NOT BORN FEMALE! But I’m not born legally male only due to the mixing of two twins, I’m born intersex. I’m not to be confused with hermaphrodite. That is different.
Anyways there’s only 1% born like me by the way, so my conversation was that I’m PHYSICALLY BORN THIS WAY, which has zero to do with damn desires etc. you were born with a penis and still wanted to be with a same sex person. Sorry but I didn’t want to be with same sex. Because for me opposite sex is a female! So once again being born like this is still considered part of the LGBTQIA community! So nobody should only look at the first 3 letters of this community and say oh no sorry you’re not born with desires like this.
Please open your eyes and educate yourselves beyond only knowing what a male and female is. Know that sometimes when it’s attempted to kill a male baby and it survives, medically they label him an intersex baby. Because the doctors don’t know the back story of how these greedy parents try to kill innocent babies.
So here I go again to say, MY LIFE MATTERS, me being born with mini penis doesn’t make me a woman but instead makes me born a handicap man. And I’ll start HRT and surgery to fix this part of my disability. No way in hell am I going to be with a man if I don’t even have a woman’s area for a man to be with and luckily this is why my hormones naturally due to my testicle etc it’s not allowing me any attraction towards men. To me it feels like a sin and many Imams agree that since I’m one of the miracle babies I’m born slowly developed male. That I shouldn’t be forced to marry a guy.
Now. I’m sorry but my personal belief is that I don’t even want to judge gay and lesbians let Allah be the judge but all I know is that im not gay, because I do not desire a person with same body structure as mine. Nor with my parts internally, yes I have a prostate, testicle and penis, but only due to the way my growth was paused during nothing drugs, my chest is like a chubby boys or teen kids. Even then it doesn’t resemble an actual woman’s. So I’m gonna get top surgery.
Anyways once again please know the difference between intersex being a birth sex and gay being a sexual orientation 2 different worlds brother … I hope Muslims educate themselves before embarrassing in the name of Islam.
Thanks you all, “Knowledge is Power”
Gofundme allows my campaign that shows photos of Muslimahs with hijab, seeking money for Muslims. Yet LG, had asked me to remove the term LGBTQIA community and rejected my already approved campaign!! 1. They already openly help ltbtq campaigns! Yet mine wasn’t going to get them rich so thst didn’t want that. But remember IM NOT GAY. I’m a Muslim man born intersex so I wanted to help intersex and trans communities but in order ro do that, INTERSEX and trans are in the acronym LGBTQIA I IS FOR INTERSEX that’s how I’m
Born due to abortion attempt. Luckily my male body part is inside and will be out surgically. Anyways meaning it’s just sad that LG tried forcing me to remove my identify and for whom I’m fundraising. They wanted me to lie and say that I’m fundraising for all gay ppl too and I said although I do not judge anyone it’s for Allah to judge. I’m only trying to build a shelter for those born like me, so we don’t end up in shelters with women which is a sin in my eyes. Anyway instead of thanking me for such a beautiful idea, they allowed others lgbtq campaigns but rejected mine related to Muslims born intersex. Sadly….
No brother I have emails and phone calls where the team of marketing specifically asked me to remove the part that says I am born intersex and of that I’m helping lgbtq community. And before I could say well I’m
Not gonna help gay ppl
But only those born intersex and trans etc before even saying that, I said wait a minute, didn’t LG allow campaigns for a gay restaurant owner who’s cafe got shot by a homophobe and that Muslim man who shot and killed 50+ people at a club in Orlando, LG was running that campaign like hot cake!
So no I did not get rejected for my other campaigns but the minute I said I’m literally born intersex meaning it’s not some internal desire etc it’s a physical condition caused without any doing of mine or of God. It’s the outcome usually from different reasons but In my case it’s from abortion my mom did during her carrying two boys /twins. I was born!
Anyways, sadly each time I removed any word that said intersex or lgbtq it was approved then I would go back to add my correct words that hello I’m trying to fundraise for ppl born physically intersex suddenly I would get texts calls and emails asking me to stop.
And please don’t tell me of the costs, I have evidence of spending over $10,000 in marketing with LG in the past when my title was NOT LGBTQ intersex born etc so please know this conversation isn’t about how cheap they are etc it’s about how 2 faced they are that I have even considered a lawsuit since I have all my evidence. But sadly, I realized winning money isn’t my goal, but having LG TO STOP doing this is my goal. And I fought deadly illnesses right after they rejected my campaign. Otherwise I would have continued reporting them. CAAIR possibly might take my case since they deal with human
Rights especially Muslim rights.
We shall
See.
Jazaak Allahu khairun
Thanks for the article as usual brother Ahmed.
If people knew the history, Chris Blauvelt (Launchgood founder) was not too shy to grift with CVE, participating in the UAE’s Forum for Promoting Peace’s “Haqqathon” (and even getting first prize.) He even got a glam piece in New Yorker where he supposedly almost got “radicalized” and was “taking the internet back from ISIS” by making a picture uploading app.
https://www.newyorker.com/tech/annals-of-technology/how-to-take-the-internet-back-from-isis
Not surprised to see him graduating to up-charging $100,000 for the odd nights of Ramadan.
May Allah remove dangerous opportunists like these from relevance.
That was also an unfortunate episode.
I think Abdallah here is raising a very important point - and there are some very good questions that need to be explored here in relation to the early days of this platform and to what extent the US state dept had involvement (directly or indirectly). Esp in a surveillance economy and with CVE. We do remember ISNA's awful track record with financial details of Muslims during the Bush administration, right? This really does insist on many questions around LG's origin and rise.
I also want to add that though they claim to be a faith-based startup, they in fact operate as a capitalistic startup, manipulating a language of faith - if they were clear about this distinction then hey, we would all know who we're getting into bed with.
We have to be sharply critical of white male leadership in Muslim orgs and spaces - all leadership in general is held to the same accountability standards, but there is an added level of critique with white men in our current contexts. Thanks for this article Ahmed, good to see others asking good questions.
"We do remember ISNA's awful track record with financial details of Muslims during the Bush administration, right?"
Yikes! I must have missed that! Would you point me to where i can get more information about this? Jazak Allahu Khayran!
Compilation of all related research. I loved the part that we have to be generous not naive.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1oMb-YsQqCJhVtys3b2NprR2fckMHObCT5Q1TR_VXWsI/edit
Youtube playlist - https://www.youtube.com/@CoachZubair/playlists?view=50&sort=dd&shelf_id=5
#SmartGiving
I only donate to Dawateislami. No performance marketing. It’s a 100% organic and trusted multinational non-profit, non-political Islamic organization. Look, I am literally one of their ‘word of mouth’ marketers, simply because of how transparent and Islamic they are.
I did. I will list what happened for us all. Please do take a read. We should speak to charities to understand what and how launchgood operates. I am one of those and those I speak with have similar feedback as me. Its a good business determined to support the muslim community.
1. I paid $3,000 and raised $19,000 - my fees for marketing was $3,000 and my fees for the bank was $570 - so total $3,570. Not 50% at all.
2. I was made to pay upfront - the marketing package was not allowed to come from my donations raised, they were very strict on that. They also rejected my first campaign saying its not good for donor variety and that I should present a campaign donors would want to donate
3. They offered me guidance and training to raise funds for free. No pressure to buy a marketing package. In fact, we raised a whole lot for our project using their community pages to raise funds as a team - they did not charge at all for this - muslim consultants charge $$$ for this advice.
4. I wanted to invest in marketing, just like we invest in Facebook, TikTok and Google - the model was simple, pay whatever you can afford and get more exposure when you can afford more. Not new to the sector.
5. The fees were standard - but it went to the bank processors, not launchgood, althought launchgood wants people to leave tips (makes sense, same as justgiving and gofundme). No-one has ever complained about their 15% default fee. So I accept their tip model. I'm not sure how many people leave tips. I dont get to see that,
6. In ramadan - I saw their marketing but I was rejected as they did not feel their donors would respond to my campaign as I had run it before. But below is the deal and how I saw it:
Could purchase a $10,000 package. With a no loss gurantee. Their team mentioned that this meant if the campaign raised less, they would refund my money. They expected a 2-4x. I'm not sure how many they sold but lets say they sold 100 of these - they would make about 1-2million from packages. Now, lets say they got back charities 2-4 million - thats no different to facebook (where there is no loss gurantee)
So yes it seems LaunchGood does make money. I don't think thats a bad thing. Muslim businesses should make money. Especially when they are benefitting the community. We have no issue with non muslim platforms milking our communities 15% as a default tip and then using the same funds to target our community. But we have a huge issue with a platform serving the community making millions.
Again, yes launchgood does make millions. But lets just say they made 2 million from marketing. But was able to help Muslims raise 4 million and then give them free coaching to raise another 20 million. Is that a bad thing?
When was this? What organization? Was the advertising disclosed to donors in that case? I also think businesses should make money.
I think the bigger issue is that we the consumers don't know these campaigns are advertised. The lack of transparency is concerning. There is nothing wrong with non-profits spending on marketing and launchgood has every right to make money as they please but most people were under the impression that they are fully funded by generous tips.
I saw their emails they write 'this is a paid campaign' - this is what was on our email anyway.
If we asked charities - do you want it to say sponsored - would charities even want it?
I don't see paid campaign tags on their website - i don't have their emails so I can't speak to that.
It doesn't matter what charities want it to say - this is for the benefit and protection of the consumers/donators. It's the reason why FTC mandates creators communicate clearly when they are being sponsored to make a video.
I agree. Emails do state they have paid campaigns. The website is a different story. I pointed this out in the article in the example of Bond e shams, where there was no such disclosure
Agreed - they can add sponsored to homepage on their site. I don't think thats too hard to do. But 1) feels like an easy ask for the public to do and 2) was it even in their pipeline? Maybe it was, maybe it was not.
1. Charity - i work for a large one so wont disclose as I probably should not be commenting for them officially.
2. Yes as it was a newsletter and it did say paid campaign
Also I am seeing your comment about charities using donation funds to pay for another package. Im not clear on what you are saying. Are you saying that charities dont use raised sadaqah funds to pay for marketing? Because damn right they do! 99% of charities take an admin percentage and then use that same percentage to pay for marketing
So where I said I raised $19,000. We have an admin percentage of 15%. So we would take that $2,850 top it up and then buy another package.
Are you saying launchgood should be held accountable for the way charities make decisions about their admin spend? That is on us as charities no?
I mean think about ads right now - did you know there are adveritisng agencies in the muslim sector that charge from the donations directly. Raise x amount and we take 10% from your donations < that is what they do.
I dont think we can hold launchgood to account for how charities decide where they pay for marketing packages. BUT lets just say we wanted them to be accountable - what would they do, ask charities to confirm these funds were not from the previous fundraiser? Audit their books?
That was about a comment someone made that was the money for campaigns came from somewhere else mysterious or as if launchgood has some special money that is not fungible. Its not really about why I wrote the article. He was reaching and I was just pointing out a flaw in his claim.
If you read this newsletter you would know that it’s animated by zakat issues. LG is essentially a commission-based (effectively though not formally) charitable solicitor but it has a zakat policy it uses for marketing and profit to make people think they have standards when they don’t, at least not when it comes to it’s profiting from zakat. I would not expect them to be a charity regulator obviously. If they did not market zakat in particular its unlikely the company would have come on my radar. If they make claims about zakat, especially how it can be used or restricted, then act in ways that undermine those policies (what I noted this year and last), it deserves notice.
What marketing agencies do you refer to and are those registered with any state AGs that you have seen?
Look, if they follow the rules and play fair with donors they can have whatever business model they want and I may not write about it. If they transparently charge high prices that’s more a problem for the charity then the agency or charitable solicitor (assuming they are not pretending to be something while being something else).
STOP
LYING please I am one of the first campaigners and LG will not only be sued by me soon, I’m speaking with my attorney in few hours. I have not slept all night after seeing how they treated me and my charity and I have evidence of all of this.
Everything brother Ahmed said is 100% accurate in fact he’s too kind about it…. These people took advantage of me when I was just a “homeless girl needs justice to them!!
They took over 75% of my donations and I slept on the street! Now I’m a nonprofit charity and due to health issues caused by LG from during the days I had to sleep in my car while LG looted my campaigns!
By taking 3k plus even if I only made 7k they would say your campaign doesn’t look great but yet sadly they had no problem taking 2-3k every 2 weeks from me for over a year!!
So please do not ever defend such monsters. I am about to take them down for minority discrimination and CAAIR attorneys will either help me on this or get sued for not taking a case just because they want to continue making money off of LG. So hopefully CAAIR is smart about this.
My media outlet connections my Celebrity PR lady will really expose LG and this is no longer about finances nor lawsuit for money, this is about saving the Muslim ummah from them! Just watch and return here as I continue to update..
Jazak Allahu Khayran for your detailed response.
This is not researched well. I have raised funds with launchgood and this is not accurate.
Thanks for your feedback Abdullah. Did you participate in the marketing program? What did you raise money for and how much did you raise?
In fact, he is spot on. They make millions. Check it out on your own. Do you research. This is a money making enterprise off the backs of unsuspecting, pious and generous, Muslims.
As Salamu Alaikum Abdullah, I would love to hear your side of the story.
The author has backed up his claims with sources including screen shots, which I personally find quite compelling. Would you do so as well?
Wasalam, Sithara
I do not agree with this at all! You have no idea how it’s works internally and how the team Intention is. It is the month of Ramadan and Allah is watching you spread false information. Please spend time with yourself and your consciousness
Okay. Please tell us how it works internally, and if that is different from what we can see, like the marketing program. If there is false information please point it out, I will be happy to correct it, with apologies?
Sensationalist title for views, we need to be better than this as Muslims. I've used LaunchGood for fundraising for my charity and they never take donations from a campaign to pay for the marketing package so this notion of 'up to half your donation is going to LaunchGood' is completely false. Charities pay for their marketing package separately from their admin pot (this could've been raised from various streams, both offline and online fundraising and on any platform) and NOT from the donations their marketing package campaign raises on LaunchGood. You can do better than this.
Thanks for your comment.
What charity have you been fundraising for? Please share.
As a Muslim that is apparently better than other Muslims you disclosed you were advertising to donors right?
I actually walked readers through how LG charges and hopefully they understood it fine. You agree that if an ROI of $10,000 is 2x then x = $5,000? The cost of raising that money was $5,000? I hope we agree on the basic numbers here?
Now the money to pay for this was from was from other streams you say? There is some sort of Chinese Wall between streams of donations that makes this all ethical? Please educate us about this because that is fascinating.
LG never takes donations from a marketing package as a fee? So if a charity got $10,000 from an LG campaign and wanted to give $5000 of it to LG to do another campaign, LG would refuse? Can you cite chapter and verse from the TOS because I cannot seem to find it. Is money from an LG campaign less fungible than the rest of the money supply?
Akhi go and look at classical work of scholars they have done great work when it comes to explaining intersex people. Allah is ar Rahman may Allah give you ease ameen. I want to share my life story only to enjoin good and forbid evil alhamdulilah and Allah knows best
Latest update as of March 2025. Is it a step in right direction?
https://blog.launchgood.com/posts/zakat-fee-decision
As I explained previously, the main concern I have is not tips, which is small potatoes for Launchgood, but their marketing program. That is how they get a bigger bite out of zakat, by getting large fees from “zakat-eligible” organizations that amounts to a commission. I believe they are doing a better job disclosing advertisements now, however, where they were hiding this before.
I only donate to Dawateislami. No performance marketing. It’s a 100% organic and trusted multinational non-profit, non-political Islamic organization. Look, I am literally one of their ‘word of mouth’ marketers, simply because of how transparent and Islamic they are.