Fundraising events often focus heavily on the day itself. The venue. The logistics. The entertainment. The sponsors. The target.
But in a peer-to-peer campaign, the event is not necessarily where the result is created.
The result is often created in the weeks beforehand, by the people who have agreed to put their name behind a cause, ask their own networks for support and carry the campaign into parts of the community the organisation could never reach on its own.
That creates a different strategic question:
What would change if we treated fundraisers as one of the campaign’s most important audiences?
For one community fundraising campaign, that question changed the way the whole experience was designed.
The challenge: registration does not equal activation
Peer-to-peer fundraising can look deceptively simple.
Someone signs up.
They receive a fundraising page.
They are given a target.
Then the organisation hopes they will go out and ask.
But signing up is only the beginning.
People need confidence to ask for money. They need to know what to say. They need to understand the cause. They need prompts when momentum drops, recognition when they make progress and reassurance that they are not doing it alone.
Without that, even enthusiastic participants can stall.
The risk is that an organisation invests heavily in recruitment and event delivery but leaves the most important part of the fundraising journey largely to chance.
The shift: design around the people creating the result
The campaign needed more than event communications. It needed a participant journey.
Internally, the approach became known as The Rock Star Effect.
The idea was simple: if these people were doing the hard work of representing the cause, asking their networks to contribute and helping create the campaign result, they should feel supported like an important part of the campaign, not treated like another name on a registration list.
The engagement model included onboarding, fundraising support, ongoing communication, milestone recognition, personal encouragement and moments of celebration.
The detail of that journey mattered, but the principle mattered more:
Equip people. Keep them connected. Recognise effort. Celebrate the contribution.
The fundraiser is not just a channel
This is where many campaigns can get the audience strategy wrong. The donor needs a reason to give.
But the fundraiser needs something different.
They need:
- confidence
- clarity
- motivation
- connection
- practical support
- recognition.
They are not simply a distribution channel for your message.
They are lending the organisation their reputation, relationships, time and social capital.
That deserves its own strategy.
Once you see the fundraiser as an audience in their own right, the campaign starts to look different.
You stop asking only:
How do we get more donations?
And start asking:
What does this person need to feel confident enough to keep going?
That is a much more useful design question.
The event became the thank-you
One of the most important decisions in the campaign was also one of the simplest.
The event itself was designed with limited to no fundraising on the day.
The event was the thank-you. That mattered.
Participants had already spent weeks asking friends, family, colleagues and supporters to contribute.
Instead of using the final event as one more opportunity to extract something from them, it became a moment of recognition.
That changes the relationship.
It says:
We see what you have already done.
Fundraising can become very transactional if organisations are not careful. Another reminder. Another ask. Another target. Another push. But stewardship is not something that should begin after the money arrives.
It starts with the experience of the people helping create the result.
The campaign happened before the event
This is perhaps the most transferable lesson. The visible moment is not always the most important moment. For a fundraising event, the day itself may be the part everyone sees. But the result is often shaped much earlier.
It happens when someone first decides whether they feel confident enough to participate. It happens when they receive practical guidance instead of being left to work it out alone. It happens when they hit a milestone and someone notices. It happens when their motivation drops and the campaign reconnects them to the purpose. It happens when they feel part of a community rather than like they are fundraising in isolation.
The event may be the destination.
The campaign is the journey that gets people there.
What this changes for campaign design
Organisations often build campaigns from the outcome backwards.
We need to raise $100,000.
We need 50 participants.
We need 500 donations.
Those targets are important, but they do not tell you how the result will happen.
A stronger design question is:
Who actually has to do something differently for this campaign to succeed?
In a peer-to-peer campaign, the answer is often the fundraiser.
They need to register. They need to understand the cause. They need to ask. They need to ask again. They need to keep going after the first burst of enthusiasm wears off.
If that behaviour creates the result, the experience around that behaviour deserves strategic attention.
This goes well beyond fundraising events
The same principle applies anywhere an organisation relies on people to carry its message or create momentum.
It might be:
- community ambassadors
- board members
- volunteers
- workplace fundraising teams
- advocates
- campaign champions
- peer supporters
- members.
If the organisation depends on those people to activate others, then simply giving them information is not enough.
They need a journey. The specifics will differ, but the strategic principle remains the same:
Design for the people who create the result.
The question I would ask your organisation
If someone signed up tomorrow to fundraise for your organisation, what would happen next?
Would they receive:
a confirmation email, a fundraising link and a few reminders?
Or would they enter a deliberately designed experience that helps them feel prepared, supported, recognised and connected to the cause?
And one more question:
If your campaign relies on people to carry the message, have you designed their experience with the same care as the donor journey?
If the answer is no, there may be an opportunity sitting inside the campaign already.
Purpose Media CBR works with organisations to design engagement and campaign journeys that support the people creating the result, turning participation into momentum, and momentum into stronger outcomes.
