How reducing friction by removing a phone number field impacted gifts
Dallas Theological Seminary
The DTS mission is, “to glorify God by equipping godly servant-leaders for the proclamation of His Word and the building up of the body of Christ worldwide.” They strive to help men and women fulfill the Great Commission and the Great Commandment, or more simply: Teach Truth. Love Well.
Experiment Summary
Timeframe: 05/03/2022 - 05/14/2022
We were looking for test ideas for an upcoming fiscal year end campaign. We were launching a new free online course ahead of the FYE campaign and knew that we would be getting lots of traffic from sending the offer to the housefile so we wanted to put a test in place on the donation page. We were hoping to get a learning ahead of the fiscal year end campaign that would help us present the most optimized version of the donation form during the campaign. We noticed the donation form fields take up a good amount of space on the page and it looks like a lengthy and difficult process. We wanted to remove the barrier of “work” from our donation page visitors so we asked if there were any unnecessary form fields that could be eliminated as well as any fields that could be grouped together to reduce the amount of space they were taking up on the page. We pulled out phone number and put City/State/Zip all on the same row so it condensed the appearance of the form fields.
Research Question
We believe that reducing form friction by eliminating optional fields for instant donation page visitors will achieve an increase in donor conversion.
Design
Results
| Treatment Name | Conv. Rate | Relative Difference | Confidence | Average Gift | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C: | Control | 3.0% | |||
| T1: | 1 Samuel Donation Page - No Phone Number Field | 5.3% | 77.1% | 98.4% |
This experiment has a required sample size of 570 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 1,729, 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:
0% increase in traffic
× 77.1% increase in conversion rate
× 0% increase in average gift
Key Learnings
By taking out the phone number field, even though it was optional and not required, we saw a 77.1% increase in conversion rate with 98.4% level of confidence. Revenue also experienced a 66.8% increase with a 96% level of confidence. We believe removing the phone number field reduced anxiety for page visitors as they didn’t have to wonder “Why do you need my phone number in order for me to make a gift?” or “Who is going to contact me and how often if I give away this personal piece of information?” We were also able to reduce friction by making the form appear shorter and look like less work for the donor when filling out the form. Going forward into the FYE campaign, we will remove the phone number field on the donation form and find ways to ask for it after the gift is made rather than interrupting the donation process to get this information.