You’ve heard the saying, “You’ve got to leap before you fly.” This is certainly true when it comes to crafting a call to action (CTA) on your landing page.
Consider the analogy. The “leap” is the call to action sending your visitor “flying” to your desired target.
While creating the perfect CTA may sound challenging, we’ve put together seven ways you can build an irresistible CTA on your landing page.
With our seven tips, you’ll soon have people leaping to your target. First, let’s define the CTA.
Defining the Call to Action
The call to action on your page is usually a button with text that prompts your website visitor to take a specific, immediate action. You might see text that says buy now, download today, get a free quote and more.
An effective CTA has three main parts. The first part is the CTA must include an offer that is appealing to your target market.
Second, your CTA must be tied to a button so your visitor can actually take the action.
Lastly, your CTA button links to a page, form, whitepaper, offer, etc. This is the “reward” your website visitor gets for clicking your landing page’s CTA.
Now that you are well-versed in the three components of a CTA, let’s talk about ways you can build an irresistible CTA on your landing page.
#1: Use Pops of Color
When a customer lands on your landing page, the very first thing you want them to see is your CTA. Since this is the whole purpose of your landing page, you want the button to be visually attractive and appealing. This is where your A/B testing comes into play. Test a few color combos and use the winning one.
Color is important to your marketing. Different colors appeal to men than women, so target colors to your market. Blue is a universally appealing color.
We recommend choosing a button color that contrasts with the rest of your page. Placing a blue button on a page with blue overtones isn’t going to get noticed. Remember – you want it to be the first thing they see.
When it comes to making your button stand-out, white space is invaluable. Be careful not to cram your landing page with unnecessary information that causes the visitor to get lost and wander from your desired outcome.
#2: Use Action Words
Buy now, submit, enter… those are boring words for your call to action buttons. Try action words. Get creative and pull out your thesaurus! Words like try, get, download, start are a good place to start.
Another great place to concentrate on when it comes to text is the creative offer. Let’s consider the landing page at square.com. The text says, “Start Selling Today.” The CTA button says, “Get started.”
What works for this page? Coupled with an image that shows the Square hooked to an iPhone, one can immediately see that it is indeed possible to start selling today by clicking the “Get started” button. This is one CTA that works because of the action words involved.
Finally, your text above the button matters nearly as much as the button text. Your headline text must motivate your visitor to click the button.
#3: Craft the Value Proposition
This leads us to the next item when it comes to building an irresistible CTA on your landing page. That is the answer to the “What’s in this for me?” question.
This is where you use your skills to elicit the emotion. Let your visitor know simply and enticingly what’s in it for them if they click your CTA button.
Use your second person pronouns here – stay away from the “we” word. Let your visitor know what they’ll receive with statements that let them know they deserve what you are offering. This is where the “you” comes into play.
#4: Pay Attention to the Size
Yes, size matters. So does shape.
When it comes to the size of your button, it depends on the relative size of everything else on your page. You want your button big enough to stand out, but not so big that the whole page is off balance.
Try using rounded corners on your buttons. Rounded corners are friendlier and draw the attention to the inside of the button.
Plus, rounded rectangles or circles are less taxing on the eye. Cognitively, rounded corners elicit trust and respectability.
#5: Pick the Right Spot
Like size and shape, the location of your CTA matters. Traditionally, experts agreed that the best place for a call to action was on the lower right side above the fold. As with all “rules,” this is a good place to start with your A/B testing to see what works for you.
Let’s look at why the lower right side above the fold isn’t always best. The “fold” is a nebulous term these days as one person’s fold – think desktop – isn’t another person’s fold – think mobile.
And, some landing page experts have found that placing the CTA farther down the page doesn’t really affect conversions. What’s important to note here, is that if you decide to move your CTA around, do some testing to learn what works for you.
What does matter when it comes to your conversion rate is whether the button is placed above the right copy and copy that converts.
#6: Use Cues
When designing your landing page and your CTA, include some directional cues, all directed to prompt the user to click. Cues can be subtle, or they can be overt, such as using arrows or creating a pathway to the button.
#7: Lure Your Customer
We bet you haven’t walked into a clothing store and been approached by a sales clerk who says, “Buy this red pump today,” without first trying it on.
We can apply this to your landing page as well. If convincing your website customer to put down $1,000 to buy your service seems like a hard sell, offer the free trial.
This gives your CTA some breathing room, and once you’ve hooked them with the trial, you can continue marketing to them to make the final conversion.
To Conclude
Now that you are armed with tips for building an irresistible CTA on your landing page, there are a few more things to remember.
Your landing page should have only one CTA. You want to build your page and your CTA with one conversion goal.
Your well-crafted CTA should motivate your website visitors to take the specified action. In others words, your goal is the click. Pay attention to the tips we mentioned above, and then factor in the human response – the emotional value.
Offer something of worth. Give your website visitor a reason to continue their relationship with you by clicking on your CTA. With offers hitting them multiple ways throughout their day, you’ll have to make a connection with your customer to earn the click.
By building the most enticing calls to action on your landing pages, you’ll be well on your way to turning website visitors into leads through your CTA.
Are you ready to squeeze more profit out of your website by building an irresistible CTA on your landing page? If so, we can promise you we’ll do just that. With our guarantee, you can rest assured we will increase your profits.
If you’re ready to work with the leader in landing pages and conversion rate optimization, contact us today.We’ll provide you with our FREE site performance analysis so we can work on your landing page conversion rates.
Image: Skrewtape via Visualhunt / CC BY-SA
“Cognitively, rounded corners elicit trust and respectability.”
Well… that’s a strange fact. Good to know, though! It also makes me glad I’ve been using rounded corners this whole time for pretty much everything, just because I like how they look.
Hey, Ion! Nice tips. helped me a lot to design my CTA buttons. All the points you mentioned in the aticle are exactly true and very informative for newbies like me. Like the way you explained all the points. Thank you sharing the helpful article.