What’s a website call to action and why is it important?
When you start working on the content for your website and thinking about what you want to put there, it’s easy to start by seeing what other people with similar sites are doing. If you have a small mostly informational site you might think, “Well, I need a home page, an about page, a services/products page, and a contact page and that should do it”. It’s that simple, right? Put the info up and they’ll find their way around? Well, not so much.
We’re guilty of it too. We’ve often asked clients this question in the past: “What do you want your site visitors to see when they visit the home page of your site?” We would then use this information to determine what should be on that page when we design it. Lately though, I’ve decided to rephrase this question to “What do you want your site visitors to do when they visit the home page of your site?”.
Do you see the difference? The first question is focused on finding solutions and the second is focused on discovering what problems we need to solve before we seek solutions. Instead of asking what we want visitors to see, we are instead thinking about what we want them to do before we decide what they should see. This first step is very important in the process and shouldn’t be skipped.
Once you know what you want your visitors to do, you can then focus on how you will implement your call to action. A call to action on a website is basically an element on your page that shows people clearly what you want them to do next or helps guide them where to go. It could be a button, text, a form, etc. Here are some examples of typical scenarios where you could use calls to action on your website.
- Want new clients to contact you? How about putting up a big brightly colored contact form or button with your phone number? (see our fancy pants call now button above)
- Want customers to sign up for your program? How about a big button that says “Sign up here”?
- Want to sell a particular product? How about featuring that product predominantly near the top of your page?
- Want to increase your subscriber numbers? Move your newsletter form to a more prominent place on your site and offer extra incentives for them.
Take a moment to think about where you are sending your customers. Are you helping guide them? Add a call to action and watch your conversion rates increase. While you’re at it, think about all the other pages on your site too. How about your services page? Do you want people to contact you after they go there? And your blog posts? If you are looking for reader comments, are you asking for them?
What else can you think of that will help your site visitors go where they need to go?
P.S. Want to see another example of another awesome website call to action? Check out Jonathan Fields’ sexy newsletter sign up form on his blog (sidebar, top right). Who knew a newsletter could make you taller, smarter, and sexier?
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