Can a search engine empower your local impact community?

Yes, it can. In four regions, the non-profit search engine Gexsi started to use its revenues to specifically support social innovators from the respective regions. This way, your daily web search supports the local impact community, one click at a time.

There exist numerous online tools that rely on donations. Wikipedia is a good example. Google is different. Last year, the company generated the equivalent of 123 billion euros in revenues through its advertising network. Too bad that the money does not flow back to the region where it was generated. Yet it could do so much good there.

Think global – act local

With Gexsi we seek to change these mechanics. As a non-profit search engine, we use at least half of all revenues (and because of our charitable umbrella 100% of the profits anyway) to strengthen the impact community. We support innovative social projects that make the world a better place. And we now started to do this with the ambition to empower regional impact communities. 

In the four regions listed below, we count the revenues which we generate through the search requests in each region, and make sure that we include a corresponding number of projects from that area in our Gexsi project portfolio. This way the daily search on the internet turns into local engagement. To run this scheme, we work closely together with the local impact communities:

• Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Region
• Baden-Württemberg
• Switzerland
• Austria (in preparation)

Each region counts about 8 to 12 million inhabitants and benefits from sufficiently strong emotional ties.

Visibility far beyond the home region

The regions are big enough to ensure that there exist enough innovative social projects whose solutions and stories inspire people even beyond the region itself, and hence are worth spreading. As of now, we feature all projects supported on our global website. We share the stories with all Gexsi users, whether they are based in the respective region or anywhere else in the world.

«We are specifically looking for local projects whose innovative approach is likely to inspire people independent from their location. For example, our current project Tausche Bildung für Wohnen (“Education for Housing Swap”) is anchored in the two cities of Duisburg and Gelsenkirchen. But the model could also work in other parts of the world» Andreas Renner, Co-Founder Gexsi

At the same time, each of the four regions has a rich impact community to team up with, such as the various Impact Hubs, Social Impact Labs, or the Impact Factory in Duisburg, with whom we work closely together. These serve as scouts to identify powerful projects and could develop into regional Gexsi Hubs. This way we can grow as a search engine without losing touch with our community.

The 17 Global Goals as common ground

For us, there is no contradiction between regional and global. The mission of Gexsi is to close the financing gap of social enterprises – everywhere. We want to support social innovators worldwide who contribute to the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and give them visibility through our platform and media partners. This is particularly important where others – investors, foundations, government – find it difficult to engage or are underfunded. This mission is also hidden in our name: Gexsi stands for “The Global Exchange for Social Investment” and ties in with a program that was conceived several decades ago by the Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship but then got stuck halfway through.

We are amazed at how well it is possible to bridge local initiatives with global impact. Almost half of the 27 projects selected on the basis of our Gexsi Scorecard to date are rooted in either Germany, Switzerland, or Austria, but have a strong social impact in the global South. Examples are OneDollarGlasses from Nuremberg, Socialbnb and Forest Gum from Cologne, Ya Bana Global Care from Munich, or Swimsolar from Vienna.

Partner wanted!

While we have already supported several projects from the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region and Baden-Württemberg, we are in the very early stages with Switzerland and Austria. We are looking for people and partners who like to help build a local Gexsi movement there, and to identify inspiring projects to support.

«This is a powerful instrument to give more visiblity and to support the many good initiatives from the region that tackle social and ecological challenges.» Oliver Kuschel, Co-founder Impact Factory

And of course, we are already looking for partners with whom we can get involved in other regions.

Questions, remarks, or critique?
Write to us: andreas@good-search.org