The Importance Of A Call-To-Action

Visitors to your website are interested in something either you as a marketer, your brand, your website, or your content has to offer.  But when it comes down to it, your website visitors need a bit of nudge to get the ball rolling and engage with you and the rest of your marketing or sales team.

As digital marketers, the way we go about getting web visitors to interact and take the next step is through calls-to-action or CTAs.  One could even argue that CTAs are the most important and integral step to not only your website but to your overall sales funnel.  Here is our list of why CTAs are important.

As we’ve already alluded to, CTAs are the jumping off point for your entire sales funnel.  If you’re already using marketing automation software and you’ve got sales funnels, workflows, and email marketing in place, then you are 100% dependent on CTAs to get that party started and get your leads rolling through your marketing.

CTAs, often used as buttons within content, help your website visitors take measurable action on your website.  In most instances, you’ll connect each CTA to an appropriate landing page where visitors can opt-in to becoming a sales lead for your company.  Even if you have all the inbound marketing infrastructure created but no door to it, your website visitors will simply leave without being converted.  

All of that to say, CTAs throughout your website and content are the doorway for visitors to turn into leads and offer a logical next step for them to follow your content.

An effective, well-placed CTA on your website is your company’s online billboard for users to get in the game and without them, you very well may be leaving your web visitors unsatisfied and hung out to dry.  An effective CTA lets web visitors clearly understand what it is they are supposed to do and exactly what they’re getting.

Your content is what gets people to your website, but your CTAs are what gets them to do something once they’re there.  See, CTAs on your website are just like billboards on the highway.  They advertise exactly what your company offers, tells them how to get there, and gives them the directive to do so.  Just like a billboard, though, a well-placed CTA will always outperform a poorly placed one.

It’s good practice to keep at least one CTA above the fold of every page on your website.  This approach will always offer a customer the opportunity to engage with your brand.  An blog subscription CTA or simple “contact us” CTA is always a safe approach on every one of your webpages.

If a prospective customer has landed on your website, they’re undeniably in search of something. 

Whether they’re simply gathering information on a subject or they’re getting closer and closer to making a real purchase decision, they’ve found their way to you by no small accident.  When it comes time for those customers to learn more or speak to someone in sales, they need an obvious, conspicuous way to do that.

Naturally, if you don’t have a way for them to engage with your sales team or marketing department, there simply won’t be anywhere for them to go except to leave and find someone else in cyberspace with a clearly defined path.  The worst thing you can do as a marketer is turn away a thirsty customer seeking exactly what your company has to offer.  

One of the beautiful things about CTAs is they have a profound effect on both potential customers and existing customers who visit your website.  We’ve already mentioned that customers desire that “next step” approach and appreciate more than anything to be led into that next step by a cleanly designed website; however, once they engage your CTAs they start to desire more of your content.

Naturally, your next step is to offer them useful content in order to satisfy that desire, but the beauty of CTAs is that existing customers look for them as well.  If you’re regularly posting quality customer-focused content, then your customers will continue to come back to you to get updated on what’s happening in your industry and with your products.  

Not only do CTAs work wonders for gaining new customers and getting them into your sales funnels, but they are a great way to retain existing customers and keep them updated on just exactly what you’re up to. Now you understand why it’s so crucial to have a CTA on every piece of advertising!