Most nonprofit organizations never walk through their own donation process as a first-time visitor. They built it, they know it, and they assume it works. But every extra step, every moment of confusion, and every unexpected redirect reduces the percentage of willing donors who actually complete a gift.
Here are the signs that your donation journey is more complicated than it needs to be.
Count the clicks
From your homepage to a completed donation, count every click required. If a donor has to click "Donate," land on a page that explains giving options, click again to choose a one-time gift, land on a third-party platform, fill in a form, and then confirm on a separate page, you have at least five clicks before the transaction is even started.
Ideal: one click from the homepage to the donation form. Two clicks is acceptable. More than three before the form appears is a signal to simplify.
Check for unexpected redirects
If clicking "Donate" takes a visitor to a completely different domain with a different visual design, that's a trust interruption. The donor was on your site, felt good about giving, clicked the button, and now they're on a generic platform page that looks nothing like your organization. Some donors complete the gift. Many pause, question whether something went wrong, and close the tab.
If you use a third-party donation processor, customize it as much as possible to match your branding, and set the expectation on your donate page that the visitor is about to be redirected and that it's safe.
Look at your required fields
Open your donation form and count the required fields. Name and payment information are essential. Most everything else is a question about whether you want the data more than the donor wants to give. Phone numbers, organization affiliations, "how did you hear about us" dropdowns, and mailing addresses for online-only donors are all friction.
Ask for the minimum. You can always follow up with a thank-you email that invites donors to tell you more about themselves.
Test on mobile
Walk through your entire donation process on a phone. Not a browser simulation. An actual phone. Tap every field. Notice which fields trigger the wrong keyboard (a numeric field opening a text keyboard, for example). Notice how far you have to scroll to reach the submit button. Notice whether the credit card number field accepts input correctly.
Mobile donation abandonment rates are consistently higher than desktop, largely because donation forms are designed on desktop and tested on desktop. The friction that causes abandonment is disproportionately mobile-specific.
Watch for ambiguous recurring gift options
Many nonprofit donation forms include an option to make a gift recurring, which is valuable. But forms that default to recurring without making this visible and understandable create donor anxiety. No one wants to accidentally sign up for a monthly charge they didn't intend. If your recurring option is pre-checked, unclear, or buried, it creates hesitation that costs you single gifts.
Make the recurring option visible, clearly labeled, and easy to opt in or out of. Default to one-time unless you have a specific reason not to.
A GoodSiteReport donation flow review walks through your entire giving process as a first-time donor and flags every moment of friction, confusion, or trust interruption.
Look at your abandonment signals
If you have access to Google Analytics or your donation platform's reporting, look at where donors drop off in the process. A high exit rate on the donation page itself (before form submission) suggests the page is creating doubt. A high exit rate after the form appears suggests the form itself is the problem. This data tells you exactly where in the journey you're losing people.
If you don't have this data set up, that's worth addressing too. Understanding where donors abandon is essential to improving the process.