A call to action is a response you would like your audiences to complete. It typically is a text or an image that encourage visitors to take a preferred action. For example, you may require your visitors to download your free ebook subscribe to your articles or sign up for a newsletter.
Every website should have a call to action, which is an important part of a website. Here are 7 tips for creating an effective call to action on your website.
1. Use Optin-In form on your site
Optin-In form is one of the best online methods for converting potential customers into your clients. The primary objective of the use of Optin-In forms to create an aimed contact list of people who have interest in the products or services you are promoting.
Currently, three types of Optin-In form are popular in the email marketing:
- In-Line Opt-In form: a form that are placed in your sidebar, under your articles or within your articles.
- Pop-Up Opt-In from: a form that can “pop up” when someone visit a web page. This type of Opt-In form has the settings that allow a user to change the actual time before the pop-up form shows up.
- The Lightbox Opt-In form: a form that is still pops up in the existing window, darkens the website area, and places a Lightbox over the content on a page.
You can hard code your Opt-In form on you own if you are a programmer. However, if you are not comfortable with hard coding, you’d better use a plugin that helps you install an Opt-In form on your site on the fly.
2. Only request the most important information
When you use opt-in form to require information from your readers, you should only ask for the most important information, such as their email address and names. In my experience, the more information you ask for, the more suspicious the readers will be, thus resulting in a decrease in your conversion rate.
3. Identify the benefits before a user takes action
You have to let your users to know why they have to complete a call to action before they are willing to do so. The best way for this is to first identify a problem and demonstrate that your products or services can solve the problem.
Also, you can offer some additional benefits that entice users to take action. For example, you could offer a free ebook, discounts, etc.
4. Use specific and active language
Most users won’t complete a call to action if they are not convinced completely. A call to action should make it very clear that what you would like them to do. You should use clear and active words instead of ambiguous ones. For example, you could use active words such as buy, call, subscribe, register, donate, etc.
5. Create inspired submit button text
One of the most effective ways to have visitors take action is to create an attractive submit button. The color of the submit button should be different from its surrounding background. If the surrounding elements are light colors, a button with orange color or red color is good to make the button stand out and eye-catching.
6. Use white space
White space is one of the most neglected and underused elements in web design. It is the blank or empty space surrounding elements on a web page. Surrounding the submit button with whitespace can be very effective for highlighting call to action area, making it stand out in a web page.
7. Protect your users
You should convince your users that they wouldn’t be spammed. People normally are very protective of their personal information such as their email address or phone numbers especially when they have to expose this important information to complete a call to action. To convince your users, you should add something like “ we hate spam and promise not to expose your personal information to anyone else.”
