Here is a simple assignment.
Take out your phone, go to your organization’s website and make a donation.
Don’t just look at the donation page. Start where a prospective donor might start. Visit the home page. Find the Donate button. Follow the process all the way through to the thank-you page and acknowledgment email.
Then ask yourself one question:
Was that as easy and compelling as it should have been?
During the final months of the year, your fundraising communications will likely send more people to your website. Before you invest time and money generating that traffic, make sure your online donor experience is ready for it.
Your website may look terrific on the computer in your office. That doesn’t mean it works equally well on a phone.
Check it yourself.
Is the Donate button immediately visible? Is the type easy to read? Do pages load quickly? Are forms easy to complete without pinching, zooming or excessive scrolling?
Then go through the entire donation process.
Every unnecessary step creates another opportunity for someone to leave.
Fundraisers spend so much time looking at their own materials that it becomes difficult to experience them like someone seeing them for the first time.
Try anyway.
Does your donation page quickly remind someone why their gift matters?
Are suggested gift amounts appropriate? If possible, do they connect the amount of a gift to something tangible or meaningful?
Is there an obvious recurring-gift option?
Does the page provide enough information to create confidence without overwhelming the donor?
And is the actual giving process simple?
Your donation page has one primary job. Make it easy for someone who wants to help to do so.
The donor experience doesn’t end when the credit card is processed.
What appears on the screen immediately afterward?
A generic “Transaction Successful” message is a missed opportunity. This is a moment when someone has just acted generously toward your mission.
Thank them.
Reinforce what their gift makes possible. Let them know what to expect next. Give them another opportunity to feel good about the decision they just made.
Then check the email acknowledgment.
Does it arrive immediately?
Does it display correctly on a phone? Is the donor’s name correct? Is the tax information accurate? Most importantly, does it sound like a genuine thank-you from your organization rather than a receipt generated by a payment processor?
As we discussed last month, prompt acknowledgment is an important part of donor stewardship. Your online giving system should make that easier, not harder.
There are sophisticated tools available to analyze website performance and conversion rates. Those can be extremely useful.
But there is also tremendous value in simply becoming your own donor for ten minutes.
Ask a staff member who doesn’t normally work on fundraising to do the same thing. Better yet, ask someone unfamiliar with your website to try it while you watch.
Where do they hesitate? What do they miss? What questions do they ask?
You may discover something remarkably easy to fix.
Fall fundraising is already underway. Before your biggest campaigns drive donors to your website, make sure the experience waiting for them is one that helps turn their intention to give into a completed gift.
