Donors not able to predict own giving habits 2

Fundraising | Celina Ribeiro | 25 Nov 2011

Donors do not accurately predict what kinds of messages will get them giving, according to new research from eBay and nfpSynergy.

A survey conducted by the retailer of its eBay Give at Checkout facility tested 17 different asks for a £1 donation to be added at purchase across more than 500,000 eBay users. NfpSynergy then surveyed a sample of 1,000 adults asking how likely they would be to give to each of those £1 asks.

The results have indicated that donors were not as attuned to their own propensity to give to various appeals as may have been thought.

eBay shoppers were most likely to give to the ask to ‘support the fight against prostate, testicular and bowel cancer’, but this was only the fourth most popular ask in the survey conducted by nfpSynergy. Conversely, 29 per cent of adults surveyed said they would likely give £1 if asked to ‘help a young person fight cancer’, but this ask, when put to eBay shoppers, came in as the fourth most popular.

And while nearly one in five survey respondents said they’d happily donate £1 to 'help small UK charities stay open and help local people', this ask fared extremely poorly in relation to other, more emotive asks of eBay shoppers checking out their purchases. It ranked the second-least popular choice of the 17 asks put to eBayers.

While the research concluded this shows that donors are more motivated by emotion than they like to admit, the authors also admitted that there could be slight variation down to eBay audiences perhaps behaving slightly different to that of a sample of the British public as a whole.

Top five eBay asks:

Support the fight against prostate, testicular and bowel cancer
Feed a malnourished baby for a week
Help a nurse care for a terminally ill cancer patient
Help a young person fight cancer
Give a Kosovo child a pair of shoes and warm gloves that they can wear to school

Top five asks favoured by survey respondents:

Help a young person fight cancer
Help a nurse care for a terminally ill cancer patient
Help small UK charities stay open and help local people
Support the fight against prostate, testicular and bowel cancer
Stop child trafficking for sexual exploitation and child labour

Directory: nfpSynergy | Mission Fish charity partner ebay

Place a comment

Nick Aldridge
CEO
MissionFIsh UK
30 Nov 2011

I've published the full data on my blog, which should give a much clearer view of the differences. The correlation actually looks quite weak.
http://nickaldridge.co.uk/?p=140

[Reply]

PS Siu
Fundraiser
RNS
25 Nov 2011

It does show a 60% correlation between asked and surveyed so its not quite 'people are crazy' type results, the differences could come down to nothing more than the inconsequential nature of the absolute sum asked influencing people's thought processes (or lack of) whilst making their minds up. It might be interesting to see other studies on how size of ask correlates to the length of time/thought processes invested in a decision like this.

On another note I'd stick with the ebay results as a truer indicator of people's propensity to give to various types of appeals, since it's based on what people actually did, rather than what people think they'd do.

[Reply]

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