A call to action is one of the most important parts of any piece of content you produce. Your call to action, if done right, will guide your visitors to take a desired action instead of just paging away or closing your site, which could potentially cause you to lose a new lead or frustrate an existing customer. Each call to action on your site should be well-placed, well-thought out, and well-executed to produce the desired results. Read on to learn how to create a meaningful and successful call to action!
What makes a call to action meaningful?
What stands out more:
Contact Us!
Or
This CTA button:
How about if you're looking for more information on how to use data from your email campaigns to learn more about your contacts
This link that’s relevant to your search:
How to use email campaign data to learn more about your customers
Or
This CTA button that has nothing to do with your search:
How about this CTA button that stands out and is also relevant to your search?
As you can see from the examples above, a good call to action is more than just a link leading to another one of your pages or a flashy button designed to stand out. A meaningful CTA should be designed to guide your visitors, leads, and customers to the next logical step in their journey in a way that is clear and deliberate.
The best way to test if your CTA is meaningful is to ask yourself if it accomplishes the following three tasks:
1. Does your CTA encourage readers to click?
A meaningful CTA shouldn’t be generic; it should be specific to where your business wants the reader to go next in their buyer’s journey. Your CTA should include clear content that proves the value and urgency of the link to the reader before they even click the link. Make sure your CTA is also visible and clickable in the correct place in your content.
2. Is your CTA the next logical step in their journey?
Don’t include a CTA for something that has nothing to do with what the content is about. Include options for a CTA in case a reader doesn’t want to page off at the moment, but make sure to give them another opportunity later without overselling your link or product. You want your CTA to guide them towards the next step, not push them so you don’t run the risk of actually driving them away instead.
3. Does your CTA take the reader to the correct spot?
Don’t mislead your visitors with a CTA promoting one thing when you are actually leading them to a page promoting something completely different. This is one of the quickest ways to lose your visitors' trust and will most likely cause them to leave your site altogether and be lost as a lead.
If your CTA checks off each of these three boxes, then it will be meaningful and valuable to your readers, which will give you a better chance of it also being successful and accomplishing your goals.
What makes a meaningful call to action successful?
A successful CTA should encourage your readers to move forward in the process and should be the next logical step after reading your content. The best way to accomplish this is by making sure you follow the previously discussed steps to ensure each CTA you place in your content is meaningful.
Some additional tips on how to ensure your CTAs are successful include:
- Paying attention to the text around your CTA: If your CTA, whether it is a button, a photo, or a text link, doesn’t make sense when you read the surrounding text in your content, it won’t be as successful as it could be. Make sure that your CTA placement flows well and that the text around it supports your CTA and the action you want your readers to take.
- Mix up your CTAs throughout your posts: As we’ve shown in examples above, there are many different types of CTAs, including buttons, text links, photo links, and more. Try mixing up your CTAs in different posts and even including a few different types in one post to give your readers options. We aren’t recommending overwhelming people with your calls to action, but if each CTA is meaningful and well-thought out, including a couple different ones in one piece of content can still be successful.
The best way to ensure your CTA is successful is to think about the goal you want each CTA to accomplish. These goals could be to download an offer, to visit a different page, to fill out a form, or more. If your CTA is well-placed, well-thought out, and well-executed - all with your specific goal in mind - then it will most likely be successful and provide you with the results you’re looking for.
One of the best ways to make sure your CTA accomplishes your desired goal is to know who you are targeting with each piece of content and CTA you produce. Learn how to develop your own targeted audience by creating a buyer persona for your desired customer here:
