NextAfter

How links are placed in a digest email affects clickthrough

Experiment ID: #10799

NextAfter

Experiment Summary

Timeframe: 02/22/2019 - 02/28/2019

In this experiment, we were continuing to test the format of our digest emails to optimize for more clicks. When setting up this email, we had 2 ideas of how we could link up the various articles, blogs, podcasts, etc. On the one hand, we could link up the description text so that the links are tied directly to the value copy. On the other hand, we could simply list out several links in a block below the description text.

Research Question

Which method of linking resources in a digest email will lead to more clicks?

Design

C: Linked Descriptions
T1: List of Links

Results

 Treatment NameClick RateRelative DifferenceConfidence
C: Linked Descriptions 2.8%
T1: List of Links 5.1%81.6% 100.0%

This experiment has a required sample size of 558 in order to be valid. Since the experiment had a total sample size of 8,366, 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:

    81.6% increase in traffic
× 0% increase in conversion rate
× 0% increase in average gift

Key Learnings

The list of links saw an 81% increase in clicks. It’s possible that having the linked up text in the description paragraphs made the email harder to read, or obscured all the different resources. Putting them in a list could make it more skimmable and easier to digest.


Experiment Documented by Nathan Hill
Nathan Hill is Vice President, NextAfter Institute.

Question about experiment #10799

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