Purpose—Identifying the characteristics of fundraising messages generated by French charities and exploring which of these features engage the most social media users. Methodology — A qualitative approach was conducted on 444 fundraising messages from two of the most popular social media platforms [Facebook & Twitter]. Research implications/limitations—This paper identifies how social media users evaluate content and therefore explore what makes this prosocial content more engaging than another. Practical implications—Charities managers could use the findings of this paper, to design an engaging content and thereby optimizing the efficiency of fundraising campaigns.