8 essential calls to action (CTA) for your website
There is no miracle solution for calls to action on a website. However, contrary to what some sites put forward, it is not enough to insert red buttons everywhere on a website, which incite to “click here” and then hope to have a ton of leads and customers in a very short time.
Indeed, an effective call to action is a bit more complex to execute. Remember that you have very distinct audiences walking through your website. Some are visitors, others are prospects and even current customers who want more information about you and your offerings – that’s why you need each of them to perform specific actions and be able to recognize them.
In order for a visitor to go from being a visitor to a prospect to a customer, it is impossible to think that a single repeating CTA can meet their different expectations. The solution? Create CTAs that can cater to all types of audiences to help them reach their goal, while moving them through your marketing funnel.
In reality, it’s not necessary to create 100 different CTAs on your website… in fact, there are only 8 essential ones to find on your website. Let’s see them together!
1) Lead generation
First, calls to action are essential since they help generate leads on your website. Since you are trying to turn a simple visitor into a lead, you need to place CTAs that are meant to generate leads, that is, in places that lead to landing pages and forms. They should be in places that are known to attract many new visitors.
The most common place is certainly on your company’s blog, whether it is at the end of an article, on the side bar or in a banner. In order to be successful, these CTAs must be visually appealing and convey the value to be received by clicking on them. Take the example below which talks about inspiration, experts in the field and quantity (generous), which makes your mouth water much more than if you had read the simple “download quote”.
2) Form
Une fois que votre visiteur clique sur un CTA tel que celui expliqué au premier point, il devrait atterrir sur une page de destination, laquelle contiendra un outil essentiel à son engagement … un formulaire !
Les formulaires permettent de transformer un inconnu en visiteurs connus. Plus un prospect remplit de formulaires qui contiennent des champs différents, plus vous cumulez d’informations sur celui-ci et plus vous pouvez lui envoyer du contenu pertinent à sa situation, à ses besoins et à sa progression dans le cycle d’achat.
À retenir qu’un bouton de formulaire ne devrait pas simplement lire, téléchargez. Pourquoi ? Afin d’éviter des taux de rebond apeurant, il faut rappeler aux visiteurs ce qu’il aura en échange. Tel que le démontre l’exemple ci-bas, on parle de guide et de possession, puisqu’on sous-entend qu’en cliquant, il devient “notre” guide.
3) Read more
Any place on your website that relates to systematically displaying content, such as your blog, news section or resources, you will be inclined not to display everything on the library or home page. In fact, encourage your visitors to continue browsing by inviting them to learn more about each news item or article individually.
For example, as the following example shows, the image and CTA invite them to read more, which is much more interesting than a simple “read more” button.
A Simple Example, if you want to earn money with SEO and Digital Marketing, you can Read more here.
In addition to giving you more space for other content, these CTAs allow you to better track the performance of breaking news, and drive navigation to pages that lead to more engagement on your website.
4) Discover a service or a product
When someone browses your service or product pages, you want to make their experience as easy as possible. After all, these are the ones that make you dollars. So make those CTAs interesting by giving glimpses of your product, or even putting in the background photos in action that relate to your services.
In the example below, the colors are interesting, we understand that it is a product that relates to several types of technology (cell phone, tablet and computer). The main CTA is discovery, but it also allows you to request a demo for someone already interested in using it.
5) Sharing on social media
The simplest CTAs to have on your website are the share buttons on social platforms. They are easy to put, and especially important on all pages that relate to content that may interest your visitor’s community. They are also buttons that require little involvement from your visitors, your leads and your customers when they want to get involved with your brand.
Be careful not to put them everywhere! You don’t want them on pages where people are giving you their personal information. They will tend not to engage with it. Finally, what’s really interesting about this type of CTA is that you can customize them and adapt them to the tone normally associated with each platform; more professional on Linkedin and friendly on Facebook. Here is an example:
You Like this Content? You can Simply share the content!
6) Entertain your prospects
What happens when your prospect is not quite ready to invest in your product or service? You need to make them savor it, give them a taste of what could change their lives. To do this, use offers with a very high level of involvement.
Think of offers like free demos, a free trial period or free estimates. These are the kinds of offers that you need to put forward for a prospect who is almost convinced of what you are offering.
Also, these types of CTAs should be placed in places on your website that get a lot of weekly traffic, whether it’s on a thank you page or even at the end of your blog posts.
