Om bawang, answering this question might make you get more haters. What's your thought on fansites? They usually take pictures/fancam where it's restricted, but that's also the way to "entertain" fans (and make money for those who sell).
Smaller fandoms definitely need the added publicity and social media exposure, as well as the dedicated following that fansites can usually help to galvanise. EXID is a prime example of how well things can go (though the fancammer was not an EXID fancammer as much as someone who just followed hot girl groups around).
Bigger groups, not so much.
Same with donations for gifts. I’ve talked to a few idols, their friends and family and for the most part for bigger names, they are grateful for them but they’re not needed. To paraphrase one that left an impression on me, “It’s not like the members can’t buy things for themselves when they earn [six digits] a year. We know our fans are usually young and we don’t want fans to be burdening themselves by taking money out of their allowance or first paychecks to do that.” I found new appreciation for that person, putting the fans first, no matter what.
From a business standpoint, a fansite for one member of a big group can usually raise five digits USD, which translates to thousands of albums and goodness knows how many streams and downloads. Given the cost of production of fangoods, delivery costs and a cut taken by most sites either on a personal level or for better equipment, the gifts that arrive are necessarily less than the value of the donations, and as I said the gifts are not necessary.
Popular groups also feel burdened by smaller gifts, like plushie toys and whatnot. Several of the top groups literally have a rented warehouse where they keep all of them, because it’s honestly impossible to put them anywhere else other than landfill at the risk of literally filling up their house from top to bottom.
Hence why I’m more inclined to support fansites that do charity donation projects and bulk album purchases more so than ones that send gifts to the artist, unless it’s something really fun and unique. Charity by fans is something positive that idols can get into news articles for, without being accused of mediaplay, and with charity done by idols and charity done by fans being seen as different things, you can clearly see that fan charity donations is something that idols can’t do for themselves, no matter how much they personally earn.
