Join our grant-matching focus group

The grant-making system is broken. We’re building the navigation system to fix it.

Raiser is a platform that helps charities and funders find each other, built by people who have spent years on both sides of the grant-making table.

We’ve just won innovation funding through the Greater Manchester Business Growth Hub to build something the sector has never had: a matching engine that understands what charities actually do, not just the words they use to describe it.

This autumn we need five funders and five frontline charities around the table to shape how it works.

4 × 90-minute calls in November · 10 organisations · £25 voucher per call

The problem

If you’re a small charity, you already know the drill

• Hours spent trying to find funders that might be interested in your community
• Weeks bending your work to fit word counts that make no sense
• Answering the exact same questions you answered for the last funder
• Losing out simply because you didn’t use the "right" sector jargon

If you’re a funder

• Your inbox is overwhelmed with a 400% surge in applications since 2020
• You’re still struggling to uncover the quiet, grassroots organisations doing the most vital work on the ground

Across the UK, hundreds of millions of pounds are wasted every year on rejected bids and compliance theatre. Not on the work. On the paperwork.

We don’t think charities should have to become full time PR professionals to be heard, and we don’t think funders should have to rely on guesswork, clunky keywords or black-box algorithms to find great causes.

What we’re building

A navigation system for philanthropic grant-making. We don’t just want to put a plaster on the current fundraising landscape to make it a bit less painful. We want to redefine it and create transformative infrastructure which underpins really good grant-making.

This project is creating the sector’s first meaning-based matching engine. Instead of relying on rigid tags or generic AI that just mimics jargon, we’re engineering a purpose-built philanthropic ontology. It translates what charities actually do day to day into the specific outcomes funders care about, with transparent, explainable recommendations that back up human decision-making rather than replacing it.

How it works: key, map and sat nav

• Key: the components the sector’s map of impact is made up of, such as activities and outcomes
• Map: how all the different pieces of impact data fit together: who funded what work, which charities achieved what outcomes
• Sat nav: Raiser’s new way of navigating this formerly complex, scattered data. Home in on exactly which charity or funder is the best partner to deliver the change you want to see

This isn’t an abstract theory session

It’s a working room where ten organisations get hands-on with the prototypes, challenge our assumptions and define the shared language that will power pilot deployments in early 2027.

Why take part

For funders

A chance to build the intuitive, trustworthy discovery tools you’ve always needed, cut the administrative noise and fund where the impact is greatest.

• Shape a discovery tool that filters out generic, AI-generated fluff and flags genuinely aligned organisations before paperwork starts
• Co-design an explainable recommendation engine, grounded in strict eligibility rules and clear audit trails, that assists trustee decisions
• Benefit from structured, reusable charity impact profiles that cut assessment overhead
• Influence the underlying ontology so it reflects your foundation’s strategic priorities
• Secure priority access to the early-2027 pilots and a curated community of high-impact charities

For charities

A chance to make sure the technology values real-world frontline evidence over glossy grant writing.

• Make sure your frontline delivery is accurately mapped to funder priorities, even if you don’t use their terminology
• Help refine a platform built around a single, reusable Impact Story™, cutting time spent writing repetitive bids from scratch
• Counter the advantage held by well-resourced fundraising teams by training the engine to surface real community outcomes
• Shape the workflows and core free features so they reflect frontline realities and capacity limits
• Gain early visibility with active grant-makers taking part in the 2027 pilots

What’s involved

• Four 90-minute calls: 9, 16, 23 and 30 November
• You’ll need to join at least three of the four sessions
• A £25 voucher for each call you attend

Apply to take part

Together, we’re making the grant application form a thing of the past. Places are limited to five funders and five charities.