As an innovative social impact business, Beam is continually looking for new ways to help our members and engage our supporters.

Here are just a few things we have added after learning more about our members’ needs and hearing feedback from our supporters.

Childcare

A major barrier to training and work for many parents is the time constraints and costs of childcare. Beam now funds the costs of childcare, giving parents an equal opportunity to train up and get into their chosen career.

The first Beam member to receive this support was Khyreya.

Beam helped Khyreya fundraise to train up as a nursery assistant. Supporter donations also covered the costs of childcare so Khyreya was able to complete her training.

“I love the job as I’ve had a lot of practise raising kids and know this is something I can succeed at — helping other mums and also making sure I can be at home to look after mine outside working hours.” — Khyreya

Updates

When people donate to a member’s campaign, they have the option to leave a message of support.

Since we launched in September, hundreds of positive messages have come flooding in for our members. The impact of these has been transformative and many members wanted to respond to these directly.

That’s why our developer Julian has built a personalised “News” section for every member. Now members can share their progress and training experiences and supporters can see the direct impact of their donations. This communication and connection is an invaluable part of the Beam network.

Members are able to use their creativity to share their journeys however they want, with images, testimonials and even personalised Beam vlogs!

Monthly Donations

When we launched in September, many of our supporters asked us if they could give every month. So we made that happen!Supporters now have the option to give once — and Beam will automatically split their donation equally between all live campaigns each month. This innovation helped not only increase the predictability of funding our members’ campaigns, but has allowed us to successfully fund 100% of Beam campaigns.

If there’s anything else you’d like to see, let us know! Just send us an email at [email protected] or give us a tweet @wearebeam.