How to Set Up Peer-to-Peer Fundraising - A Guide for Schools
What are Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Teams?
Peer-to-peer (P2P) fundraising teams allow your school to host a fundraising campaign where participants create their own fundraising pages to raise money on behalf of your school. Teams can be organized by grade level, classroom, sports teams, clubs, or any other school group, making it perfect for events like fun runs, spirit weeks, or annual giving campaigns.
Setting Up Your School's P2P Campaign
1. Create Your Campaign Foundation
Access your campaign setup:
Log into your Zeffy dashboard on a computer
Click "Fundraising" in the left menu, then "Campaigns"
Click "+ New form" and select "Peer-to-Peer"
Add your general information:
Create a compelling form title (e.g., "Lincoln Elementary Fun Run 2024")
Select your language
Set your overall campaign fundraising target
Add a description explaining your school's fundraising goals
2. Configure P2P Settings for Schools
Customize team and participant options:
Enable team creation to allow grade levels, classrooms, or clubs to create team pages
Enable individual participant pages for students who want to fundraise independently
Customize the welcome message that will be sent to all fundraisers
Important for schools: You can choose to have teams only, individuals only, or both depending on your fundraising strategy.
3. Set Up Preset Teams (Recommended for Schools)
For better organization and control, create your teams in advance rather than allowing open registration:
🎥 If you prefer a visual walk-through we have a great video walking you through how to pre-set up a team here!
Go to your P2P campaign form by clicking the three dots next to your form and select "View form"
Click the "Fundraise" button to start creating teams
Click on "Create teams"
Create separate teams for each:
Grade level (e.g., "Grade 3 Team," "Grade 4 Team")
Classroom (e.g., "Mrs. Smith's Class," "Mr. Johnson's Class")
Activity group (e.g., "Soccer Team," "Drama Club")
Important: Use the actual name and email addresses of team leaders (teachers, coaches, parents) to enable easy communication.
If you would like the leader to be able to fundraise in their own name, enable the "I will be joining the team"
Once you've added all of your teams, you will need to remove the "Fundraise" button on the form. You can do this by manually modifying the URL of your form, before sharing it to your donors. Add this to the end of your form's URL to hide the "Fundraise" button:
?noFundraise=True
If you accidentally created the teams using your own email, your team leaders won't be able to edit their form or receive an email when a student joins or a donation is made.
You can't change the email associated with the team, and will instead have to delete the team and then create a new team.
You can read how to do this here: Delete or edit a team or participant page from a peer-to-peer campaign
4. How Students Can Join a Team
Method 1: From the front page of your P2P campaign
Once you create your form, you can go to the "Share" section of your form editor to access your "Sharing link".
You can send this to your teachers and students. Remember to add ?noFundraise=True at the end of the URL to avoid anyone accidentally making their own team!
When students click the link, they will be taken to the front page of your campaign
Here, they can click on their teachers team as shown below:
Method 2: From their team page
Each team will have their own team page which can be shared directly with their sponsors by clicking on the share link at the top of the page by clicking "Copy share link":
5. How to Share the Form
Your students, teachers and staff can now start sharing the form to start collecting donations!
Once your form configuration has been finalized and you're ready for it to be publicized, you'll be able to share it with your community. To learn how to share your form, consult the instructions here: Sharing your Zeffy form.
Remember to add ?noFundraise=True at the end of the URL/share link to avoid anyone accidentally making their own team!
Frequently Asked Questions
Q: Help! One of my students accidentally joined the wrong team/didn't join a team!
A: No worries! Send us a message using the chatbot in the left-hand corner or send us an email at [email protected] and we can move them to the correct them for you :) Please send us the name of the student and the team you would like them to be moved to.
Q: Help! One of my students accidentally created two campaigns for themselves!
A: Again, no worries! Send us a message using the chatbot in the left-hand corner or send us an email at [email protected] and we can merge the two accounts :) Please send us the URL for both of the campaigns the students have created and indicate which one you would like to keep.
Q: Can I delete or edit a team or participant page from a peer-to-peer campaign?
A: Yes! You can read about how to do this here: Delete or edit a team or participant page from a peer-to-peer campaign
Q: A donor accidentally donated to the general campaign/the wrong team/the wrong student, what can I do?
A: To move a donation from one campaign to another, go to Fundraising > "Payments" in your Zeffy dashboard.
Find the donation by the donor and click on the transaction. A small page should open up to the right. In the top right of that page, click on "More", and on "Move donation". Then, select the donation campaign page your donor actually wants to contribute to.
The donation should now be reassigned to the correct campaign page. If you prefer a visual overview, you can look here: Move a donation to another form
Q: We had a peer-to-peer campaign last year, and would like to re-create it this year. Can I duplicate/clone my form?
A: Yes! You can clone the form by following these instructions: How can I duplicate or clone my form?