Why CTA is Critical in Website Copywriting

At its core, the goal of copywriting is to get your audience to do something you want them to do. The first steps to accomplish this is to show them you understand the challenges they face and to showcase the benefits of your offer. However, none of that matters if you don’t let the audience know exactly what you want them to do.

A call-to-action, or CTA, is an invitation for your audience to take the desired action. In other words, a CTA tells your audience exactly what you want them to do.

And while some CTAs like Use the Force might seem pretty straightforward, sometimes you need to be more direct in your instructions.

Why Are CTAs Important?

One thing you need to know about your audience is that they are either incredibly busy or incredibly lazy. It’s one of the three unspoken rules of understanding your audience. Either way, you need to make it as easy as possible for them to do what you want because they’re not going to waste their time trying to figure out what you want them to do next. So the easier you make it for them, the more likely they are to do it. And not enough websites do this.

A 2013 report from Small Business Trends found that 70% of small B2B websites had no CTA on their home page. Yes, I know that study is almost 10 years old, but if you start looking around at your competition, you’ll start to see that it’s still a pretty common issue.

In addition to giving your audience clear instructions and directing their actions, CTAs provide three major benefits that enhance your copywriting and improve your customer experience.

Increase Sales and Grow Your Audience. With simple and clear instructions such as Buy Now or Follow Me on Instagram, you give your audience an immediate and easy way to purchase your products or connect on social media.

Ensure Your Copy Leads to an Action. Everything you write for your website should be meaningful or what’s the point of writing it? By including a CTA to everything on your site, you bring it into your overall marketing plan and help drive audience engagement and conversion rates.

Reduce Decision Fatigue. When a person has to make multiple decisions back-to-back-to-back, they begin to tire of the process and start making hasty or bad choices. By giving them clear direction, you guide them through to the next appropriate step making their customer experience more impactful.

8 Types of CTA That Improve Your Customer Experience

There are 8 types of calls-to-action that can improve your marketing message and guide your audience through their customer journey.

• Lead Generation. Most commonly found on blogs or landing pages {anywhere with a high percentage of new visitors), these CTAs turn visitors into leads.
• Form Submission. This type of CTA converts anonymous visitors into identifiable leads but is more challenging because it requires two audience actions: fill out the form and click to submit.
• Continue Reading. Found primarily on your home page, this CTA follows introductory copy and leads your audience to more in-depth copy on the topic at hand.
• Product/Service Discovery. The most common CTA found on your website, it leads your audience to descriptions of the product and services you have to offer.
• Lead Nurturing. Effective for prospects that aren’t 100% convinced to commit, this allows you to entice your audience by offering something for free (demo, trial, quote, etc.).
• Sale Closing. Once lead generation and nurturing are complete, you need to complete the transaction by presenting a sales-focused CTA that turns prospects into customers.
• Social Sharing. The digital equivalent of word-of-mouth, providing this CTA gives your audience the chance to share your content with their online community through social media.
• Event Promotion. Whether online or in-person, hosting an event can bring in new prospects so you need CTAs like this to raise awareness of the event or drive ticket sales.

Tips for Writing an Effective Call-to-Action

To write effective CTAs that convert visitors to leads, leads into prospects and prospects into customers, here are a few tips.

• Make Your CTAs Visible. Your CTAs are important so why hide them at the bottom of the page or hide them in your copy? Make them stand out and place them in every section on each page.
• Use Regular Language. Don’t use confusing jargon or uncommon language. Communicate as simply and effectively as possible.
• Be Transparent. An essential part of copywriting is building trust with your audience. So be transparent with your CTAs and give them what you’ve promised.
• Be Consistent. If you’re using buttons for your CTAs, keep them consistent in terms of shape, size and color.
• Use Strong Command Verbs. Don’t assume your visitors know what to do next. Tell them by using strong command verbs like Buy, Order, Sign Up, Subscribe, Learn More, Read More, Add to Cart, etc.
• Create Urgency. Don’t be afraid to tap into their fear of missing out (FOMO). Give a deadline or warn them you have a limited supply so there’s more incentive to follow your direction.
• Provoke Emotion. Put some enthusiasm in your CTA and it will transfer to your audience, too.
• Keep Character Count Low. Keep your CTAs short, sweet and to the point so you don’t bore them with exposition.

To learn more about using CTAs to get your audience to follow your lead, click here and send me an email. I’m always happy to help.

Until next time,