Charitable Memberships, Volunteering, and Discounts: Evidence from a Large-Scale Online Field Experiment

Andreas Lange and Andrew Stocking

No 14941, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: Despite the increasing use by charities, significant uncertainty exists about optimal online fundraising mechanisms, especially when large donor pools show substantial heterogeneities. We use an online natural field experiment with over 700,000 subjects to test theory on price discounts and show large differences in donation behavior between donors who have previously given money and/or volunteered. For example, framing the charity's membership price as a discount increases response rates and decreases conditional contributions from former volunteers, but not from past money donors. Our study thereby demonstrates the importance of conditioning fundraising strategies on the specifics of past donation dimensions.

JEL-codes: C93 H41 L30 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp
Note: EEE PE
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