National Breast Cancer Foundation

How the type of ask in an appeal affects click rate

Experiment ID: #7689

National Breast Cancer Foundation

The National Breast Cancer Foundation's mission is to provide help and inspire hope to those affected by breast cancer through early detection, education, and support services.

Experiment Summary

Timeframe: 10/20/2017 - 10/24/2017

National Breast Cancer Foundation was sending an email appeal for BCAM, and wanted to test click-through rate on a direct ask call-to-action (give your gift here) vs. a soft ask (learn more about how you can help). The rest of the email remained the same on the control/treatment.

Research Question

Does a softer ask increase click rate in an email appeal?

Design

C: Direct Ask
T1: Soft Ask (learn more)

Results

 Treatment NameClick RateRelative DifferenceConfidence
C: Direct Ask 0.78%
T1: Soft Ask (learn more) 1.6%110.4% 98.6%

This experiment has a required sample size of 1,198 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 3,996, 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:

    110.4% increase in traffic
× 0% increase in conversion rate
× 0% increase in average gift

Key Learnings

The softer ask increased clickthrough rate by 78%. It’s likely that the “learn more” call to action encouraged more people who weren’t initially planning to give to the donation page, while people who were already motivated to give a gift were more likely to click a link from a direct ask. This leads to a higher click-through rate, but does not necessarily translate to more gifts.


Experiment Documented by Allison Autrey

Question about experiment #7689

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