How Much is Your Landing Page Costing You?

28 Apr How Much is Your Landing Page Costing You?

29 April 2024

By David Allen, Development for Conservation

Linsday

Linsday comes off the preserve trail with her family. She surveys their flushed faces happy chatter from being outside these last few hours. The bald eagle siting was truly awesome and inspiring. The weather was perfect. And there was plenty to explore.

She makes a comment about how lucky they are to live so close to a park like this. Her son corrects her: “It’s not a park, Mom. It’s a nature preserve, and it’s owned by the land trust. You should give them a donation!”

Right. So, she looks up the website when they get home, thinking that she’ll make a $50 donation. She clicks on the webpage and finds something like this:

[Editing Note: I couldn’t find a good example that wouldn’t embarrass some specific land trust, so I’m just describing it here. I can tell you that it’s not an exaggeration.]

Eight giving options ranging from $35 (Individual) to $5,000 (Champion). She clicks on $50 (Family) which makes sense in the moment.

Eleven options for directing where she wants the gift to go. She doesn’t recognize most of them (what’s an Opportunity Fund?). The specific preserve her family enjoyed isn’t one of the options. Before she chooses, she scans the rest of the form.

Add me to the email list?

Matching gift?

In memory of, in honor of, or on behalf of?

Volunteer?

Gifts of land?

Add 3% to cover credit card fees?

Uggh! She thinks before clicking off the page. I don’t have time for this!

Richard

Richard is ready to renew his membership. He clicks on the hotlink in the email thinking that this would be a good time to “up his game” with the land trust. He’d been giving $250 every year, and this year, they were asking for $365. Cute!

The hotlink takes him to a landing page with four options:

___$250      ___$100      ___$50      ___$25      ___Other

He looks for and cannot find any mention of $365.

Oh well, he thinks. And clicks the $250.

(BTW, it never occurs to Richard that “Other” could mean “More than $250.”)

Holly

Holly is sitting in her attorney’s office reviewing the provisions in her will. Among other things, she has decided that she wants to include more gifts to charity than she had thought when she last revised it, some fifteen years ago.

I should give some to the local land trust, she thinks, remembering that she is already supporting The Nature Conservancy.

“I want to leave $10,000 to the land trust,” she tells her attorney. The attorney asks for the full legal name of the Trust, its current legal business address, and its EIN number. She doesn’t know that information.

The attorney asks if she can find it on her phone or tablet. That seems easy enough. She pulls up the website and starts looking.

Hmmm, there’s a DONATE button. That sounds promising. Ways to Give – click.

All the way to the bottom – There it is – Planned Giving. That’s the same thing, right?

Monthly, no. IRA, no, Stock gifts, no. Gifts of land, no.

Ahh – gifts from your will or trust – “Consult with your attorney.” Rats.

Fortunately, there are other local land trusts around here. Maybe I’ll check with their websites, she thinks.

How much money is your website’s landing page costing you in missed opportunities?

As you consider your answer, look critically at the landing page or pages you already have. Consider how and when someone might be using it. Their frame of mind. How much time they have. What they want to see and the information they need to find.

The landing page you need may not be the one-size-fits-all page you have.

And you might need more than one.

Cheers and Have a Good Week!

-da

PS: Your comments on these posts are welcomed and warmly requested. If you have not posted a comment before, or if you are using a new email address, please know that there may be a delay in seeing your posted comment. That’s my SPAM defense at work. I approve all comments as soon as I am able during the day.

Photo by Medgyesi Jenő courtesy of Pixabay