When you’re looking to raise money for a charitable cause, it pays to team up. We mean that literally — teams on Mightycause see 60% more donations than fundraisers who’ve decided to fundraise alone. That’s because the more people you have fundraising for a cause, the wider your circle of potential donors and people who can help spread the word about your fundraiser. Fundraising as a team can present unique challenges, though. You’ll need a clever spin on your fundraiser that works for the whole group, you’ll need to manage a whole team of people, and you’ll need to keep them engaged from beginning to end. That may seem like a lot of extra work, but never fear! We’ve compiled a list of 20 creative team fundraising ideas, and we’ll share tips to keep your team organized and motivated along the way.
1. #GivingTuesday
We may be a little biased at Mightycause because last year our #GivingTuesday event raised over $3.5 million for charity from over 20,000 donors in just one day, but #GivingTuesday is the perfect time to fundraise as a team for the causes you care about. #GivingTuesday is on November 27, 2018, and always takes place the Tuesday after Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday. Join forces with friends, coworkers, any clubs you belong to, or fellow nonprofit volunteers and start a team on Mightycause to raise money for charity — and because Mightycause’s team fundraising tools allow you the flexibility to let your team members choose their any nonprofit they choose, you can make sure that your #GivingTuesday team allows everyone to fundraise for causes that are meaningful to them.
2. Give It Up Challenge
If you’re trying to cut back on eating out, drinking soda, or wean yourself off your morning latte from Starbucks, you can keep yourself motivated and join up with buddies working toward the same goals by donating the cost of those vices back to charity! With these team fundraising ideas, you can organize a group to fundraise as a team, and in addition to donating the cost, have team members ask friends or family members to show their support by donating to a good cause.
3. Gaming for Good
Do you and your friends have a regular game night? Do you have buddies online with whom you play video games? Are you a Scrabble master or a Dungeon Master? Then you should gather your fellow gamers and fundraise as a team! Whether you play tabletop RPGs, video games, or classic board games, you can game for charity on Mightycause. Lots of passionate players have utilized live-streaming platforms like Twitch to help them team up, connect with, and fundraise with other gamers and we’ve seen plenty of charity gaming marathons raising money on our platform. So take your normal game night or video game habit and turn it into a force for good!
4. Mission Trips
If you’re teaming up with other church members for a mission trip, try digital tithing to help with expenses! Mission trips are one of the most common reasons people come together on Mightycause to fundraise for a team, and they’ve had tremendous success. Northstar Church Kennesaw has raised tens of thousands on the platform to send their church members all over the world to spread their message and help others. Learn more about mission trip fundraising, and start a team for your church’s next mission trip!
5. Read-a-Thon
If curling up with a good book is more your speed than running, walking, or climbing a mountain for charity, don’t worry! You can join forces with your fellow bookworms to start a read-a-thon. Fundraising as a team on Mightycause is perfect for this — get your bibliophile friends or your book club to join your team and create a fundraising page where they share how many books they’re aiming to read and their reading list. Then, you’ll compete with one another to get the most donations. This is a great fundraising idea for education-based causes and it’s proven successful on our platform; Oakland-based Sequoia Elementary School raised over $14,000 with their 2017 read-a-thon!
6. Cycle for Charity
Like golf tournaments and charity walks, cycling for charity is another proven team fundraising tactic that has raised lots of money on the Mightycause platform. Cycle Across Illinois is a team that’s been pedaling for a good cause since 2005 — they’ve raised tens of thousands of dollars for their local chapter of Concerns of Police Survivors. Cycling to fundraise as a team doesn’t have to be a huge organized event, though. If you have friends who like to bike, you can team up to raise money for a cause you all care about, or let everyone choose their own cause. Your team members can complete their miles on their own schedules, asking friends and family to sponsor them by making a donation. Knowing that each mile you bike will help a nonprofit doing work you care about can help push you to keep cycling, even if you’re tired and would prefer to stay in!
7. Dance-a-thon
Put on your red shoes and dance … for charity! Dance-a-thons are a great, cost-effective way to make fundraising as a team fun. All you need for a dance-a-thon is a dance floor, great music, and some people willing to get footloose for a cause. Create a team on Mightycause, get your fellow dancers to join and create pages where they can collect donations from their family and friends. The Hipline Shimmy-Pop-a-Thon team raised more than $13,000 for Oakland Elizabeth House, a nonprofit helping women and children.
8. Polar Bear Plunge
What’s a polar bear plunge? It’s when a group of people strip down to their swimsuits in the winter months and hop into a body of water, shivering for a good cause. Polar bear plunges have raised millions for charities all over the country, and they can be especially effective for wildlife and environmental causes. So if the cold has never bothered you anyway, gather a group of friends or coworkers to either join an existing polar bear plunge or start your own by fundraising as a team on Mightycause.
9. Trivia Tournament
If you and your friends are trivia masters, why not put your encyclopedic knowledge to good use by running a trivia tournament for charity? There’s lot of room for creativity here — you can partner with your favorite pub trivia night to devote a night to charity where a percentage of the evening’s proceeds go to charity, or host your own even where your contestants fundraise as a team on Mightycause before the event.
10. Giving Days
Giving Days on Mightycause are 24-hour charitable giving marathons where communities come together to lift up local nonprofits. If you have a Giving Day already established in your community, you can easily sign up to fundraise as a team with your workplace, your friends, or your family. But you can also start your own Giving Day on Mightycause! It’s as simple as starting a team, picking a date, and setting a goal. San Benito GIVES is a local Giving Day that raised over $35,000 for organizations in San Benito County in Texas using team fundraising on Mightycause.
11. Battle of the Classes
Kids are just as competitive as adults, and you can stoke the flames of competition by planning a classroom battle! Start a team on Mightycause and have each class at your school create a page where they can send their parents, friends, family members, and community members to donate to charity. Forest Ridge Academy used this technique to raise more than $14,500 for their school in just 24 hours!
12. Art-a-Thon
Whether you paint, sculpt, or write as a hobby, you can kickstart your creativity and raise money for charity at the same time by running an Art-a-Thon! An Art-a-Thon is an event that gathers artists together for a marathon of creating, and in the weeks leading up to it, ask family and friends to support their efforts by donating to their Mightycause page. Several teams have recently had huge success with Art-a-Thons on Mightycause: Louisville Story Program hosted a Write-a-Thon that raised more than $16,500 for their nonprofit, while Community Arts Center in Danville, KY blew their original $10,000 goal out of the water with their Art-a-Thon 2017. You don’t need an in-person event either — November is National Novel Writing Month (or Nanowrimo), which is a great opportunity to band together with your fellow writers and finally finish that novel you’ve always wanted to write … and raise money for an important cause at the same time!
13. Triathlon
Triathlons can be amazing experiences for the athletes who compete in them, as they challenge their bodies, their skills, and their willpower. But running in a triathlon for a charitable cause can make it an even more meaningful experience — and it can help keep you motivated to know that you’re doing it help others when your legs feel like rubber and every muscle aches. Organize a group of triathletes competing and fundraise as a team for charity!
14. An Actual Sports Team
We’ve already covered how high the cost of sports can be and how crowdfunding can help. But crowdfunding as a team? Even better! Your team (or you kids’ sports team) works together on the field (or track, or pool, or field, or court …) to win games, but they can also work together to keep your team funded, get to the championships, buy new equipment or uniforms, and the list goes on! You already play as a team, why not fundraise as a team as well?!
15. Marathons
If you’re a runner, you’ve probably participated in a marathon or two, or you’re working up to competing in one. Some marathons have charity built into them, but even if they don’t, you can still use these team fundraising ideas to get people to sponsor you and raise money for charity on Mightycause! Get together with your fellow runners and fundraise as a team to keep you motivated!
16. Holiday Fundraiser
If you find yourself drawing a blank when family members ask what you want for the holidays, donate the holiday to charity! Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hanukah, or Kwanzaa, running a holiday fundraiser is a meaningful way to give back to causes you care about because the holiday season is a key fundraising time for nonprofits. You’re also more likely to hit your goal during the holidays because not only are people looking to give to charity, people who know you are looking to spend a little cash on a holiday gift. Spread holiday cheer by fundraising as a team with family members, coworkers or friends!
17. Birthday Team
Birthday fundraisers are one of the most effective peer-to-peer fundraisers because you’re asking for donations at a time when the people you know are already looking to give you a gift — you take the guesswork out of the equation by asking them to donate to your favorite charity! Terrence has been donating his birthday month to charity with a Mightycause fundraiser for several years now, and has raised thousands for education causes. If you share a birthday month with friends, family members, or coworkers, fundraise as a team to donate your birthday month to charity to maximize your impact! Fundraising as a team on Mightycause makes it easy for mutual friends and family members to donate to more than one birthday fundraiser by providing a customizable team landing page that allows them to choose the fundraiser they’d like to donate to so they don’t have to hunt down your individual pages.
18. Golf Tournament
Golf tournaments are one of the top time-tested team fundraising ideas that helps raise tens of thousands for charity each year on the Mightycause platform. Tee It Up for the Troops, for instance, holds a golf tournament each year and raised more than $21,000 this year. Organize your golf buddies, choose a cause, find a course to hold your tournament, and fundraise as a team on Mightycause!
19. Steps for Charity
Do you and your friends meet regularly for power walks, or have a regular crew you run with in the morning? Shake up your fitness routine and keep each other motivated by fundraising as a team on Mightycause! On Mightycause, you can each choose your own cause so all of you can each walk, jog, or run for a cause that’s close to your heart. Designate a team leader, create your team page, and have your buddies join. You’ll each create a page where you can set your goal for how many steps you’re donating and how much money you’d like to raise, and then share it with your social networks to ask people to pledge to supporting you as you walk for charity. On days when you’re really struggling to find a reason to go for a walk instead of sitting on the couch, knowing that you’re raising money for a good cause can motivate you to hit the pavement.
12. Workplace Fundraiser
Work is one of the easiest places to conjure team fundraising ideas. You’re all there together each day anyway, you work together for common goals all the time, and HR is usually looking for new ways to get employees to improve teamwork, build better relationships, and give back to charity. So this one’s a no-brainer! Even if you’re working for a nonprofit, gathering employees to fundraise as a team for the cause you all care so much about is a must-do — a nonprofit’s employees are its best ambassadors! Need inspiration for your workplace fundraiser? We’ve got a whole bunch of ideas for you!
Now that you’ve got some team fundraising ideas, get your friends together and start a team on Mightycause!