Higher participant numbers see virtual fundraising events grow in 2021
Melanie May | 7 December 2021 | News
Virtual fundraising events grew for charities of all types and sizes in 2021, with income rising due to higher participant numbers according to Massive’s 2021 Virtual Fundraising Monitor.
The report, by mass participation agency Massive in partnership with JustGiving, is an update on last year’s Monitor, which looked at virtual fundraising performance during the pandemic. It combines insight from JustGiving and data from 150 virtual fundraising events that raised over £39m in 2021, and compares this with results from the same number of events and campaigns from 2020.
Focusing specifically on peer-to-peer fundraising activities, Massive’s report covers a range of campaigns by charities including Diabetes UK, Breast Cancer Now, Dementia UK and Alzheimer’s Society.
Advertisement
54% of the 150 events were new in 2021, with 29% repeats, and 17% pivots of existing events (down from 38% in 2020). Physical challenges dominated with 57% of events focusing on running and walking challenges, and while 2020 saw a number of pick your own challenge type events these all but vanished in 2021 with lockdown-specific activities like stair challenges disappearing entirely.
Overall, the 2021 Monitor found virtual fundraising events raising more on average than in 2020. Almost half of the events surveyed in the report raised over £100k in 2021, double the previous year, while the number of events raising more than £1m also doubled.
The findings also show a rise in the number of people participating in virtual events over the last year, with the number of registrants in the survey more than tripling to an average of almost 3,000 per event.
However, average value is flat or falling and there was a slight fall in the average number of participants going on to fundraise at 48% of those signing up challenges.
John Tasker, partner at Massive said:
“We’re seeing more people taking part in virtual events but not seeing any significant growth in levels of fundraising, so the growth we’re seeing appears to be driven by volume as opposed to value and we’ve seen a corresponding increase in marketing spend to drive that volume.”
The report also looks at the return of physical in-person ones, and on charities’ increasing use of Facebook in their virtual fundraising events.
Sally Falvey, Head of Retention Marketing at JustGiving said:
“The report echoes what we’ve seen on JustGiving this year – virtual events are no longer simply the understudy for physical events and have unique value in attracting new and diverse audiences to good causes.
“This time next year we expect to see a continued growth in charities blending their events portfolios on JustGiving, with a balance of virtual and physical experiences developed to suit the needs of their supporters.”
Tasker added:
“In 2022 we expect to see continued success for both virtual and physical events. As ever the most successful campaigns will be the ones that adapt their offer to the changing expectations and attitudes of their audience to offer something new, regardless of whether that’s online, in real life or a mix of both.”
Related posts
About Melanie May
Melanie May is a journalist and copywriter specialising in writing both for and about the charity and marketing services sectors since 2001. She can be reached via thepurplepim.com.