Seddon, thanks for addressing this. What are your thoughts about measuring the extent to which you would have to run a minimalist banner to achieve current goals, as per https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising/2018-19_Fundraising_ideas#Design ?
Both of the "small" banners in the set of four (total?) you are testing -- linked from the top of that page -- seem to be as big as the average banner was ten years or so ago. Is that a fair statement? Do you agree with Yair's sentiment that you should have never measured the cost per donation on Facebook as expressed at https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Fundraising/2018-19_Fundraising_ideas#Technical ? Best regards, Jim On Fri, Nov 30, 2018 at 2:47 PM Joseph Seddon <jsed...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > > Hey Molly, > > Thank you for your feedback, it is really appreciated. There are a fair few > points you’ve raised so I will do my best cover them all. For some > background, mobile fundraising is vitally important. Desktop page views > have been in decline for the past 2-3 years from 4.36 billion (Oct 2016) to > 3.64 billion (Oct 2018). Likewise, the relative effectiveness as of mobile > as a fundraising platform has historically been substantially lower > compared with desktop. So we’ve been working hard to ensure that as user > behaviours shift we are well prepared and that the future of the movement > is safeguarded. > > We show two types of banner to users on both desktop and mobile. The first > banner is larger and shown only once to user in their browser followed by a > second banner that is show to the user typically up to a maximum of 9 times > and is substantially smaller. > > Our mobile large banner changed last November from a splash style banner to > the current text message style. Since then one of the things that has > constantly surprised us, is that people seem to genuinely read the extra > content. We’ve repeatedly tested over the past year removing content and > every time, the shorter banners loose. Now this could just imply that it’s > length that was producing move effective banners. So we decided to confirm > if people were actually reading our banners. We tested two banners of > similar length, one with our best copy and one where we replaced some of > the lower paragraphs with copy had historically lost out in previous > testing. Our best copy won and confirmed that people are actually invested > in reading our banners. So the copy is long and we are continuing to try > and shorten it but we genuinely believe its not just impactful of genuine > value to our readers and donors. > > When we implemented this style of banner we made sure to add a toolbar to > the top that enabled users to skip straight to the article. You mentioned > on facebook that you didn’t notice that we will look to see if we can make > the toolbar a little more visible to users. > > Regarding the bottom red banner, that is something that was retained from > previous versions of this banner. We actually have just instrumented our > banners so that we could track the effectiveness. We got data that this > additional call to action was not performing as originally expected, most > likely due to the format of the banner having changed since last year. We > re-tested removing this and the effect was minimal and so we have removed > this in our large banner on the first impression. > > We completely agree that it’s vitally important to ensure our readers who > use assistive technologies are supported and we are going to look at how we > can improve our banner content to ensure compatibility and provide a good > experience including improving descriptions, providing better descriptions > and maybe look at suppressing some content for screen readers to reduce > some of the impact for them. > > I will copy this to your cross post on wiki too :) Thank you again for your > feedback, it is genuinely appreciated and the fundraising team are actively > acting on it. > > Regards > > Seddon > > > On Fri, Nov 30, 2018 at 4:52 PM GorillaWarfare < > gorillawarfarewikipe...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > Hey all, > > > > I feel a little bad raising this because I know there was some community > > vetting of fundraising initiatives that I ignored, but please forgive me. I > > brought this up in the Wikimedia Weekly Facebook group asking where best to > > raise the issue, and it was suggested I post here. > > > > I was looking something up on my phone just now, apparently not logged in > > to Wikipedia, and I discovered that mobile users in the US (and presumably > > elsewhere) are being shown enormous ads. It took four full page scrolls for > > me to reach the content of the article I was hoping to read. Even once I > > made it past the ads at the top of the page, I was greeted with a pop-in > > banner from the bottom of the page, as if I could possibly have not noticed > > the four pages of text asking me to donate. (Screenshots attached). > > > > I understand that we need donations to keep the site running and all, but > > this seems excessive. I particularly worry for people who use assistive > > technology who are having to listen to or try to skip through four pages' > > worth of text-to-speech before they can get to what they want to know. The > > WMF needs donations, but I think we need to weigh the need for cash against > > the goal of providing free and accessible information to our readers. A > > couple of page scrolls might not seem like much, but I assume if they're > > off-putting to me (a reader with good vision and generally high tolerance > > for WMF money pleas) they'll be off-putting to others. > > > > So much of this text could be cut out. I work for a marketing/sales company > > in a non-marketing role, and I've heard from colleagues that it's > > frustrating when people writing copy like this hear from people who are not > > educated about appealing to people, so I don't pretend to know better than > > you at the WMF or your consultants about how to write good donation copy. > > But to my (admittedly uneducated eye), copy like "It's a little awkward to > > ask you, this Friday, as we're sure you are busy and we don't want to > > interrupt you." and "We can't afford to feel embarrassed, asking you to > > make a donation—just like you should never feel embarrassed when you have > > to ask Wikipedia for information." seems like at best it's not adding > > anything besides more words to have to scroll past, and at worst it's > > pretty cringey to read. Are you really expecting people will read all four > > pages? > > > > – Molly (GorillaWarfare) > > _______________________________________________ > > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and > > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l > > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> > > > > -- > Seddon > > *Community and Audience Engagement Associate* > *Advancement (Fundraising), Wikimedia Foundation* > _______________________________________________ > Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and > https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l > New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org > Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, > <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe> _______________________________________________ Wikimedia-l mailing list, guidelines at: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mailing_lists/Guidelines and https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia-l New messages to: Wikimedia-l@lists.wikimedia.org Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l, <mailto:wikimedia-l-requ...@lists.wikimedia.org?subject=unsubscribe>
