30+ Top Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas for Nonprofits

Most modern fundraisers are more than aware of peer-to-peer fundraising, where you encourage your nonprofit’s supporters to fundraise on your behalf. These campaigns combine a sense of purpose with the social and competitive aspects of charitable giving, making it one of the most engaging and successful fundraising methods.Engaging fundraising ideas are essential to success. To help you select an idea that’ll most benefit your organization, this guide will cover:

• Best Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas
• Easy Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas
• Best DIY Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples
• Unique Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples
• Best Virtual Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas
• Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples for Schools
• Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples for Cancer and Medical Needs
• Tips for Choosing a Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Idea
• Getting Started with Peer-to-Peer Fundraising

Let’s start with the best peer-to-peer fundraising ideas for your nonprofit!

Best Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas

Run/Walk/Ride Events

Hosting a run, walk, or ride event is one of the most popular peer-to-peer fundraising campaign ideas, and for good reason. These events are fun, large in scale, and can bring together multiple groups (and their networks) to fundraise for your cause. Participants form teams or fundraise on their own, giving them options for getting involved.

When designing your run/walk/ride, be sure your team thinks through the following fundraising questions:

• What’s your budget?
• How much do you need to raise?
• Will you have a theme?
• What’s your launch timeframe?
• How will you promote the event?
• What peer-to-peer platform are you using?

One of the basics of any peer-to-peer campaign is giving participants tools to raise donations on their own for the cause. Be sure to select fundraising software that supports your run/walk/ride event to the fullest—more on that later!

If you’d like to learn more about these events, check out our guide for more tips.

Golf Outings

Golf outings are a great way for nonprofits and their supporters to raise money for a cause before the event, using traditional peer-to-peer methods, and then take the competition to an even higher level on the course itself.

An easy way to use social fundraising for your golf outing is to add competitive elements to up the ante and the fun.

• Have foursomes fundraise as a team, with every dollar going to support the cause.
• Include at-the-hole competitions for individuals or teams.
• Have a corporate sponsorship ‘golf-off.’

This allows participants and businesses to leverage their social networks far beyond the golf course!

Ambassador Fundraising

Ambassador fundraising is a subset of peer-to-peer fundraising that takes the competitive nature of peer-to-peer campaigns to new levels. Nonprofits can maximize donations and engagement by identifying a handful of top supporters and highlighting them as Ambassadors.

These Ambassadors do the bulk of the social and in-person fundraising, and at the end of the campaign, you’ll reveal which Ambassador raised the most money at a big party, in-person or virtual.

Easy Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas

Pub Crawl

Who doesn’t love a social pub crawl, especially if it comes with a charitable twist?

Nonprofits can turn to support local restaurants and bars to see if they offer discounts or percentage nights (for example, 10% of sales would go to a nonprofit organization) and then plan a pub crawl around these locations.

Participants can take the excitement to the next level by breaking into teams and competing in challenges at each location as a way to raise more donations. Or create wrap around events that tie into a larger peer-to-peer campaign!

Movie Night

Grab some popcorn! Movie nights are a terrific way to raise money and enjoy a cozy night with your favorite flick. Planning this fundraising event is relatively simple—just choose a movie, book a venue, and send out invitations.

Ask your team to donate the price of a movie ticket to your page as an entry fee, and you’re all set. This is a great option for Ambassadors looking to build their network!

Car Wash

Car washes are fundraising staples that speak for themselves; they’re low-cost, quick, and an easy way to bring in funding. You’ll just need to invest in soap, sponges, and promotion. Your nonprofit’s staff and most loyal volunteers can help wash cars the day of.

You can even make it a team fundraising competition—who can wash the most cars?

Matching Gift Drive

Nothing inspires giving more than knowing your donation will have a greater impact than usual. For a matching gift drive or challenge, secure sponsorship from a major donor or corporate partner. They’ll agree to match donations at a certain ratio, usually 1:1 or 0.5:1 during a specific period, such as the next two weeks.

Then, you’ll encourage your loyal supporters to donate and spread the word to their peers. Individuals will jump at the opportunity to increase their donations at no extra cost! Plus, you can also encourage them to research and leverage their employers’ matching gift programs.

Competitive Team Fundraising:

To make any peer-to-peer fundraiser successful, you must motivate your participants. One way to do this is to instill a healthy dose of competition by encouraging them to create teams and compete to see which team is the most successful at fundraising by the end of the challenge.

With the help of your peer-to-peer fundraising software, guide the campaign with:

• Weekly fundraising challenges
• Fundraising and recruiting leaderboards
• Social media rewards
• Social activities
• Milestone badges

This is a surefire way to inspire friendly competition and pull in more funds for your nonprofit’s cause!

Best DIY Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples

Birthday Fundraisers

A birthday fundraiser leverages the power of social media and the excitement surrounding your supporters’ birthdays. Rather than receiving traditional gifts, individuals may wish to raise donations on your nonprofit’s behalf.

Here’s how it works:

• The individual creates a fundraising page with information about their connection to the cause.
• They spread the word on social media, encouraging their network to donate before the end of their birthday.
• As the birthday fundraiser progresses, they provide updates on the total amount raised.

This tactic is extremely useful for generating year-round revenue. You get the donations, and supporters can feel proud that they’ve helped your organization.

Tributes and Memorials

Everyone has a reason for giving. Allow supporters to honor and pay tribute and celebrate loved ones with personalized giving opportunities.

Check out Faith’s Lodge success story of how they remember and honor their loved ones.

These campaigns bring a community together to provide powerful testimonials and create something good out of loss.

These campaigns raise more and reach more with a peer-to-peer fundraising solution, with the opportunity for each participant to set up their own fundraising page and give their tribute to honor the loved one.

Holiday Party

Holiday parties are a popular way for communities to gather and celebrate the occasion. Why not let them add your mission to their list of things to celebrate? For this idea, encourage your key supporters to fundraise for you at their holiday parties. They can create peer-to-peer fundraising pages that party attendees can donate to if they feel moved by the spirit of giving. Or, they might ask all attendees to make a small donation in exchange for attending.

If you’d like to add a gamification element and further inspire your supporters’ creativity, have them compete to see who can raise the most money for your nonprofit’s cause!

Give It Up Challenge

Whether they want to cut midnight snacks or stop smoking, people are always trying to form better habits. A little external motivation can be helpful if they’re serious about sticking with their new lifestyle. That’s where your nonprofit can help.

Your supporters can turn their new habit into a Give It Up Challenge, where they collect pledges or donations from their peers in exchange for staying dedicated to their new routine. This peer-to-peer fundraising idea can raise significant amounts at the beginning of the year, as many people will be creating new resolutions and trying their best to stick to them.

Unique Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples

Casino Night

We all want to feel like James Bond sometime in our life, and casino nights are the perfect place to give your donors a taste of the high life.

Participants can set up online giving pages where others can donate to the nonprofit, and the attendees who raise the most get more chips to use at the tables.

While casino fundraisers might start off as traditional nonprofit events with online ticket sales and online donations, what happens at the event really takes the peer-to-peer elements to the next level.

Creative Mission-Focused Campaigns

One of the great parts of being involved in nonprofit fundraising is getting to flex your ‘creative chops’.

There are plenty of ways to use your nonprofit’s mission as a jumping off point for creative peer-to-peer campaigns.

Just look at Well Aware, a nonprofit dedicated to providing people in African countries with access to safe, clean drinking water. Running with the water theme, the Well Aware team launched Shower Strikes as a fun, creative way to raise money through peer-to-peer fundraising.

Today, the Well Aware Shower Strike campaigns:

• Has raised over $1.5 million for water relief in Africa.
• Engage more than 285 team members who go on shower strike to raise money.
• Leverage additional P2P functionality like matching donations and social media.

Personal Challenges and Events

Personal challenges are a type of peer-to-peer campaign where individuals raise funds on their own to benefit a charity, and at the end of the campaign period they take on a challenge of some sort—such as running a marathon barefoot or walking across an entire state.

Challenges like this require peer-to-peer fundraising pages that are easily shareable across multiple social media platforms to maximize visibility and fundraising results. Promote DIY giving options to your supporters and encourage action!

Bowl-a-thon

Spare yourself the hassle, and organize a bowl-a-thon ripe with team fundraising challenges, social activities, and fun giving opportunities leading up to the bowling alley. This is sure to be an engaging and family-friendly event that all supporters can attend!

To make your bowl-a-thon a peer-to-peer fundraiser, you can have bowling teams raise funds for your cause as their entry fee. Or, you can team up with the bowling alley so a portion of all concession stand proceeds go to your mission.

Serve-a-thon

A serve-a-thon fundraising event helps your organization raise money by performing some needed community service! Your participants can accept donations for the amount of trash they pick up.

For example, someone might donate a dollar for every aluminum can you pick up or $5 for every pound of garbage you collect.

Your participants can ask for donations from their families, friends, and peers. All you’ll need to do is recruit volunteers, collect pledges, and get to cleaning!

Best Virtual Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Ideas

Virtual Run/Walk/Ride

Although run/walk/ride events are one of the top examples of a peer-to-peer fundraising event, they have one drawback—they’re limited to participants who live near the event. With a virtual event, you won’t have to worry about that constraint.

These campaigns work the same as traditional run/walk/ride events. Participants secure donations, log the time they spend on their activity, and have fun online while supporting your mission and participating in a memorable experience.

Think about adding a virtual celebration to wrap up the event. Highlight your top fundraisers and celebrate the impact your participants have made on your mission!

Want to learn more about taking your next run/walk/ride virtual? Check out how HCRA took their ride virtual here.

Viral Social Media Campaign

While this is technically an ‘easy’ peer-to-peer fundraising idea, it is also the goal of every single nonprofit organization to go viral.

Think of the Ice Bucket Challenge benefiting ALS or the Bottle Cap Challenge promoting recycling. The social media wildfire took off, starting with one person’s network and multiplying from there.

By creating a challenge on social media and using organic shares and networking to promote this campaign, nonprofits can raise money without investing any overhead funds.

Bonus! The best viral campaigns also serve as a way to increase brand awareness and get a nonprofit noticed, which can have long-term benefits and create new, dedicated supporters.

Scavenger Hunt

Create a scavenger hunt where people walk, bike, or drive to pre-assigned locations in your area and answer questions at each site. At each place, there are questions related to a theme such as environmental, wildlife, historical, etc. There are endless ways for you to tie this peer-to-peer fundraising example back to your mission and ensure participants have a great time!

Encourage participants to fundraise on your behalf by asking them to collect donations as their entry fee. Additionally, you can give them hints during the scavenger hunt based on the amount of donations they collected. Offer a prize to the first few individuals who finish your scavenger hunt and watch the donations roll in!

Online Games and Activities

Create online challenge campaigns around a theme and have teams complete activities and games or hit fundraising goals. From shower strikes to virtual bowling events, you can harness the power of peer groups and competitive giving to deepen engagement and drive results.

Take an organized approach by hosting a tournament for online games. Pick a few games that are popular with your audience, and charge an entry fee for participants to compete against each other to take home the win.

Awareness Campaigns

In today’s social media-connected world, awareness campaigns have become one of the fastest-growing nonprofit campaign ideas.

A virtual awareness campaign is a great way to spread the word about your cause and reach new audiences of potential supporters. Develop a multimedia awareness campaign to highlight your mission or a specific project related to that mission.

Although the main focus of an awareness campaign isn’t to raise funds for your mission, be sure to still include a link or QR code to your donation page in all your social posts and promotional materials. Once an individual learns about your mission, they may be called to show their support!

Wishlist Drives

Wishlist drives are another easy way to generate support for your organization without necessarily asking supporters to make donations.

Create an online wishlist of the tangible goods your nonprofit needs, and include a link to your wishlist on your nonprofit’s site to give donors easy access and an alternative to making financial gifts.

Products relating to your mission will be most effective, but dedicated supporters will likely be happy to help with more mundane items like office supplies, too.

Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples for Schools

Classroom Wars

With a classroom war, classrooms compete against each other to raise the most funds! Here are the five steps to running a successful classroom war:

1. Set up individual giving pages for every participating classroom.
2. Send out emails and announcements to parents, PTO members, and other key stakeholders to let them know about the upcoming classroom war.
3. Give parents, students, and teachers sample messaging to share on social media.
4. Keep everyone updated by posting how much each classroom has raised in your cafeteria, gym, and other areas around the school.
5. Announce the winning classroom at a school-wide assembly and award the winning class with a fun prize, such as a pizza party!

This peer-to-peer fundraising idea is a great example of leveraging competition and gamification to increase giving for your school.

Giving Days:

Giving Days are great for schools since there are hundreds to choose from throughout the year—just think of Giving Tuesday, which happens at the end of the year. If none of them fit your needs, you can even create your own!

To maximize your school’s giving potential, here are a few tips to keep in mind:

• Announce your Giving Day early. Give students, parents, and teachers enough time to get ready and start spreading the word.
• Allow students to set up their own fundraising pages. This is a great way to get students interested in and passionate about fundraising.
• Plan plenty of activities and fun surprises for students. And be sure to share everything on your school’s social media page to bring in even more donations.

Whether your school wants to have its own Giving Day or take part in a larger charitable cause, Giving Days are an easy way to mobilize your students into an army for good.

Trivia Night

Are YOU Smarter Than a Fifth Grader? There’s nothing more fun than a little trivia competition.

Most importantly, build up the excitement with fundraising challenges before the trivia night. You might even frame your trivia categories around your cause so that your evening is both entertaining and extra-educational.

Anyone can compete in a trivia tournament, but more importantly, almost anyone can plan one with next to no hassle.

You could even make the trivia students vs parents! Let the competition ignite your fundraising.

Read-a-thon

For a fundraiser that promotes literacy and helps you increase donations to your school, look no further than a read-a-thon. In this peer-to-peer event, students will accept donations in exchange for meeting a reading goal, whether that’s a set number of books or pages or an amount of time.

You can host this event over the summer to encourage students to continue reading even when they’re not in school. Provide reading lists with fun books on them so it’s easy for participants to get started. And, offer a prize to the top readers or the classroom with the most time spent reading over the summer!

Bake-Off

Calling all bakers! A charity bake-off is a classic way to engage your supporters and raise some money for your school—and did we mention that you get to eat a lot of goodies, too?

To pull off this event, you’ll need a theme (bonus points if it relates to your cause!) and plenty of willing participants. Charge a small entrance fee and sell tickets to the big event for all your hungry guests.

Charity bake-offs are low-cost and offer a high return on investment. They also do a stellar job of encouraging engagement from your supporters, which is beneficial for your donor retention.

Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Examples for Cancer and Medical Needs

Shopping for a Cure

Hosting shopping events are a fun and social way for nonprofits to raise money for cancer research while bringing together supporters in a casual environment.

There are two different ways to host a Shop for a Cure:

1. Work with local boutiques and/or thrift stores to get items donated. Then, attendees can bid on the items they want to take home like a standard auction.
2. Ask attendees themselves to bring in items, making the event more of a ‘swap’ than an auction.

If you really want to maximize donations, open up your online auction page to people not in attendance, which will bring in more donations from outside sources. Spread the word on social media!

Head Shaving Fundraisers

One tried-and-true peer-to-peer fundraising campaign is the head shaving fundraiser, because it combines multiple aspects of traditional peer-to-peer campaigns, including:

• Ambassador fundraising
• Social media and digital networking
• Personal challenges

To run a successful head shaving fundraiser:

1. Have participants sign up online and create a personal peer-to-peer fundraising page to share with their networks
2. Encourage supporters to donate and vote on what kind of haircut they want participants to receive
3. On the big day, thank the donors and participants and reveal which haircuts everyone is going to receive – whether it’s a full shave or a mohawk!

Dance Marathons

Because they require a lot of participants, most dance marathons are often hosted by schools and universities. Students set up individual or team peer-to-peer fundraising pages and leverage their extensive social networks to raise money for the cause.

Dance marathons are traditionally associated with children’s hospitals and children’s cancer research, making them the perfect peer-to-peer fundraising idea.

Tips for Choosing a Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Idea

Now that you’ve learned about all these peer-to-peer fundraising examples, you’re probably excited to pick an idea for your next campaign. However, there are a few things to take into consideration before you make your decision. In particular, think through these aspects of the idea:

• Mission alignment. Ask yourself, does this idea fit with my nonprofit’s mission? The more aligned it is with your cause, the more likely your supporters are to connect with it and fundraise on your behalf.
• Ease of engagement. Is the idea easy for supporters to participate in and engage with? Consider your supporter and donor demographics and interests to determine the answer to this question. For example, if most of your supporters have families with young children, a movie night might be more accessible and appropriate than a pub crawl.
• Timing and seasonality. Some ideas are best hosted during specific times of the year. For instance, run/walk/ride events should be hosted during the spring or fall, when temperatures are moderate enough that participants won’t overheat or be too cold. Take a look at your events calendar to determine when you need to host an event and then brainstorm events that fit those times.
• Creativity and innovation. Supporters appreciate creative and unique peer-to-peer fundraising events. If you’re already in the habit of hosting peer-to-peer events, try an idea they haven’t seen before to pique interest and inspire giving.

Don’t forget to promote opportunities for DIY fundraising to supporters as well! Since your supporters will need to take the initiative to host those types of peer-to-peer events, make sure they know all about them. You might occasionally feature these ideas in your email newsletters and social media posts to maximize awareness.

Getting Started with Peer-to-Peer Fundraising

Peer-to-peer fundraising ideas have many moving parts. For instance, a run/walk/ride event requires you to handle the usual event planning. On top of that, you must help participants create their fundraising pages and spread the word about your event to their peers to solicit donations. And that’s just one example of a peer-to-peer fundraising campaign—others require a similar amount of time and effort.

To ensure that your next campaign runs smoothly, you need software ready to support peer-to-peer fundraising. Ideally, your solution should include the following features:

• Online registration. Provide a convenient and streamlined online registration process for supporters so they can sign up regardless of where they are.
• Fundraising pages. Robust peer-to-peer fundraising software will allow supporters to create individual fundraising pages they can personalize with their story and connection to your nonprofit.
• Gamification tools. Use friendly competition to motivate and inspire supporters to fundraise more on your behalf. Gamification tools like fundraising thermometers and leaderboards allow supporters to track their progress and ensure they’re your top fundraiser!
• Automated messaging. Whether you need to remind supporters of upcoming deadlines or send crucial event information, automated messaging will simplify the process for you. Plus, keep your event top-of-mind with regular updates!
• Social sharing integrations. Make it convenient for supporters to spread the word about your event and send out their fundraising pages with social sharing integrations. Through these, supporters can easily share pages to their networks on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, boosting visibility and donations to your nonprofit.

If you’re looking for a solution that includes all these features and is sure to meet your peer-to-peer fundraising needs, OneCause is your top provider. Our solution empowers your supporters to go the extra mile, unlocking your nonprofit’s potential for powerful fundraising.

Wrapping Up: Peer-to-Peer Fundraising

Although peer-to-peer fundraising can be complex, it brings great benefits and the potential to upgrade and transform your fundraising landscape. Use these ideas as a jumping-off point for creating your next campaign. With the right peer-to-peer fundraising idea, you’re sure to deepen your relationships with supporters and inspire even more giving!

We’re just scratching the surface of peer-to-peer fundraising. Keep digging deeper with these resources:

• Unlocking the Secret to Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Success. Discover best practices and more in this ultimate guide to peer-to-peer fundraising.
• 15 Premier Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Platforms for Nonprofits. Support your peer-to-peer fundraising efforts with robust platforms and software built specifically for nonprofits.
• Top Online Fundraising Ideas to Capture Donors’ Attention. Looking for other ways to inspire donations? Check out our list of top online fundraising ideas to increase giving and outreach.