How To Write A Good Call To Action

Do you know how to write a good call to action?

We explain everything about it here!

Can you imagine a cold email or a B2B email without a call to action? An Instagram post or simply any digital marketing action without a call to action? It’s a crime! 🚨

Calls to action or CTAs (Call To Action) are one of the most powerful tools to win customers and capture subscribers. It isn’t a simple invitation, but an opportunity to persuade the user and direct them towards your conversion funnel. Do you want to learn how to write the perfect call to action (CTA)? We’ll give you some tips that work! 😜 

First of all, keep that in mind: An effective call to action (CTA) is one that persuades, invites, and challenges the reader to take the actions you want. It’s not just about getting a potential customer’s email address, it’s about starting a relationship with them and directing them to the next stage of your conversion funnel. 

Although it sounds simple, writing the perfect call to action is quite an art, especially when the writer hasn’t understood the crucial role it plays in making your website and online advertising profitable for your company. Because, if we may ask you, what results have you achieved so far with your company’s CTAs? How is your website or your online advertising campaign performing?

It’s quite possible that your bounce rate on your website is sky high just when the reader gets to see your call to action, or are we wrong? Well, it’s not the end of the world! You can start improving this today, at FindThatLead and Scrab.in we are going to show you how to write a good call to action!

What is a Call to action? 

We can define a call to action as an invitation for the user or reader to perform a specific action premeditated by the company that owns the website. 

It’s a textual and graphic element that is included in some parts of the website. It’s usually at the end of the web page, or in another commercially strategic place as an email, once the reasons why the user should take the action to which he/she is being invited have been explained. Although on other occasions the CTA is shown in the form of a floating banner that appears at a certain moment, also strategically and commercially planned to persuade the reader to do something.

OK if you understood this (if not, make sure you read it again 🧐 ), surely you know that the main objective is to make the company’s target audience follow the route you have designed within the conversion process and funnel. 

Although the CTA can be of various forms and with various objectives, its main purpose is to make the user follow the process you have designed to convert them from a user who doesn’t know you, to a customer of your company. 

That said, it’s easy to imagine that, depending on the effectiveness of your calls to action, will largely decide the success or failure of your online business strategy, right? So, stay tuned because you’re going to know how to write a good call to action!

Why do you need to write a really effective call to action (CTA)? 

The first thing we’ll say is that, when it comes to spending the time it really takes to know how to write a good call to action, many people are lazy and don’t give this section the importance it should be given (maybe this person could be you).

As we said before, this is clearly because they haven’t understood that an efficient CTA is the most important part of the internet marketing strategy; it’s the one that, at the end of it all, after having given all the arguments, must give enough reasons and persuade the user to do the action desired by the company: subscribe, contact, buy, etc. 

It doesn’t matter how attractive your digital marketing strategy is, if you have used the Design Thinking methodology or if you have invested a lot of money in it; it doesn’t matter if you have excellent content marketing, Inbound Marketing and you have hired the best SEO copywriter to publish on your blog; if you don’t know how to write a good call to action, all this is in vain! Your marketing and SEO will fall by the wayside and believe us, this will be reflected in the results of all your efforts. That’s it, you need a unique, catchy and clear call to action ⭐. 

We know that learning how to write this kind of invitation effectively can be a bit tricky, as it requires you to know your audience perfectly, what their pain points are and what they really need. Only then, will you know where to “get in” and how to persuade them to do what you expect them to do. 

To conclude for know how to write a good call to action: If you don’t start improving your calls to action as soon as possible, you will continue to invest money in getting users to find your website, enter and poke around a bit,

but end up abandoning it without getting any of these visits, without engaging with you, and without moving on to the next stage of conversion. 

Another important point is that a CTA is not only to sell or to gain a new subscription but they are also used to invite the reader to share your articles on social networks, to comment on the blog or even to know the tastes of your audience, among other things.

How to write a call to action that gets a response, our best tips!

If you’re going to write a call to action but don’t know where to start, you should ask yourself “What is my ultimate goal for the call to action? What exactly do I want the user to do? 

Do you want to close a sale? Are you looking to gain a new subscriber? Are you hoping to get your post shared on social media? The actual purpose of your CTA will determine the style and strength of the call to action in front of the audience. 

But don’t worry, don’t get overwhelmed, we’re going to explain how to write a good call to action, and how to achieve an effective and irresistible call to action for your audience 💙.

Use words or phrases that propose an action 

A call to action is like asking someone you like out on a date but you don’t say where, when or how. You can’t invite if you don’t say what you’re inviting them to – I don’t think you’ll get a first date, let alone a second one!

If you want to seduce the person you like, you must show that you have a plan, offer them something they are interested in; this shows interest, seriousness, commitment, determination and firmness, right? 

The same goes for CTAs. If a reader is interested in your products or your content, and is waiting to take the next step, but doesn’t know how or where to go, but only finds a button that says “click here”, it’s very likely that they’ll abandon the website and the process, as they didn’t know what you were offering or what your plan was for them.

If you learn how to create a clear call to action, which shows firmness and commitment, we assure you that the percentage of people who will click on your call to action element and initiate the conversion process will increase. 

Otherwise, you’ll just be a date that never was or was half-hearted 💔 

💙 Tip: Phrases that propose a concrete action or invite engagement are more efficient than a passive ‘click here’ or ‘sign up here’ invitation. You’ll achieve an effective invitation if you use strong verbs and are creative with your phrasing.

Be brief and specific 

Another trick to know how to write a good call to action is to be brief and specific.

The call to action doesn’t have to be a long or passive paragraph with a lot of excuses or explanations trying to get the reader to do something. Rather, it’s a very short but specific statement that clearly tells the reader what to do. 

However, the sentence you choose should be made up of a verb that is powerful and 100% captivating to the user. Don’t be afraid to be brief and specific, leave the beating around the bush for another time. Some efficient verbs could be ‘download’, ‘get’, ‘send’, ‘convert’, etc. 

Your call to action should be obvious 

We mentioned before that you should be brief and specific in your CTA, but in addition to this you should also write a call to action that is clear and obvious. To achieve this perfectly, brevity and clarity, try to write a sentence, accompanying your CTA button, that is no longer than 5 words. 

💙 Tip on how to write a good call to action: An effective call to action gives details about what action the reader will take (by clicking), what will happen once they click and why they should click. If you are bold, you will answer these questions without having to write more than a few words. 

Give your CTA a sense of urgency 

Incredibly, statistics show that calls to action with an air of urgency or constraint are more popular. 

It seems that a CTA that says something like ‘start today before it sells out’, or ‘download this free book now’, gets a better response, as people feel pressure not to pass up ‘that offer’ for a limited time. 

Every call to action is unique 

Most of the most popular social platforms have added the option to weight post buttons or have call to action options. 

💙 Tip: You need to customize each CTA according to the platform and the type of audience that is on that platform. A CTA on Facebook is not the same as a CTA on LinkedIn. Make each call really unique, and you’ll see how you get more acceptance and better results. 

Your CTA should be written in the first person 

While this tip may seem a bit simple, it makes a big difference! By writing your call to action in the first person you make a more direct connection with the reader, people like this closeness! This is so important for know how to write a good call to action.

The problem that many CTAs are ineffective is that they have a cold and distant tone, too corporate (in the old-fashioned sense of the word). Using pronouns like ‘I’, ‘You’ or ‘We’ can make a big difference to their effectiveness. 

Show what the reader will get if they click on your CTA 

Readers are very interested; we must accept that. Generally, most people in your industry who come to your website want to get something for free. It doesn’t matter what it’s but, if it’s free, they have a lot of numbers to want it! This is a good thing if you learn to take advantage of your interested audience. 

A powerful call to action is one that clearly shows the reader that they’ll get something in return for doing what you’re asking them to do. Try it! Indicate in your CTA the benefit you are giving away and you’ll notice how the number of clicks on it increases. 

💙 Tip: What we’re saying is, don’t waste time explaining who you’re and what you do in your call to action, but rather, directly state what you’re going to give to those who click on it. It’s as clear as day! 

Target emotions 

We all have emotions and you have to tap into them! People don’t want to subscribe to a website only to receive dozens of emails that seem to drive them crazy. But if your call to action targets their emotions, and touches on an area that is important to them, especially a pain point they have, they won’t be able to avoid clicking on your CTA. 

Think of NGO websites when they ask for a donation; they use phrases that seem to stir people’s conscience, because they know they are more likely to end up donating! Try the same; trigger a sense of urgency, guilt, trust, value or belonging, and bring your target audience into your network (but don’t get too emotional either…!😉).

Reinforce your words with images 

A CTA with a powerful sentence on a shiny, eye-catching button is not enough, you must reinforce your words with images. 

If you’re selling a product, show a real image of it. If your call to action is for a purpose other than completing an immediate sale, perhaps an image of someone happy and fun can be persuasive. 

Tip for know how to write a good call to action: If you don’t know which type of image suits you best, you can create several CTAs and do an A/B test, for example, so you know which image your audience likes best. 

Don’t let your CTA go unnoticed 

The call to action should attract attention, and to do that you have to make it stand out. Your CTA should be highly visible and easy to find. The most common form is buttons, and you need to be clever in choosing the right button. The shape, size and color of the button is crucial to get the user to click on it! 

💙 Tip: you should surround the button with a good amount of white space, so that it doesn’t go unnoticed. 

Again, test to determine what color and size button is most feasible for you.

Learn where to place calls to action 

One more tip to know how to write a good call to action is to learn where to place it.

Where you place your CTA is also important for it to be effective. You can’t start a blog post with a call to action; you haven’t yet given enough reason for it to be effective and you can only get the user to leave your website feeling cheated. 

If the web page the reader is on displays products and services, an early CTA can work, as it pushes them to go to the cart and check out. However, when we talk about blog posts, for example, it’s common to leave the CTA at the end of the content, when the reader has already identified with it and feels confident with your website and your company. 

Maintain your tone and style of voice 

Your call to action is part of your business and for know how to write a good call to action should have the same tone and style that you offer in all other aspects of your brand communication. 

If, for example, your posts are characterized by being close to the audience, calling for interaction and leaving aside formalism, then you cannot, for anything in the world, write a very serious and distant CTA, as this will make the reader get confused and not feel the necessary confidence to answer your call after that change of tone.

Analyze the performance of your calls to action and do A/B testing 

OBVIOUSLY, it’s very important to know if your call to actions are efficient, as this will let you know if you are on the right track or if your audience has other preferences. 

Do as many tests as you need, testing only one element of your CTA at a time, as suggested by A/B testing. This will allow you to know which elements are better accepted than others, and then make the appropriate optimizations! 

Examples of written calls to action 

• Get it now! 
• Join now! 
• Here I come! 
• I want to increase my sales 
• Get a 40% discount now 
• Free now! 
• I am interested in 

Now you know how to write a good call to action, build a solid email campaign on a tool like Email Sender by FindThatLead and start trying to write your best CTA! 

Remember to add a personal touch to your email campaigns! With FindThatLead use our Drip feature to automatically follow up on any email and get the best response rate 🚀.