How using scripture in Facebook ad copy affects email acquisition rate
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: 05/23/2017 - 06/15/2017
Dallas Theological Seminary noticed that their “Genesis” course signup page was receiving less traffic, relative to the other courses they offer. They wondered if adding a line from scripture into the Facebook copy would help individuals contextualize the importance of studying the book of Genesis. In order to find out, they launched a treatment ad that contained an extra line of copy, quoting Genesis 1:27.
Research Question
Will the presence of a scripture verse increase email acquisition rate?
Design
Results
| Treatment Name | Click Rate | Relative Difference | Confidence | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| C: | Control | 1.4% | ||
| T1: | Include Scripture | 2.4% | 74.0% | 100.0% |
This experiment has a required sample size of 1,515 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 60,802, 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:
74.0% increase in traffic
× 0% increase in conversion rate
× 0% increase in average gift
Key Learnings
Dallas Theological Seminary found that the treatment containing the scripture verse produced a 74% increase in traffic to their course signup page. It’s clear that this addition helped users understand with more clarity why studying the book of Genesis is important as Christians. One possible conclusion is that the use of scripture shifted the authoritative voice away from Dallas Theological Seminary and on to the Bible.
This discovery has led Dallas Theological Seminary to re-launch other courses with a similar approach.