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The Heritage Foundation

How including a button in an appeal email affects email click-through rates for non-members

Experiment ID: #198892

The Heritage Foundation

Experiment Summary

Ended On: 08/01/2025

The Heritage Foundation conducted this experiment as part of their President’s Challenge matching gift campaign. This campaign was designed to drive donor engagement by offering a limited-time opportunity to double the impact of a donor’s gift through a matching challenge. The email in question was the first send in the campaign sequence, making it a high-leverage moment for influencing donor behavior and maximizing initial response rates.

Given the high stakes of the campaign’s early momentum and the importance of clearly communicating the match opportunity, the Heritage Foundation sought to test whether different call-to-action (CTA) formats would affect click-through and conversion rates.

The test was deployed via email, targeting the Heritage Foundation’s non-member list.

Both versions of the email—control and treatment—were linked to the same donation landing page but differed in their CTA presentation.

The experiment was driven by a hypothesis rooted in behavioral and conversion rate optimization principles: a visually prominent, action-oriented button might outperform a plain-text hyperlink in driving user action.

Key motivations included:

  • Improving clarity and visibility of the CTA: While the raw URL in the control version is technically functional, it lacks the immediate visual weight and action language of a button. The team suspected that this might cause the CTA to be overlooked or feel less urgent.
  • Reducing cognitive friction: A clear, concise button like “Double My Gift” directly mirrors the donor’s intent and may simplify decision-making.
  • Encouraging mobile-friendly design: Buttons often perform better on mobile devices where touch interaction is key, and plain-text links can be harder to tap.

This test is a good example of using micro-optimizations in email fundraising design to explore how seemingly small changes can have an outsized effect on user behavior and conversion rates.

Research Question

We believe that using a visually prominent, action-oriented button that says “Double My Gift” will increase email click-through rate because it draws more attention than a plain-text hyperlink, creates a clearer and more compelling call to action, and reduces friction by making the next step more obvious and easier to complete.

Design

C: Control
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T1: Treatment #1
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[thumb_122_67-height] => 67 [thumb_153_153] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-153x107.png [thumb_153_153-width] => 153 [thumb_153_153-height] => 107 [thumb_130_163] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-130x91.png [thumb_130_163-width] => 130 [thumb_130_163-height] => 91 [thumb_232_177] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-232x162.png [thumb_232_177-width] => 232 [thumb_232_177-height] => 162 [thumb_272_325] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-544x379.png [thumb_272_325-width] => 544 [thumb_272_325-height] => 379 [thumb_271_346] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-271x189.png [thumb_271_346-width] => 271 [thumb_271_346-height] => 189 [thumb_271_271] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-271x189.png [thumb_271_271-width] => 271 [thumb_271_271-height] => 189 [thumb_272_172] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-247x172.png [thumb_272_172-width] => 247 [thumb_272_172-height] => 172 [thumb_372_461] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-372x259.png [thumb_372_461-width] => 372 [thumb_372_461-height] => 259 [thumb_372_500] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-372x259.png [thumb_372_500-width] => 372 [thumb_372_500-height] => 259 [thumb_385_270] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-385x268.png [thumb_385_270-width] => 385 [thumb_385_270-height] => 268 [thumb_416_241] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-346x241.png [thumb_416_241-width] => 346 [thumb_416_241-height] => 241 [thumb_448_410] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-448x312.png [thumb_448_410-width] => 448 [thumb_448_410-height] => 312 [thumb_448_410_retina] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-896x624.png [thumb_448_410_retina-width] => 896 [thumb_448_410_retina-height] => 624 [thumb_574_382] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-548x382.png [thumb_574_382-width] => 548 [thumb_574_382-height] => 382 [thumb_776_395] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123-567x395.png [thumb_776_395-width] => 567 [thumb_776_395-height] => 395 [gform-image-choice-sm] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123.png [gform-image-choice-sm-width] => 300 [gform-image-choice-sm-height] => 209 [gform-image-choice-md] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123.png [gform-image-choice-md-width] => 400 [gform-image-choice-md-height] => 279 [gform-image-choice-lg] => https://www.nextafter.com/wp-content/uploads/Treatment_1-123.png [gform-image-choice-lg-width] => 600 [gform-image-choice-lg-height] => 418 ) ) )

Results

  Treatment Name Click Rate Relative Difference Confidence
C: Control 0.28%
T1: Treatment #1 0.40% 42.0% 100.0%

This experiment has a required sample size of 18,560 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 741,549, and the level of confidence is above 95% the experiment results are valid.

Flux Metrics Affected

The Flux Metrics analyze the three primary metrics that affect revenue (traffic, conversion rate, and average gift). This experiment produced the following results:

    42.0% increase in traffic
Ă— 0% increase in conversion rate
Ă— 0% increase in average gift

Key Learnings

The key learnings from this experiment are that using a visually prominent, action-oriented button with clear and compelling language can significantly increase click-through rates in email campaigns. In this case, the treatment with the button saying “Double My Gift” outperformed the control with a plain-text hyperlink, resulting in a 42.0% increase in clicks for all traffic. In future experimentation, it is important to continue testing different elements of email design, such as CTAs, to optimize for user engagement and conversion rates. By focusing on creating clear, visually engaging CTAs that reduce cognitive friction and make the next steps obvious and easy to complete, organizations can increase the effectiveness of their email fundraising efforts. Additionally, considering the importance of mobile-friendly design in email campaigns, using buttons rather than plain-text links can further improve user experience and drive better results.

Experiment Documented by NextAfter

Question about experiment #198892

If you have any questions about this experiment or would like additional details not discussed above, please feel free to contact them directly.