- Treatment
- Symptoms
- Prevention
- Research
Down near the bottom of the list were things such as "donations," "annual report" and "media releases." In fact, the top response ("treatment") got as many votes as the bottom 22 responses combined.
Normally, you can't scan a charity's website without running headlong into multiple pleas for money. Buttons, banner ads, text links--you just can't avoid them. This charity was no different.
So, they set out to change things. Because people go to a website to accomplish something, the charity decided to concentrate on making it easier for visitors get what they needed.
Instead of a barrage of requests for money, they focused on helping visitors accomplish their top tasks (e.g., getting information about treatment, symptoms, prevention and research), and asked for a donation only when it was appropriate. (For example, after a user has read a research report, it would be appropriate to ask for a donation to fund that research.)
The result? A 70 percent increase in one-time donations, an 88 percent increase in monthly donors and a whopping 164 percent increase in registered members.
"It is interesting to see just how little impact the front (home) page has on donations," charity official Beate Sørum was quoted as saying in the email newsletter New Thinking by Gerry McGovern.
"The previous page had two large banners, more visible donation menus/options and frequent 'news' asking for donations--and yet donations are now doubled after we removed all this from the front page. It is much more effective to have 'asks' in relevant content than to interrupt people with banners and 'donate now' buttons, when they are really trying to accomplish something completely different."
This same principle applies no matter what your goal is for your website. So, if you want more donations/business/members/participants/etc., spend less time talking about what you need and more time helping people get the information they need. The rest will take care of itself.
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ABOUT THIS ARTICLE: Special thanks to Gerry McGovern, a worldwide authority on web usability issues, for bringing this case study to my attention. I have been a fan of Gerry's for many years and read his newsletter religiously. If you are interested in getting your website to work for you, I would suggest you sign up for it at gerrymcgovern.com.
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