How To Use a CTA On Your Website Effectively

Coming up with a good CTA (call-to-action) can be challenging, especially when you are trying to reach different audiences. First time visitors, customers, leads and past customers promoting your products and services are all likely audiences to visit your site. You will need different messaging for each of these to accomplish your goals. If you do not have a CTA, potential leads and customers may find it challenging to navigate your site and find what they need. CTAs can help generate leads, but they are also helpful to the consumer journey. 

Hubspot has put together 10 types of CTAs.

Let’s explore different types of CTAs

1. Lead Generation 

A good call-to-action on your website is an important part of the lead generation process. You want to make it easy for visitors that come to your site to take the action you’d like them to.

Therefore, a CTA should be located in a spot where a lot of new visitors land. It should catch the eye of the visitor and the value proposition should be clear. When visitors click on the CTA, they should know what to expect when they land on the page on your website it points to. 

A good place is on your blogs. All blogs should end with a CTA. You can also add them to the sidebar and as a floating banner. 

 

2. Form Submission

When your visitors land on your website, they still have to take a few more steps to submit a form. Because your visitor is so close to becoming a lead at this point, you don’t want to turn them off with a lackluster submit button.

If the copy on your submit button is more specific to the trade off they are getting, your visitors are more likely to click and fill out the form. 

A submit button that reads: “Download Your Guide” is more likely to get the response you want than “submit”. 

 

3. “Read More” Button

When placing content in your blog, customer case studies or press releases — you should avoid displaying the whole post on the home page.

You want to entice your viewers to click on individual posts by featuring the first few paragraphs of your content followed by a “read more” CTA.

This will allow you to feature more content on your homepage and “read more” buttons ensure your engaging posts receive the stats they deserve.

This allows people to click through to read any post instead of scrolling down on the homepage. In turn, the post itself gets credited with its own traffic, not the homepage. 

 

4. Product or Service Discovery 

You want to ensure that anyone that is exploring your website to learn about your company has an easy time. After all, your products and services are what keep your business afloat.

The CTAs don’t have to be fancy images — simple text on a button can do the trick, as long as the button stands out enough against its background.

 

5. Social Sharing

One of the simplest types of calls-to-action is one that encourages sharing of your content with friends. Social sharing buttons are a low-commitment way for visitors, leads, and customers to engage with your brand.

Therefore, it’s important to include these buttons in places where it makes sense on your website, such as blog posts and landing pages.

The best part about this type of CTA is that it is really easy to customize.

 

6. Lead Nurturing

What if someone becomes a lead but isn’t necessarily ready to pay for your product or service?

You’ll need to remessage them with another type of offer that is more aligned with your product offering than a typical top of the funnel marketing offer.

Lead nurturing CTAs promote offers like product demos, free trials, and free quotes. A lead nurturing CTA should be in an area you know many leads visit. 

 

7. Closing the Sale

Now that you have a lead and are nurturing the lead, you’ll need to turn them into customers.

This type of CTA will be very sales-focused: you want to get potential customers to want to buy your product or service right here, right now.

If you have smart CTAs, you can use them at the end of blog posts. However, consider placing them on product pages, as potential customers may want to do one last bit of research before taking the plunge.

 

8. Event Promotion

If you are hosting an event, you’ll want people to attend.

Use an event promotion CTA to raise awareness of the event or help drive ticket sales. This type of CTA can be in many areas of your website, depending on which segment of your audience you’re trying to get to attend.

For customers, place the CTA on their login page, dashboard, or on the page you offer them a receipt. For leads, make this CTA appear in the blog sidebar. The possibilities are endless.

 

9. Related Content

Your goal should be to have a visitor stay on your site for a long period of time. A related content CTA makes it easy for website visitors to jump from one piece of content to the next on your site. 

An added benefit to keeping your visitor engaged is that they will learn more about your company and what you offer. Place a related content CTA within the content, such as between sections of a blog post or in the side bar as a link.

 

10. Quiz CTA

Audiences love to be delighted, and what’s more delightful than a quiz to test their knowledge or learn more about themselves? We all love a good Buzzfeed quiz, right? 

If you decide to employ a quiz or a game to encourage visitors to stay on your site longer, you’ll need to capture their attention. And if the quiz is free, call that out in your CTA.

CTAs make your website easier to navigate, and they can serve as a roadmap that takes a visitor on the path to becoming a lead. However, to get the most out of your CTAs, you’ll need to make them engaging, hard-to-miss, and straightforward. 

Now that you know the different CTAs available for your site, you’re ready to use them to your advantage. Our AlphaDigital team can be a terrific consultative partner. Reach out today to discuss your goals and how we can help you achieve them.