Focus on the Family

How a radical redesign of an instant donation page impacts donor conversion

Experiment ID: #9788

Focus on the Family

Focus on the Family is a global Christian ministry dedicated to helping families thrive. We provide help and resources for couples to build healthy marriages that reflect God's design, and for parents to raise their children according to morals and values grounded in biblical principles.

Experiment Summary

Timeframe: 10/09/2011 - 11/13/2018

Focus on the Family offers a free video series for couples on a variety of topics. One of the topics is about how to better cherish your spouse. They sent people to sign-up for this video series through many different channels. After a person signs up for the series, they are immediately given an instant donation ask on the confirmation page. In reviewing the original instant donation page, we hypothesized that a radical redesign – one that focused on the value proposition and how it was presented – might increase donor conversion. To test this, we rewrote the copy on the page, put them in numbered steps, and asked for a specific gift amount attributing the amount back to what it would help do. We then tested this version against the control over four weeks to see the results.

Research Question

How would a radical redesign impact donor conversion?

Design

C: Control
T1: Treatment #1

Results

 Treatment NameConv. RateRelative DifferenceConfidence
C: Control 0.64%
T1: Treatment #1 1.2%89.1% 100.0%

This experiment has a required sample size of 2,182 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 16,988, 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
× 89.1% increase in conversion rate
× 0% increase in average gift

Key Learnings

The radical redesign increased donor conversion by 89%. This significant lift can be attributed to a few things:
1. Immediately congratulating people and confirm that they are signed up. This brought clarity to the conversion process.
2. Created expectations and specific next steps we wanted them to know and do by telling them “there are five important things for you to know before you start the video series” and then numbering them in order.
3. Made a strong case for support that was reinforced through every numbered step.
4. Suggested a gift amount that communicated the specific impact of that gift, “Your gift of $50 today will allow 82 more couples to get signed up for the Cherish Your Spouse video series…”.
By communicating a stronger value proposition, reinforcing it, and mentally walking the end user through a numbered/ordered approach, we were able to increase the motivation of the reader and increase donor conversion.


Experiment Documented by Courtney Gaines
Courtney Gaines is Vice President at NextAfter.

Question about experiment #9788

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