5 Insights to Master Effective CTAs to Generate More Leads and Sales

Attracting a new visitor to your website is the first step. The next step is to inspire them to take action with effective CTAs.

How do you do that?

Knowing your audience is key. And I’m not just talking about demographics here. I’m talking about understanding their core desires and how you can solve their problem.

You want to know your audience so well that you can speak to their subconscious mind. You’re ultimately joining them in a conversation in their mind.

This may seem like it takes some kind of mind reading, but as you get to know your audience on a deeper level you’ll be able to write in a way that will make them feel as if you wrote the content just for them.

This content leads to the all-important CTA (call to action).

After you’ve engaged your audience the next step is to encourage them to take action with your CTA.

The next step could be a variety of things including booking a call, filling out a form, signing up for your newsletter, or something else.

And every time a visitor completes one of these steps it is called a “conversion”.

As a business owner, I imagine you want to increase your number of leads and sales. By increasing the amount of these conversions on your website you’ll do just that. We call this “conversion rate optimization”.

In today’s article, you’ll get a better understanding of CTAs, how they work on your website, and how to optimize them for more conversions.

Here are 5 key points to consider when optimizing your CTAs:

1. What is the purpose of a CTA?

The primary focus of any CTA to get your visitor to take action. 

The days of brochure websites are gone. If you have a website you want it to be an integral part of your sales process. 

Think of your website as a vehicle to collect your ideal client’s contact information so you can continue to engage with them via email or text message. 

This is just the start of a conversation that leads to visitors becoming your paying customers. 

The CTA guides your ideal customer on the right path to take.

There are a variety of actions that your CTA can lead your website visitors to take, but they all have one thing in common. Each CTA leads them to take a step to share their contact information. 

You’ll end up with a list of leads ready to engage and soon purchase from you.

Below are 6 different types of CTAs that you could use on your website:

2. No Generic CTAs Allowed

Avoid using a generic CTA on every single page of your website.

The purpose of your CTA is to inspire and encourage your ideal customer to take action. This can’t be accomplished with a generic CTA. 

An example of a generic CTA would be “Contact Us”. This generic CTA doesn’t offer any value to the visitor. 

You want a CTA that flows with the engaging content preceding it. It will match in context and give a clear next step.

It will guide them on what to do next and why they should take the next step.

3. Get Creative with Your CTAs

Think of your audience and what would encourage them to take action. 

Your CTAs don’t need to be boring. They can be clever and possibly humorous. They can create a sense of urgency.

For example…

Let’s say you just wrote content about your cybersecurity services. 

You discussed the common fears of business owners — how a security breach could halt their business or lead to lawsuits if the right security measures aren’t in place. 

They are reading along and feel heard and understood. Your content may be pulling at them emotionally as they realize they need to do something now. 

Then, you have a button with “Sign Up”. 

Now, that’s not very inspiring. 

How about “Protect Your Business” or “Defend Your Data”? 

These CTAs are fitting for your offering and address the concerns business owners have. They create a sense of urgency while highlighting the benefits of taking action. 

It ties your content in a bow with an appropriate next step to take.

4. Why You Should Optimize Your CTAs

Not optimizing your CTAs is like leaving money on the table.

You already attracted your ideal customer. Don’t let a generic CTA keep them from taking the next step to engage with your business.

A CTA that doesn’t match the context of your content can put an abrupt halt in the sales process. 

But one that works can lead to more leads and sales for your business.

Here’s an example of a CTA that matches in context with a clever play on words. 

The Dollar Shave Club is promoting its precision detailers for trimming ear and nose hair with the CTA “Get the Detail(er)s”. 

They make this otherwise mundane grooming task that many don’t want to talk about fun and approachable with a bit of humor.

Measuring CTA Effectiveness

Now you may be wondering, how do I know if my CTA needs to be optimized or if something else is causing a less than stellar conversion rate?

Various metrics can uncover the effectiveness of your CTAs. Each one will give you a good idea of what’s working and what’s not on your website. 

For a comprehensive approach, you can use a combination of these key metrics to determine if your CTA is doing its job.

Let’s take a look at these metrics:

What’s Your Click-Through Rate (CTR)?

That’s quite a pick-up line if you ask me…

Joking aside, the click-through rate (CTR) gives you a clear picture of who is seeing your CTA compared to who is clicking your CTA. 

Divide the number of clicks by the number of impressions to get this number.

For example, if you had 60 clicks and your link was seen 800 times. That would be (60/800) x 100 to equal a 7.5% CTR.

Are Your Visitors Bouncing Too Soon?

Your bounce rate tells you how many visitors leave your website without taking further action. 

While this isn’t directly going to tell you that your CTA is the problem, it will give you insight that your website content isn’t matching your user’s expectations. 

If they’re bouncing then they’re not clicking so something needs to be fixed ASAP.

A/B Test to Compare CTAs

A/B testing is a wonderful way to see which CTA is working best. 

But listen up, you want to be sure to only change one thing for your testing…the CTA. 

If you change anything else on your website you won’t pinpoint if the CTA improved conversions or not. 

For instance, don’t change the headline, a paragraph here and there, and also the CTA in your testing. 

You’ll want version A with one CTA and version B with another. 

Then, measure and compare the results from both to get your winner.

Bonus: Examples of Effective CTAs from Top Websites

I found a variety of CTAs from top brands like Dollar Shave Club, Warby Parker, Casper, Unbounce, and Lyft.

These websites all handled their CTAs in different ways. 

Some target different audiences either by their stage in the sales process or by the products they’re most likely to purchase. 

Others tackled customer pain points. 

They all were direct and sometimes humorous and clever. 

These examples are sure to spark some ideas on how your website’s CTAs could be improved for more leads and sales.

Watch the video for a complete breakdown of each website’s CTAs:

Top 5 Call-To-Action Examples:

1. Dollar Shave Club
2. Warby Parker
3. Casper
4. Unbounce
5. Lyft

Conclusion

We’ve gone through how important it is to have effective CTAs to increase your leads and sales. 

Your CTAs are like guiding posts on a hike to show your visitors they’re on the right path. 

When they follow a logical order and match the context of the content, your CTAs can be powerful tools in your sales process to convert visitors to long-term customers for your business. 

So take some time to view the CTAs on your website, measure them for effectiveness, and optimize for continued revenue growth.