Facebook Fundraiser Feature
Challenges on Facebook: What, Why, and How for Nonprofits
February 3, 2022
Meta’s social fundraising tools were first launched in 2015, starting with fundraisers and Donate buttons on Facebook. Since then, the tools have been used to raise $6 billion in donations.
The power of social giving can’t be overstated, especially considering the impact of the innovation we've observed over the past two years. Covid-era Challenges on Facebook raised hundreds of millions of dollars, propelling missions forward when in-person events were impossible.
Post Covid, social giving, defined as socially-native, designed-for-digital fundraising, has emerged as a prominent new fundraising method, allowing nonprofits to experience the best of two worlds— peer-to-peer and social media virality— in one solution.
For nonprofits eager to embrace a digital-first approach to fundraising, it’s time to recognize Challenges on Facebook as the ideal solution to connect with the next generation of social supporters. This comprehensive guide to Challenges on Facebook will cover the following topics:
Before we discuss the logistics of hosting a Challenge on Facebook, let’s first discuss what these fundraisers are. That way, you’ll have a strong foundation in Challenges before hosting one for your nonprofit.
A Challenge on Facebook is a time-bound, social fundraising-based peer-to-peer campaign fully conducted in-channel on the social platform.
During a Challenge, participants complete a specified activity while raising funds for your nonprofit using a Facebook fundraiser. Participants are also added to a Facebook group created specifically for the Challenge, to connect with other participants and your nonprofit.
Here’s an example to help you visualize this type of fundraiser:
Participants sign up to complete a 30-day walking Challenge in support of a nonprofit that promotes heart health. Each day, they’re challenged to walk 10,000 steps and track their progress. While doing so, they raise funds for the heart health nonprofit using a Facebook fundraiser and log their progress in the Challenge Facebook group.
We’ll explore numerous real-life examples later in this guide.
You may have noticed that Challenges on Facebook dramatically increased in popularity in 2020 and 2021, as we saw the digital-first, “new normal” of fundraising emerge as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The increasing popularity of these fundraisers comes down to a number of factors. Challenges on Facebook are beneficial for nonprofits because:
In short, Challenges on Facebook allow your nonprofit to grow your audience online, engage with supporters near and far, and raise your relationships with social supporters. But if you’ve never hosted a Challenge before, how do you get started?
There are a number of key components to keep in mind when planning a Challenge on Facebook for your nonprofit.
Challenge parameters describe the basic, foundational aspects of your fundraiser. It includes:
Building off our earlier example, you might host a Challenge on Facebook with the following parameters:
Participants sign up to complete a 30-day walking Challenge (Duration) in support of a nonprofit that promotes heart health. Each day, they’re challenged to walk 10,000 steps (Challenge Activity) and track their progress. While doing so, they raise funds for the heart health nonprofit using a Facebook fundraiser and log their progress in the Challenge Facebook group.
The nonprofit hopes to raise $20,000 in donations and sets a goal of $100 for each Challenge participant (Fundraising Goals). They hope to connect with 2,000 participants (Participation Goals).
Once you’ve laid your foundation, turn to the participant experience. This includes how participants will:
Remember that many registrants (90%+) will be new to your organization or cause. Consider creating educational guides to share with participants and ensure they know how to engage with the Challenge and continue supporting your nonprofit afterward. You could create a guide to starting a Facebook fundraiser, how Facebook fundraising works, how to have a fulfilling participant experience, and even educational information about your nonprofit and cause.
One major reason that Challenges on Facebook are so successful is the digital community aspect. This community space is created using Facebook groups.
Essentially, your nonprofit creates a closed group for all registrants to join for the duration of the Challenge. Throughout the fundraiser, you can then share the following with participants in the group:
Participants can respond to your posts as well as make their own. They can create “check-in” posts to discuss their progress each day and chat with others who are participating in the Challenge.
Once you’ve defined the parameters of your event and the participant experience, as well as created the foundation for your digital community, it’s time to market the fundraiser so new supporters know to join.
This is done using Facebook Ads. With Facebook, you can create targeted ad campaigns that invite individuals to sign up for your Challenge; when prospective registrants click on the ad, they’ll be directed to sign up for the fundraiser and join the corresponding group.
We recommend targeting your ad campaigns to reach both known supporters and individuals you haven’t encountered before, but are likely to be interested in your campaign. For example, you might target lookalike audiences— or Facebook users who have similar characteristics as your known supporters. Or, you may target audiences that have a demonstrated interest in your cause— such as having “liked” a page for a similar nonprofit in your space.
This allows to you maximize your campaign to connect with new audiences.
Challenges on Facebook open the door for continued engagement, and conversational messaging is how that engagement takes place.
Conversational messaging describes one-on-one conversations between a representative from your nonprofit and a social supporter. These conversations take place via Messenger, where your nonprofit can chat with individual supporters just as one would a friend on the platform.
Challenges give you an initial method of connecting with new supporters who join the fundraiser, as registrants are given the opportunity to become subscribers of ongoing messaging.
In Messenger, you can then share fundraising tips, encouragement, and reminders with individual supporters. You can ask questions and share surveys to learn more about each participant— including asking for their contact information, which Meta can’t provide you with.
These conversations can continue long after the fundraiser itself is completed and allow you to grow a personal relationship with each individual social supporter.
More recently, questions have arisen regarding the safety of Challenges on Facebook.
This is largely because Challenges, by nature, bring individuals who haven’t met previously together in one large online community. In that community, participants check-in and share information with others who are essentially strangers to them. There is some worry that, by sharing this information with strangers, participants put themselves at risk.
That said, there is no risk associated with Challenges on Facebook as long as participants follow internet safety best practices. For example, individuals shouldn’t share deeply personal information, such as their home addresses, workplaces, contact details, or exact locations at any given time. Participants should also be mindful of the photos they post— for example, not sharing internal images of their homes.
Consider sharing internet safety guidelines with Challenge participants. While it’s likely that individuals joining a nonprofit fundraiser have only the best intentions at heart, there is no harm in taking additional precautions.
GoodUnited is a turnkey social giving solution designed to democratize the nonprofit supporter experience and empower nonprofits to have a one-to-one relationship with each and every social supporter.
We work directly with nonprofits just like yours to bring Challenges on Facebook to life— from the initial Challenge planning, through running Ad campaigns and managing groups, to messaging your supporters for ongoing cultivation. Our social giving solution includes:
GoodUnited is at the forefront of bringing traditional peer-to-peer fundraising tools to social giving.
The world of social giving is rapidly developing and we’re continuing to improve our product alongside it.
We aren’t making shot-in-the-dark guesses at what will work in the fairly new realm of social giving. We carefully test our hypotheses and slowly roll them out across nonprofit partners.
The biggest driver for this testing is Messenger itself, where we get to ask participants questions such as:
The answer to these questions (and more) in Messenger allows us to continue elevating our nonprofit partners’ social fundraising efforts— both adjusting their strategies overall and hyper-personalizing each individual participants’ experiences.
For example, you could discover which types of Challenge activities participants most like to complete, how frequently you can host repeat fundraisers, and even the best wording to use to encourage return participation. And, you can understand participants on a personal level to share relevant information and experiences year-round (and for multiple years down the road) to foster ongoing engagement long after the campaigns are finished.
This testing doesn’t only take place in Messenger. For example, we can use polls and questions in groups to understand participants’ preferences and we can explore data on ad performance to understand which ads best inspire action.
The goal of this testing is to ensure that by the time any updates find their way to you, they’re tried and true. This process has allowed us to make numerous enhancements to GoodUnited’s social giving solution in the past year, including:
These efforts allow us to better support the fundraising efforts of nonprofits like yours.
If you’ve encountered Challenges on Facebook in the wild, you’ve likely seen some variation of common run/walk/ride activities. However, there are a wide variety of Challenge activities that you can incorporate into your fundraising lineup to surprise your supporters with an exciting new fundraising activity.
Consider incorporating any of the following 10+ ideas into your next Challenge on Facebook.
The following Challenge activities test your participants’ physical fitness:
Generally, physical challenges are measured by either distance (i.e. number of steps or miles) or time (i.e. completing a 20-minute calisthenic workout). This type of Challenge activity is often the most popular for nonprofits, as physical challenges are incredibly motivating— participants usually want to show off, improve upon, or test their physical abilities.
As another way to improve the well-being of your supporters, wellness challenges ask participants to slow down and practice mindfulness. This includes tasks such as:
Our society is moving faster than ever, and wellness-based challenges task participants to break the cycle (even if for a short period of time). Participants will enjoy the refreshing change of pace and, ideally, adopt the wellness practice into their regular routines long after the Challenge is completed.
Philanthropic challenges are those that ask participants to go out of their way to help others while raising funds for your nonprofit. There are two common philanthropy-based tasks that you could use for your next Challenge on Facebook.
The first is volunteering. Participants would be tasked with completing X number of volunteer hours over the course of the month. After each volunteer session— with your nonprofit or another— they’d check-in and discuss all that was accomplished.
The second is “paying it forward.” This describes small tasks that participants complete to improve another individual’s life in some way. For example, a participant might purchase coffee for the person behind them in line or shovel the snowy driveway of an elderly neighbor. For this Challenge, participants are tasked with paying it forward a set number of times per week and encouraged to check in with updates on their tasks throughout the fundraiser.
Comedic challenges task your participants with embarrassing themselves in some manner, all with the goal of advancing your cause.
Often, the “embarrassing” task is minimal— the goal isn’t to outright humiliate participants. For example, this could be a:
Comedic challenges are especially effective because they generate conversation. When an individual asks a participant about why they’re wearing wacky clothing or growing facial hair, the participant can share the message behind their actions.
Bonus! We’ve written numerous guides with ideas for social fundraisers. Check out our peer-to-peer fundraising ideas, virtual fundraising ideas, and virtual event ideas to continue brainstorming for your Challenges on Facebook.
We’ve discussed how Challenges on Facebook would work in theory. Now, let’s explore four real-life examples of nonprofits that incorporated Challenges into their fundraising strategies with great success.
Susan G. Komen sought a new way to raise peer-to-peer funds from social supporters. Partnering with GoodUnited, the nonprofit hosted a month-long Challenge on Facebook with the goal of acquiring 6,500 new supporters.
The Challenge tasked participants with completing 25 burpees per day for the month of February in 2021. Komen’s GoodUnited Challenge on Facebook had the following results:
Now, heading into 2022, Komen is building Challenges on Facebook into its social fundraising calendar. To see how Komen blew its Challenge goals out of the water, explore the full case study here.
American Cancer Society (ACS) partnered with GoodUnited to host a series of three Challenges on Facebook. Each Challenge was one month long and tasked participants to complete a different activity (running, walking, and doing squats).
Here’s how the three GoodUnited Challenges on Facebook panned out:
American Cancer Society’s Challenges on Facebook were so notable that they smashed the platform’s previous record for the most money raised by a single organization in a single day— receiving 23,000 donations in one day in October 2020. Explore the full case study to learn more.
No Kid Hungry saw its most popular fundraising efforts— in-person culinary and tasting fundraisers— become derailed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Seeking community-building events, the nonprofit partnered with GoodUnited to host a 31-Mile Challenge on Facebook in 2021.
The Challenge resulted in the following:
The nonprofit is now planning additional Challenges on Facebook for the coming year. To learn more about No Kid Hungry’s success with Challenges, check out the case study here.
Best Friends Animal Society (BFAS) has the mission of eliminating no-kill shelters across the nation by 2025. In 2020, the nonprofit partnered with GoodUnited to host a Challenge on Facebook, with the goal of growing recognition for the nonprofit and cause, strengthening its community, and of course, raising funds.
BFAS hosted the 30-Mile Challenge in 2020, during which participants were challenged to run the distance in March. It had the following results:
Review BFASs efforts by reading the full case study here.
Challenges on Facebook are the ideal way to connect with the next generation of social supporters and raise your relationships for long-term engagement. To begin planning a Challenge for your nonprofit, consider partnering with a social giving solution such as GoodUnited. To learn more, contact us here.
In the meantime, explore the following additional resources:
