It’s late at night. Someone is visiting your website and they like what they see. They want to donate to your cause, but it’s too late to call the office and too bothersome to write out a check. Where is the “Donate Now” button? You do have one, right?

Most nonprofits are heavily dependent on donations from the public to sustain their programs. A nonprofit’s website is increasingly the first public face of a nonprofit - and an excellent channel for receiving donations. Not quite sure? Watch this TechSoup webinar on making it easy for supporters to give by accepting online donations.

How would you mashup the Network for Good donation processing service with other services to make it easier for nonprofits to raise money online? Submit your ideas to the DonateNow Mashup Challenge sponsored by the Case Foundation by May 19.

At the beginning of December, nptech blogger extraordinaire, Beth Kanter, created a Network for Good Charity Badge for the Sharing Foundation's education programs, and began a campaign to win a $50,000 matching grant from Yahoo!.  In order to win, the Sharing Foundation had to have the most individal donors give through the Sharing Foundation's Network for Good Charity Badge. In three weeks, they raised $49,537 from 745 donors and won the Yahoo! Matching grant of $50,000.  Second runner up was WorldChanging with 522 donors giving $12,767.  Third runner up was Global Justice with 261 donors giving $14,321.

The biggest barrier will be translating communication into specific action. We can all agree that people should not go hungry in America but what exactly are we going to do about it?