There are many reasons to love peer-to-peer, but if you’re new to a peer-to-peer strategy, you may at times have felt too intimidated or overwhelmed to get started. After all, peer-to-peer fundraising depends a lot on motivating others to raise funds for your cause. Letting others take control can sometimes make anyone nervous!
The good news is that with some planning and thoughtful execution, your next peer-to-peer could be your most successful campaign yet. Below we’ll share our favorite tips to help make your next (or your first!) peer-to-peer campaign feel less intimidating and more inspirational.
Create fundraising teams
Teams are the heart of a peer-to-peer. With teams, fundraisers group together to fundraise on behalf of your cause and spread the word. You’ll instantly see more reach with more people involved. It’s free advertising in the form of word-of-mouth marketing, and with peer-to-peer, this is crucial for success.
In your next peer-to-peer campaign, some teams you can try to form include:
- Beneficiaries. Those who received help from your charity and would want to start a team can do so to share their story as a powerful way to inspire others.
- Supporters. Supporters believe in your cause but may not have a connection or story to tell. If you share impactful statistics or stories with supporters, they can form an effective team for your campaign.
- Corporations. Corporations love to get involved in team fundraising. It’s a great way to motivate employees to give and hold office competitions. You can help these teams too by providing stories, imagery, and pertinent information.
When encouraging donors to form teams, don’t forget that peer-to-peer teams need to assign crucial roles like team captain, fundraiser manager, marketer, and more.
Encourage user-generated content
User-generated content is the secret sauce for content. It refers to anything created by someone outside your team that you can use. Most user-generated content from a specific campaign or topic, which makes it perfect for a peer-to-peer campaign. In your peer-to-peer, you can think about asking for supporters to help you create user-generated content such as:
- Impact stories that tell how someone has been helped by your organization
- Volunteer stories that show how much effort gets put in behind the scenes
- Donor stories that highlight active givers or who participate in specific or annual campaigns
- Fan stories that show the effort and support of people who may like your organization but don’t contribute in another way
- Stories that may have emerged from past successful peer-to-peer campaigns
Have Charity Merch Available
Merch is a great way to represent a cause and spread awareness. It can also help bond a peer-to-peer team or incentivize a team to work towards a fundraising goal.
For example, when fundraisers join a team, or make any individual donation, merch like stickers and shirts can be awarded as a thank you. Or, consider giving fundraising leaders free swag as they work as a team captain. It’ll help recognize their leadership and make them feel more connected to the cause.
If your peer-to-peer is going to venture out into the community, let participants show themselves sporting your gear. It’s a great way to brand a team and show unity, plus invites conversation as others ask about t shirts or stickers they see. Sharing why the branded item matters is a great way to generate content while sharing a mission.
If you are looking for ideas, the GiveWP store can lend some inspiration. It runs on Printful and WooCommerce, which connect to your WordPress website for a relatively simple setup.
Be strategic about social media
Peer-to-peer strategies go hand-in-hand with social media campaigns. Due to the social nature of a peer-to-peer, campaigns that are actively engaging with users may see more impact.
The first step in a solid social media campaign will be optimizing its presence and content. The way to do this is through posting relevant and engaging content on multiple platforms. Think of content that focuses on people. (This is where user-generated content comes in handy!) Posts that center around the people that the campaign helps or the people raising money will show a commitment to the cause. We’re a fan of using social platforms like Instagram and TikTok for engaging your fundraisers.
Additionally, think about how you can encourage teams to share a post about the campaign, since word-of-mouth is the backbone of peer-to-peer. Perhaps putting a “most shares in 24 hours” incentive on a campaign post can add some fun social pressure. Make sure to award or highlight the team who wins!
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Implement Gamification
When thinking of social pressure, there’s nothing like adding a bit of competition to your peer-to-peer. The best way to do this is by embracing elements of gamification.
In a gamified system, users are motivated by the possibility of a reward. Whether it’s through a competition, achievement, progress bar, badge, or points, there are several ways you can help along a peer-to-peer campaign by simply gamifying the process a bit.
Challenging your donors to raise towards a set goal is a simple way to do this. When creating a challenge for your peer-to-peer, you can make it amount-centered (first team or fundraiser to hit a certain amount), or you can try a time-based challenge (most raised in 24 hours, for example). Use a progress bar to help the challenge along. Donors love seeing a piece of that bar filled as they race to complete the goal before the campaign ends!
Give donors a task to complete
We mention it often, but the reason the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge was such a sensation was because it required that people tag others — whether on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram or YouTube. Additionally, it added a fun challenge on top of the social sharing part.
To think of creating something in this spirit, start by giving donors something fun to do.
The task can be simple, like a share of the campaign or joining a team. Or, think bigger, like a photo upload doing a certain activity (though, we encourage you to think beyond ice buckets). Videos are everywhere nowadays, and users love the chance to film themselves completing a challenge, or even talking about why they love your charity so much. The possibilities are endless!
Use Email Marketing
Emails that motivate fundraisers can be one of the most important tools for a peer-to-peer, but they can also be one of the most time-consuming tasks. Before launching your campaign, plan out the emails you might send throughout.
For example, day one might begin with a welcome email and information on how to donate and join a team. Day two might be how to reach out to others and extend the campaigns to donor’s social circles. Day three could be an article sharing tips, like this one! Day four could be a social challenge to complete. And so on!
While it’s a good idea to touch base everyday of the campaign, but don’t become overbearing or ask for too much. Keep the message short and snappy and think of empowering donors to be successful little by little.
Recognize fundraisers throughout the campaign
Funds coming in through individuals and team efforts are what keep the campaign alive and going. It’s important to not focus all your efforts on recruiting and spreading the word and forgetting to take time to show gratitude for the funds that actively come in during the campaign.
Take a few moments throughout to recognize and feature your high performers or inspiring individuals. Think about sending an upbeat, motivating email when they’re halfway to their goal, or celebrate when they’ve gone above and beyond. Even consider applying a slight bit of social pressure by mentioning when one team is closing in on their goal and may “beat” other teams to a prize.
These high-performing teams and team captains should be treated just like big donors to keep them returning each year. Those small recognitions along the way can help boost morale to push a team closer to your target campaign goal.
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Craft an honest thank you
Of course, you’ll thank your fundraisers after the campaign is complete, but make sure it feels authentic and specific. In addition to a tailored email thanking donors, thinking of other ways to show your gratitude. A thank-you can come in a variety of ways, whether it’s public recognition through social media or tokens of appreciation.
Think about prizes, personalized thank you notes, newsletters about the project they raised funds for, or even a special event for these fundraisers. Perhaps those who participated in the peer-to-peer have VIP status for a future fundraiser or activity you host. Show your donors how much you value their time and efforts!
Analyze the success
When you hit your goal, take the necessary time to celebrate and send thank yous, and then internally, take a look at performance. It’ll be helpful after the campaign to build a report of the key metrics that helped drive your campaign’s success. Some of the metrics might include average donation size, supporter retention rate, number of new donors who contributed, number of teams, average team size and contributions, marketing success rate, and more.
These metrics will help you see what went well and where there’s room for improvement. Make note for the next one. Did a social media strategy not quite pan out? Or did something take off that you weren’t expecting and with relatively little effort? Consider why to determine if it can be replicated in the future.
Keep in mind that each campaign is different, and a cookie-cutter approach to peer-to-peer won’t always work. Since participants involved can change each campaign, you’ll need to keep on your toes and adapt as needed to make the campaign a success.
Have a tip that’s helped you launch a successful peer-to-peer campaign? We’d love to hear about it. Drop a comment below and share your user success story with us. If you’re ready to try out peer-to-peer, read more about how this strategy may help your cause.Â
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