Matt Collins gives his advice on how you should structure your donation collection forms.
In an era of so called big data, it can tempting to collect as much of it as possible from supporters. While good-quality data is indeed important, charities shouldn't get carried away with it to the point they put donors off becoming donors in the first place. Here are my top tips for collecting the right data, at the right time, and in just the right amounts.
The fewer fields, the better
The more fields someone sees on a form, the less likely they are to bother filling it in. Online research indicates that the fewer fields a form contains, the more people will fill it in. One form saw a 120% increase in submissions when the number of fields was reduced from 11 to four.
So ask yourself - do we make enough use of this information we get from this question to justify having an extra field?
Don’t ask for too much
Collect the bare minimum information; only the bits you really need. For most, that will be credit card details and the essential information merchants need to complete those transactions.
Only collect email addresses and phone numbers as well if you have planned a follow-up series of communications (and if you do, make sure you put effort into making it useful, interesting or inspiring to the donor).
Only ask for information you will actually use
If your charity asks for a phone number, are you actually going to phone that person? Or are you asking for it just because you think you should have their phone number?
Research shows that asking users for their phone number reduced the number of people who completed it by 5%. That could add up to thousands of pounds in lost donations every year.
Ask for more information later
If someone makes a donation on a charity’s webpage, that doesn’t mean they are a super-committed supporter yet, one who won’t mind doing admin just because you ask them to. So start with just their credit card details and an email address. Then later, come back to them and ask them a bit more about themselves (as long as you plan to actually use the information of course).
Matt Collins is managing director of Platypus Digital
