A Call to Action (CTA) is one of the most important aspects of marketing. When developing content, before a single word is written, a CTA should be defined.
What Is a Call to Action?
A “call to action” or CTA is a common marketing term. A CTA is one of the most important aspects your content marketing should have. A call to action is a phrase used to tell a user exactly what action to take and how to take it. This could be “Buy Now”, “Subscribe”, “Learn More”, etc. For Facebook and other social media platforms, this could also mean sharing, liking, or commenting on a post.
According to Marketing Experiments, consumers go through a six-step process before clicking a CTA on an email or landing page:
- Arrest attention
- Build a connection
- Solve a problem
- Develop interest
- Build suspense
- Transfer momentum
So, what makes an effective CTA?
Constructing An Effective CTA
It is important when adding a CTA to a website or blog to keep in mind the design, message, and placement of the CTA. Keep in mind when adding a CTA to your website to keep it simple and relevant to the overall design aesthetic of your site. The CTA should be a clickable headline or button that spurs action. The message should also have a few compelling words to get your visitor to complete the CTA. Don’t mislead but ensure that each CTA is tailored to your audience. This could be mixing content such as eBooks or videos that will be helpful to website visitors.
Also, keep in mind the placement of the website CTA. According to a HubSpot CTA study, it’s estimated that only about 6% of leads come in through blog post CTAs. Most readers don’t read the entire blog. However, relocating the CTA to a text headline in the middle of the post jumped lead conversions by 90%.
Keep in mind that without a CTA, there is no way to measure if your website or piece of content marketing has been successful.
Measuring CTA Success
It is important to not just have a CTA, but also to measure its success. There are three key metrics to consider: Click-through rate (CTR), clicks to submissions, and views to submissions. A CTR is how many people saw your CTA and then clicked on it. Then, after the CTA was clicked, how many submitted a contact form or produced another step to receive more information? Views to submission mean the percentage of people who saw the CTA, then converted into a lead. It helps to continually keep track of these metrics to help form new CTAs in the future. What CTAs would be the most beneficial to your audience? Comment below.
