JustGiving is poised to trial a new company giving platform as part of a strategic push towards corporate giving for the website.

More than 20 companies have already signed up to the soon-to-be launched platform, which will begin in trial stage with a few founding partners next month. The platform will enable company employees to fundraise on one platform, but for whichever and as many charities they choose.

Howard Bell, head of partnerships at JustGiving, told Civil Society that the impending launch was not an isolated corporate-facing initiative. “This is definitely the beginning of a new growth area for us,” he said. “We see this as a first proposition.”

The sites will be managed by JustGiving, but companies will be given scope to customise the content, from branding to colour and look and feel.

Bell said that the idea for the corporate-focused platform came about after market research found that many individuals fundraising on JustGiving were employees at FTSE100 companies – around 80 of those companies have a significant number of employee fundraisers. He added, however, that while at first launch stage the proposition will focus on these kinds of organisations, JustGiving expects it to have use to a range of companies and public sector organisations.

“We’ve never had a direct relationship with companies, and that seemed wrong,” said Bell, adding that in conversations, CSR departments expressed a desire for such a product, particularly in that it can support more effective reporting. He said that JustGiving had noticed an increase in strategic partnerships between companies and top-tier charities in the last 18 months, and felt that such a platform could support and enable more such partnerships.

“It’s particularly interesting to charities who want to solidify existing partnerships,” he suggested.

Bell said that the new focus at JustGiving is not a result of increased competition from Virgin Money Giving for the sponsorship pound, but “a natural response to what our customers wanted”.

There are no firm targets for how much this kind of platform might raise for charities. “We are very optimistic that it will be a very popular solution,” said Bell.

JustGiving will monitor the trial launch in April with a view to launching more widely soon thereafter. “We’re not in a rush to get this out early,” said Bell, who did not nominate a specific full-launch date.

The development follows JustGiving’s launch of a team fundraising facility earlier this month, which is open to corporate, school and sporting teams, which now has 450 teams fundraising on it.