A-thons: What you need to know

Online a-thon fundraisers are the easy (and fun) way to raise funds for the causes you care about most. Think of an online a-thon experience as your typical “pledge per” fundraiser, but without all the hassle! No more paper forms. No more manually tracking donors down for payment. 

How an online a-thon works

1. Donors visit your fundraising page and make their donation to a participant in your experience.
2. They can pledge to donate a certain amount per each unit of activity completed; for example, they might agree to donate $5 per mile in a jog-a-thon or $3 per word completed in a spell-a-thon. If they prefer, they can also make a flat, one-time donation. 
3. After the actual a-thon event, you’ll enter activity results. 
4. Once the experience is finalized, the donors’ credit cards are charged per unit of activity completed by the participants. 

Flexibility of online a-thons

Not only do online a-thon fundraisers simplify the fundraising process by eliminating a lot of the manual work traditionally involved, but they’re also really flexible in their capabilities!

An online a-thon experience can:

• spur competition and excitement by offering prizes for different fundraising efforts.
• involve a single participant performing the activity.
• have team/peer-to-peer fundraising (to allow more than one participant to raise funds on your experience).

When Peer-to-Peer fundraising is enabled, each participant and team will receive a personal fundraising link to share with their network. Givebacks will calculate the amount raised for each participant and team.

Promote your experience

To begin making progress towards your fundraising goals, spread the word about your a-thon to as many people as possible. Sharing your fundraiser with the greatest number of potential donors increases exposure and may make others more likely to share your cause with people in their network, too. You can share the link to your fundraiser on social media and send an email to your donors, family, and friends to get the word out.

Questions? Contact Givebacks Support.