Crowdfunding campaign (Facebook ads) for female product

Last registered on March 03, 2025
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
Crowdfunding campaign (Facebook ads) for female product
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0015460
Initial registration date
February 26, 2025

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
March 03, 2025, 8:09 AM EST

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
Sofia Bapna
Affiliation
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Gordon Burtch
PI Affiliation
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Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2025-02-27
End date
2026-08-31
Keywords
Gender
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
We are interested in understanding what ad/pitch text will motivate men to be more interested in contributing to the funding of female products.

We study the performance of an ad campaign (comprising of multiple ads) on Facebook that asks people to support the development of a female focused product through crowdfunding. We use interventions (described in the 'interventions' section) to see if different text affects interest in contributing (i.e. clicks on Facebook ads). We examine heterogeneity by investor gender and age.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Bapna, Sofia and Gordon Burtch. 2025. "Crowdfunding campaign (Facebook ads) for female product." AEA RCT Registry. March 03. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.15460-1.0
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2025-02-27
Intervention End Date
2025-08-31

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Clicks on the ad (which take the user to the crowdfunding campaign page), which are collected by Facebook.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
1) Subjects are individuals on Facebook who are:
• located in the US,
• age 18 to 55, and
• match interests Crowdfunding or Equity crowdfunding.
On Facebook the ‘objective’ of the ad will be set up as ‘awareness.’
Based on these constraints, the audience size reported by Facebook is 8.7M to 10.3M.
2) Subjects are randomly assigned to one of the experimental conditions by Facebook (advertiser split testing tool).
3) Individuals in each experimental condition are shown a slightly different fundraising ad (see the 'Interventions' section for the text included in the ads). The ads are shown by Facebook.
4) Clicks on the ad (which take the user to the crowdfunding campaign page) are collected by Facebook. This is the main dependent variable

Notes:
Study duration is estimated and may vary depending on Facebook imposed restrictions on new advertiser accounts (e.g., daily budget restrictions imposed by Facebook).
Experimental Design Details
Not available
Randomization Method
By Facebook
Randomization Unit
Individual (potential contributor)
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
NA - consumer level randomization.
Sample size: planned number of observations
We have a fixed budget to work with ($9000) and the cost per ad varies based on external factors such as competition in the ad auction. We estimate that with $9000 we will be able to reach ~2.1 million people.
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
2.1 million people divided by 5, is the sample size per arm (i.e. ~420,000).
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Unclear, given other noted caveats.
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
IRB Approval Date
IRB Approval Number
Analysis Plan