Money or Network? Experimental Evidence on What Motivates Women to Enter Entrepreneurship

Last registered on June 15, 2023
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Money or Network? Experimental Evidence on What Motivates Women to Enter Entrepreneurship
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0011458
Initial registration date
June 06, 2023

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
June 15, 2023, 4:02 PM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

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Primary Investigator

Name
Naja Pape
Affiliation
INSEAD
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Chiara Spina
PI Affiliation
INSEAD
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Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2023-06-06
End date
2024-10-31
Keywords
Behavior, Finance & Microfinance, Gender
Additional Keywords
Entrepreneurship
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
Ample research documents the female founding gap, but we lack a thorough understanding of the reasons for this gap and of potential solutions to reduce it. We examine two main structural constraints that may prevent women from taking the first steps towards entrepreneurship: access to finance and access to a relevant network, and investigate to what extent these constraints play a role in the decision to enter entrepreneurship. We use a randomized recruitment campaign for an incubation program– a common first step towards entrepreneurship – to run a field experiment. Through the experiment, we test the impact of informational messaging treatments focused on getting access to finance vs. access to network on the decisions of women to apply for the program and complete it. In addition, we examine if this variation in messages results in different types of women applying for and completing the program. We expect findings from the experiment to uncover mechanisms that help explain the existence of a female founding gap at the entry stage and suggest remedies to it. A deeper understanding of the drivers behind the low rates of entry of female founders into entrepreneurship is not only important from a scholarly perspective, but it also has critical implications for policies and programs promoting entrepreneurship and the participation of historically underrepresented groups.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Pape, Naja and Chiara Spina. 2023. "Money or Network? Experimental Evidence on What Motivates Women to Enter Entrepreneurship ." AEA RCT Registry. June 15. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.11458-1.0
Sponsors & Partners

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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We partnered with a well-established incubation center that has been a part of the Pakistani entrepreneurial ecosystem for the past five years and that is currently about to start inducting its 11th cohort of startups. We created a new incubation program and advertised it online through a ‘closed campaign’ – i.e., available only to a random subsample of the eligible population active on social media. To understand the importance of different types of structural constraints (i.e., either financing or networking, or a combination of the two) faced by potential female applicants, our intervention randomly varies the recruitment message emphasizing different benefits of the program. We then track if participants exposed to a recruitment message express interest in the program and complete the application steps for the incubation program. The incubation program is open to participants aged 18 years and older and that have a business at a pre-revenue stage.
Intervention Start Date
2023-06-12
Intervention End Date
2023-06-19

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
• “Number of unique clicks per message”
• “Has applied”
• “Number of unique impressions per message”
• “Total number of clicks per message”
• “Click-through rate per message”
• “Time spent on landing page conditional on clicking on the ad”: first visit and total time spent (conditional on the person being able to come back to the page)
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
- “Number of unique clicks per message” is measured by our partner organization’s web analytics software
- “Has applied” (yes = 1, no = 0): indicates whether or not a given person exposed to a given message fills out the initial application form. It is measured through our partner organization’s application form system
- “Number of unique impressions per message” is a measure of how many people who have been exposed to our message
- “Total number of clicks per message” is a sum of the total number of clicks an ad receives by taking into account that a given user can click multiple times on the message
- “Click-through rate per message”: the percentage of people exposed to the message who actually click on the link to get redirected to the program’s landing page
- “Time spent on landing page conditional on clicking on the message”: first visit and total time spent (conditional on the person being able to come back to the page and conditional on our partner organization being able to capture it in their web analytics software)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
• Pitch deck
• Additional baseline survey
• Phone interview
• Mechanism test (this is described in more detail in the pre-analysis plan document)
• Start of the training
• Completion of the training
• Performance during the training
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)
This is described in more detail in the pre-analysis plan document

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The incubation program will be advertised uniquely using Facebook and Instagram (both owned by Meta and the main social media platforms in Pakistan and the main outlets of our partner organization’s outreach).

The intervention will take place through (a) the Facebook/Instagram ad campaign that randomly assigns different messages to potential applicants and (b) on the incubation program’s landing page (the header of the website will repeat the message from the Facebook/Instagram advertisement).
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
The randomization will take place using the A/B/C/D/E/F testing made available by Meta for campaigns using Facebook and Instagram. This way of setting up a campaign allows the advertiser/the researcher full control over the exposure of the ads, i.e., that the same Facebook or Instagram user will always be exposed to the same message. To make sure the same number of participants is exposed to an ad across conditions, we will strictly set balanced budget/audience requirements.
Randomization Unit
Individual applicant
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
0
Sample size: planned number of observations
Minimum 13,012 clicks for women and men combined.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Minimum 1,084 clicks per condition for women and minimum 1,084 clicks per condition for men.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
The calculations below have been performed based on the following assumptions: one-tailed test with an α-level of 0.05, 0.8 power and 6 groups per campaign (the campaign will be launched as two separate campaigns – one targeting women and one targeting men). Assuming a total traffic of N = 13,012 clicks from the recruitment ad to the landing page, we will be able to detect a minimum detectable effect of 0.05. Assuming a total traffic of N = 36,110 clicks from the recruitment ad to the landing page, we will be able to detect a minimum detectable effect of 0.03. Assuming a total traffic of N = 81,224 clicks from the recruitment ad to the landing page, we will be able to detect a minimum detectable effect of 0.02.
Supporting Documents and Materials

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IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
INSEAD Institutional Review Board
IRB Approval Date
2023-05-19
IRB Approval Number
2023-48
Analysis Plan

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