Coffee mornings are the most popular ways for supporters to raise money for charity, according to new research commissioned by sector software provider Blackbaud.

A survey of 1,017 people who participated in fundraising events, conducted in October last year, found that 19 per cent said coffee mornings were the most appealing way to raise money. This figure rises to 22 per cent for women, whereas the most appealing activity for men were fun runs (25 per cent), followed by a walks (19 per cent). People participated in an average of 2.5 fundraising events each year.

The survey also discovered that people are most motivated to participate in an event because they care about the particular cause, with two-thirds of respondents citing this as a motivation. A total of 37 per cent participated because a family member or friend had asked them to participate, while 30 per cent said they wanted to do the specific activity involved.

One in five respondents got involved because their place of work had requested them to do so and men were almost twice as likely as women (9.2 per cent to 5.9 per cent) to do a fundraising activity in response to an emotive request.

Most fundraisers (46 per cent) would rather pay no registration fee and fundraise a lot when participating in an event, while 19 per cent said they would rather pay a higher registration fee and not fundraise at all.

“Not-for-profits need to balance low registration fees in order to attract participants against the risk of participants not actually fundraising," says John Bird, general manager, peer-to-peer fundraising, Blackbaud. “We are noticing that not-for-profits are increasingly offering two options within registration – a low cost, higher fundraising option and a higher cost, lower fundraising option.”

The online survey was conducted in October 2014 by market research company TFL Research as part of Blackbaud's Successful Events Fundraising report. The report, published this week, looks at people’s motivation for participating in event fundraising and how not-for-profits can support them more effectively.

Scroll down for infographic.