Six stations join NPR test of online-giving techniques
NPR and six stations will compare the effectiveness of online fundraising websites in a trial expected to start next month.
The so-called A/B experiment, designed to test how web users respond to different online donation pages, will direct some givers to their stations’ donation pages and send others to a new donation portal designed to offer a better user experience.
All of the contributors will start the same place — at the newly redesigned NPR.org site, where “donate” buttons and ads let web users chose the station they wish to support.
Donordigital, a Berkeley-based online fundraiser, was commissioned by NPR to devise the new giving portal, according to Barbara Appleby, director of new revenue strategies.
Fundraising appeals on NPR.org are now sending about 5,000 prospective donors a week to station websites, Appleby said. Some would-be donors have better experiences than others. Appleby said.
Because stations and NPR don’t share much data on online giving, pubradio fundraisers don’t know which sites are best at completing donations, Appleby said.
Stations in the pilot project are KQED in San Francisco, WAMU in Washington, D.C, WNYC in New York, WUWM in Milwaukee, WXPN in Philadelphia and KPCC in Pasadena, Calif. Contributions through the Donordigital site will be sent stations’ Internet merchant accounts; only the stations will receive the donors’ names and addresses.
Web page posted Aug. 3, 2009
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