Learn how this online fundraising platform works, what it costs, and who benefits most.
If you run PTA fundraisers regularly and want to eliminate product sales, inventory headaches, and endless volunteer coordination, then Snap! Raise delivers on those promises.
The platform handles most of the technical work and automates donor outreach.
But you pay 20-30% of everything raised for that convenience. The platform also works best when participants actively share their fundraising pages, which means you need buy-in from your school community.
If people don’t share their links, the campaign underperforms no matter how good the technology is.
What Snap! Raise Actually Does
Snap! Raise runs online fundraising campaigns for schools, sports teams, and PTAs.
The platform creates custom fundraising pages for each participant in your campaign.
Every student, parent, or teacher gets their own page linked to your overall goal.
These pages show your school branding, campaign photos, a progress bar, and donation buttons. Participants share their pages through email, text, and social media.
When someone clicks through and donates, Snap!
Raise processes the payment and sends a tax receipt automatically.
The system includes pre-written messages that participants can send to their contact lists. Follow-up reminders go out on a schedule without anyone manually tracking who’s been contacted. This automation means you’re not managing spreadsheets of donor names or chasing people for updates.
Campaign leaders see everything happening in real-time through a dashboard. Total raised, number of donors, which participants are sharing most actively, and which communication channels work best all appear in one place.
| Feature | What It Does | Why It Matters |
|---|---|---|
| Custom Fundraising Pages | Creates branded pages for each participant with progress tracking | Donors see exactly where money goes and how close you are to the goal |
| Automated Outreach | Sends templated messages and reminders to participant contact lists | Eliminates manual email tracking and follow-up work |
| Payment Processing | Handles secure transactions and issues tax receipts | No cash handling, check deposits, or manual receipt generation |
| Real-Time Dashboard | Shows live updates on donations, participants, and engagement | Identify who needs encouragement and celebrate progress immediately |
| Spirit Wear Store | Year-round online store for school merchandise | Generates ongoing revenue without running timed campaigns |
Try Snap! Raise for Your Next Campaign, Set up takes less than 30 minutes
How Setup and Campaign Launch Works
You create an account and establish your campaign parameters. This means setting your fundraising goal, choosing your campaign duration (typically 28 days), and uploading school photos and logos.
The platform generates person fundraising links for every participant. You distribute these links to students, parents, or whoever is participating.
Each person gets access to their personal page and can customize their message if they want.
Participants upload their contact lists into the system. The platform sends initial fundraising asks to these contacts using templates you can change.
The system tracks who opens emails, who clicks links, and who donates.
Throughout the campaign, automated reminders go out at strategic intervals. The platform also sends progress updates showing how close you are to your goal.
Participants receive notifications when someone donates to their page.
After the 28-day window closes, Snap! Raise processes all funds and transfers money to your PTA account minus their percentage fee.
You get detailed financial reports showing all transactions.
What You Actually Pay
Snap! Raise charges a percentage of funds raised as opposed to a flat subscription fee.
Based on available information, this ranges from 20-30% depending on your campaign structure.
Here’s what that looks like in practice:
If you raise $2,000, and the platform takes 25%, you keep $1,500.
If you raise $5,000, and the platform takes 25%, you keep $3,750.
If you raise $10,000, and the platform takes 25%, you keep $7,500.
The percentage covers all platform features: the technology infrastructure, automated communications, payment processing, compliance handling, tax receipt generation, and donor management systems.
Compare this to traditional fundraisers where you buy products upfront, coordinate sales, manage inventory, handle cash, and still might not reach your goal. The question becomes whether the automation and increased reach justify the percentage taken.
Calculate Your Potential Fundraising, See what you could raise
Who Benefits Most From This Platform
Schools Running Multiple Campaigns Annually
If you run 2-3 major fundraisers each year, online fundraising through Snap! Raise reduces the volunteer burden significantly.
Instead of coordinating gift wrap sales in fall, discount cards in winter, and spring carnivals, you run digital campaigns that need less hands-on management.
PTAs With Limited Volunteer Availability
When parent volunteers are scarce, traditional fundraisers become impossible to execute well. Snap!
Raise distributes the work across all participants as opposed to requiring a core group to manage everything.
Communities Comfortable With Digital Tools
The platform needs participants to share links through email and social media. If your school community already uses these tools regularly, adoption happens more easily.
Schools where families have limited internet access or digital literacy face steeper challenges.
Organizations Fundraising for Specific Projects
Campaigns with clear, compelling goals perform better. Field trips, new playground equipment, classroom technology, or library upgrades give donors a tangible reason to contribute.
Vague “general fund” campaigns generate less enthusiasm.
Real Advantages You Get
No Product Inventory Management
Traditional fundraisers involve purchasing products, storing them, distributing them to participants, tracking what sold, handling returns, and managing unsold inventory. Snap!
Raise eliminates all of this.
Donors contribute money directly to your cause.
Geographic Reach Beyond Your Immediate Area
Grandparents in other states can donate easily. Extended family members who want to support their relatives can contribute from anywhere.
Traditional fundraisers limit you to people who can physically interact with participants.
Automatic Record Keeping
Every transaction generates a digital record. Tax receipts go out automatically.
Financial reports compile themselves.
Your treasurer isn’t manually entering data or reconciling cash versus checks versus what was actually deposited.
Built-In Communication System
The platform includes email and SMS capabilities with pre-written templates. You’re not starting from scratch trying to write compelling fundraising appeals.
The system sends reminders automatically based on the schedule you set.
Start Your Campaign Setup, Free to explore the dashboard
Honest Limitations to Consider
The Fee Impacts Small Campaigns Significantly
A 25% fee on a $1,000 campaign means $250 goes to the platform. For small PTAs, that amount matters.
Larger campaigns raising $10,000+ find the percentage less painful relative to total funds received.
Success Requires Active Participation
The platform provides tools, but people still need to share their fundraising pages. If participants don’t actively promote their links, the campaign stalls.
You can’t automate genuine enthusiasm or peer network engagement.
No Recurring Donation Options
Snap! Raise runs time-limited campaigns.
If you need steady monthly income throughout the year, this platform alone won’t solve that problem.
The spirit wear store provides some ongoing revenue, but it’s not the same as recurring donors.
Limited Design Customization
You can add your logo, photos, and colors, but the overall page structure stays the same. PTAs wanting extensive design control or unique features face constraints.
Important Context Box:
The platform works when participants share actively. Set expectations clearly with your school community before launching.
Explain that success depends on everyone promoting their pages, not just setting them up and waiting.
Advanced Strategies That Improve Results
Run Grade-Level Competitions
Instead of one school-wide campaign, organize separate fundraisers for each grade. Third graders fundraise for their field trip, fourth graders for theirs, and so on.
This creates focused campaigns that feel more relevant to participants.
Competition between grades also motivates students. Create leaderboards showing which grade has raised the most or has the highest participation rate.
Set Milestone Celebrations
Break your overall goal into smaller milestones. When you hit 25% of your goal, celebrate publicly.
Send updates at 50%, 75%, and 90%.
Research on fundraising behavior shows that visible progress motivates additional giving.
Post updates on social media showing your progress bar moving. Thank donors publicly (if they consent).
Create momentum that makes people want to be part of something that’s succeeding.
Launch With a Kickoff Event
Start your campaign with an in-person event where students create their pages together. Provide computers or tablets, help them upload contacts, and have them send their first batch of messages before leaving.
This concentrates initial outreach into a short window, which generates early donations that build momentum for the rest of the campaign.
Identify and Support Struggling Participants
Use the dashboard to find participants who haven’t shared their pages yet. Reach out personally to offer help.
Some people need extra encouragement or technical assistance.
A quick phone call often gets them back on track.
Leverage the Spirit Wear Store Year-Round
Set up the spirit wear component as a permanent online store. Every purchase generates points that convert to funds for your school.
Promote this before holidays, at the start of school, and during spirit weeks.
Explore Spirit Wear Options, Ongoing revenue without campaigns
How It Compares to Traditional Fundraising
Product Sales (Candy, Gift Wrap, Discount Cards)
Traditional product fundraisers need upfront inventory purchases. You pay for products before selling them, which means financial risk if they don’t sell.
You also coordinate distribution, track sales, and manage unsold items.
Snap! Raise eliminates inventory completely.
There’s no financial risk from unsold products because you’re collecting direct donations.
School Events (Carnivals, Auctions, Fun Runs)
Events create community engagement but demand significant volunteer time. You need people to plan, set up, run activities, and clean up.
Weather can cancel outdoor events.
Attendance determines success.
Online fundraising through Snap! Raise needs far less volunteer coordination.
The platform handles technical logistics automatically.
Geographic reach extends beyond who can physically attend.
Direct Mail Appeals
Sending physical fundraising letters costs money for printing and postage. Response rates average 1-2% for cold prospects.
You wait weeks for responses and manually process checks.
The digital outreach through Snap! Raise costs nothing to send.
Email and text reach people instantly.
Donations happen immediately with automated processing.
Questions People Ask Before Starting
How long does setup take?
Initial campaign creation takes 20-30 minutes. You upload your logo, write your campaign description, set your goal, and establish the timeline.
Generating person participant pages happens automatically once you input their information.
What if participants don’t have large contact lists?
The platform works best when each participant has 20-50 contacts they can reach. Students with smaller networks can still join, but overall results depend on total reach across all participants combined.
Can donors stay anonymous?
Donors can choose whether their names appear on the public “cheer wall.” The campaign organizer sees all donor information for record-keeping, but public visibility stays optional.
What happens if we don’t reach our goal?
You keep whatever funds you raise. Snap!
Raise isn’t an all-or-nothing platform.
If you set a $5,000 goal and raise $3,500, you receive $3,500 minus the platform fee.
How quickly do we get the money?
Funds transfer to your account after the campaign closes. Processing typically takes a few business days after the 28-day campaign window ends.
My Take After Reviewing Everything
Snap! Raise solves real problems that PTAs face with traditional fundraising.
The automation genuinely reduces volunteer workload.
The geographic reach expands your donor base. The built-in compliance and reporting save administrative time.
The 20-30% fee matters, particularly for smaller campaigns. You need to decide whether the convenience and potentially higher total fundraising justify that cost.
For PTAs running multiple campaigns annually, the time savings often make the percentage worthwhile.
The platform positions itself as the solution to traditional fundraising headaches, and it delivers on that promise for organizations that apply campaigns thoughtfully. You can’t just set up pages and expect money to appear.
Success needs promoting the campaign, encouraging participants to share actively, and maintaining momentum throughout the 28-day window.
If you’re tired of coordinating product sales, managing inventory, and spending hours on spreadsheets, this platform eliminates those pain points. If you need every possible dollar to go directly to your cause with minimal fees, other approaches might fit better.
The spirit wear store adds ongoing revenue potential beyond timed campaigns. This feature alone provides value for schools that regularly sell branded merchandise.
Setting it up once gives you a year-round income stream.
Set Up Your First Campaign, See if Snap! Raise fits your needs
Bottom Line
You get a comprehensive online fundraising platform that automates most administrative work. You pay a significant percentage fee for that convenience.
The platform works well when you have motivated participants willing to share their pages actively.
Traditional fundraisers demand more volunteer time but let you keep a higher percentage of funds raised. Online fundraising through Snap! Raise demands less coordination but takes a bigger cut.
Your choice depends on which resource you value more: volunteer time or maximizing dollars retained.
For PTAs that run 2-3 campaigns annually and struggle to find volunteers for traditional fundraising, this platform makes practical sense. For PTAs with strong volunteer networks and tight budgets where every dollar counts, hybrid approaches that mix occasional Snap!
Raise campaigns with traditional events might work better.
The technology does what it promises. The question you need to answer is whether what it promises matches what your PTA actually needs.