How design and copy placement affects conversion rate
The Heritage Foundation
Founded in 1973, The Heritage Foundation is a research and educational institution—a think tank—whose mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense.
Experiment Summary
Timeframe: 05/23/2015 - 06/01/2015
As part of an appeal for their Reclaim America campaign, The Heritage Foundation wanted to implement a landing page that used the same look and feel as the campaign’s microsite. This landing page was heavier on imagery than is traditionally used in their appeals so we wanted to ensure the design would be as effective as the standard design style.
We created an experiment using a design from a previous campaign (with minor variations) as the control and the new microsite design as the treatment. The copy and quotes used were identical between the two pages.
Research Question
Which design will drive the most donor conversion?
Design
Results
| Treatment Name | Conv. Rate | Relative Difference | Confidence | Average Gift | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C: | Stand with Heritage Design | 6.6% | $65.28 | ||
| T1: | Reclaim America Design | 7.5% | 14.0% | 91.0% | $63.31 |
This experiment has a required sample size of 5,947 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 8,895, and the level of confidence is not above 95% the experiment results are not valid.
Key Learnings
The new microsite design created a 14% increase to donor conversion on the page. After reflecting upon the page further, this may be attributable to both the page design and the placement of the quotes from well-known public figures. In the control, the quotes are placed in a sidebar while in the treatment, they are in-line with the copy.
For this specific campaign, we rolled out the new design for the remainder of the campaign. We will want to run future experiments with the placement of 3rd party quotes to validate their potential impact.