When I talk about online fundraising best practices, I usually refer to your “donation page” for simplicity; in reality, you should be applying the tips and tricks on this blog to your donation pages. For the most fundraising success, nonprofits should have more than one donation page.
4 reasons you need multiple donation pages
1. Specialized campaigns
Many nonprofits have year-end fundraising campaigns or campaigns to fundraise money for a specific project or event. When running campaigns like these, you don’t want to send donors to your general donation page because it could be confusing. They are expecting to see a call-to-action (CTA) inline with the special campaign, not just your general CTA. For example, our client Project C.U.R.E. has a donation page specifically to raise money for Nepal earthquake relief. A donation landing page such as this is a great way to promote special campaigns throughout the year.
2. Monthly versus one-time donations
I recommend that all your donation pages have a monthly giving option, but our client Big Brothers Big Sisters Lone Star has a donation page designed just for monthly giving. What makes their page special is their adherence to online fundraising best practices; the most important example of this being the explanation of why monthly giving is important. They describe that consistency in funding is necessary to provide consistency in their services.
3. A/B testing
A/B testing is a way of testing various subject lines, headlines and links to see which of the items are more appealing (and achieve more engagement) than the others. For example, if you don’t know what CTA to use on your campaign donation page, create two donation pages – one with each of your possible CTAs. Next, send half of your email list “donation page A” and the other half “donation page B.” Finally, check your website analytics and officially use the page that got more people to donate. You can play around with your donation page design a bit when doing A/B testing, but always make it mobile-friendly.
4. Tracking ROI
Speaking of analytics, you can also use different donation pages to track return on investment (ROI). Each marketing campaign or ad you run should lead to a different donation page. The content on some of these may be the same, but the URLs need to be different; that way, when you look at your analytics, you know exactly how many people visited a donation page and exactly which marketing piece led them there.
The number of donation pages you have active at any given time will be different throughout the year. Campaigns come and go, and so do donation pages, but it’s important to connect with your audiences in various ways—including multiple points of entry to your donation area and additional donation pages across your site.
