Call to action (marketing)

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Call to action (CTA) is a marketing term for any text designed to prompt an immediate response or encourage an immediate sale. A CTA most often refers to the use of words or phrases that can be incorporated into sales scripts, advertising messages, or web pages, which compel an audience to act in a specific way. [1]

Contents

Definition

In marketing, a call to action (CTA) is an instruction to the audience designed to provoke an immediate response, usually using an imperative verb such as "call now", "find out more" or "visit a store today". [2] Other types of calls to action might provide consumers with strong reasons for purchasing immediately, such an offer that is only available for a limited time (e.g. 'Offer must expire soon'; 'Limited stocks available') or a special deal usually accompanied by a time constraint (e.g. 'Order before midnight to receive a gift with your order'; 'Two for the price of one for first 50 callers only'). The key to a powerful call to action is to provide consumers with compelling reasons to purchase promptly rather than defer purchase decisions. A CTA can be a simple non-demanding request like "choose a colour" or "watch this video", or a much more demanding request. An obvious CTA would be a request for the consumer to purchase a product or provide personal details and contact information. A CTA often takes the form of a digital image that encourages a lead to move closer towards making a purchase. "Click here", "Download Now" and "Learn More" are all examples of CTAs online consumers are already familiar with. [3]

Applications

Many marketing materials, such as brochures, flyers, catalogs, email campaigns, also make use of a call to action. Such instructions are designed to show consumers how to take the next step and create a sense of urgency around the offer. [4]

Example of a website CTA Cta.PNG
Example of a website CTA

Successful sales representatives have long recognised that specific words and phrases elicit desirable responses from prospects, and soon learn to incorporate the best lines into effective sales scripts. Clever sales pitches often incorporate a series of small CTAs that lead to a final CTA. [5] These smaller CTAs create a pattern of behaviour that makes it easier for the audience to follow-through with just one last CTA, completing a more demanding request, than had it been asked without context. An example could be the purchase of a designer timepiece. The sales person might ask the consumer to choose a style, then a colour, a size and even a personalised engraving. [6] When the client views the personalised design, they are more likely to be predisposed to complete the purchase. The sales representative can close the sale by asking, "Will that be cash or credit, today?"

Advertising messages, especially direct-response advertising messages, often make extensive use of calls to action. The key to a powerful call to action is to provide consumers with compelling reasons to purchase promptly rather than defer purchase decisions. An article in the Wall Street Journal suggests that the incidence of calls to action in television advertisements is increasing due to marketers' desire for instant and measurable results. [7]

In web design, a CTA may be a banner, button, or some graphic or text on a website meant to prompt a user to click it, and continue down a conversion funnel. It is an essential part of inbound marketing as well as permission marketing in that it actively strives to convert a user into a lead and later into a customer. The main goal of a CTA is a click, or a scan in the case of a QR code, and its success can be measured with a click-through rate, a conversion rate formula that calculates the number of clicks over the times the CTA was seen. [8] Another way to test the effectiveness of a CTA is using A/B testing where several graphics are presented to users and the graphic with the highest success rate becomes the default. [9]

Moreover, beyond web design, calls to action (CTAs) hold significant importance in various digital marketing channels, including blog content. CTAs within blog posts serve as pivotal guiding elements, prompting readers to take specific actions or explore further content. By strategically embedding compelling CTAs throughout blog content, marketers not only capture readers' attention but also motivate them to engage with the brand or product offerings. This seamless integration of CTAs into blog content aligns with broader marketing objectives, fostering increased user engagement and driving conversions. [10]

A call to action is often used in email marketing, a form of media sent directly to consumers that typically raises awareness for a sale, event, promotion, or release. While consumers consent to the company contacting them via email, a call to action must be strong to be perceived as important when in an inbox. The call to action is usually included in the subject line to gain consumer's interest to open the Email. Too many cold emails are hard sells and get opened, forgotten, and buried. Instead, you want to give value quickly: what’s in it for me? Why should I trust you? How is your content or product going to help me solve my problem today? Even if you don’t have all of those answers prepared—and most people who are trying cold email probably won’t—you can still sell yourself by giving value right off the bat. Think about it: if someone takes time out of their day to read your email, they may very well be interested in what you have to say. Take advantage of that! Start with something like I know you’re busy, but I thought you might find [insert benefit] useful. [11]

Calls to action evolve as society evolves. The concept is hyper focused around the consumer and must meet the consumer where they are rather than suggesting the consumer adjusts their behavior to the business or company. Marketing professionals must keep up to date on current events and how their target market is responding to said events to ensure appropriate messaging of their call to action in relation to the context. Extreme traumatic events may cause a call to action to be less business related and more society related. On the other hand, marketers must also note interesting changes in their target audience. When an audience engages with an activity or trend more, marketers must evolve call to action messages and connect with their consumers by using their new interests.

A call to action can be both direct and indirect. Pathos reasoning is a strong and indirect tactic marketers use for consumers to emotionally connect with their message. While the consumer may not be directly engaging with the company through a purchase, a positive emotional connection through a pathos call to action leverages the business in the consumer's mind and may lead to future purchases or brand loyalty. It is a common misconception that purchase is the most important result from a call to action, emotional engagement for brand loyalty can be equally essential.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Direct marketing</span> Model of communicating discounts and other sales offers

Direct marketing is a form of communicating an offer, where organizations communicate directly to a pre-selected customer and supply a method for a direct response. Among practitioners, it is also known as direct response marketing. In contrast to direct marketing, advertising is more of a mass-message nature.

Marketing communications refers to the use of different marketing channels and tools in combination. Marketing communication channels focus on how businesses communicate a message to its desired market, or the market in general. It is also in charge of the internal communications of the organization. Marketing communication tools include advertising, personal selling, direct marketing, sponsorship, communication, public relations, social media, customer journey and promotion.

Email marketing is the act of sending a commercial message, typically to a group of people, using email. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. It involves using email to send advertisements, request business, or solicit sales or donations. Email marketing strategies commonly seek to achieve one or more of three primary objectives: build loyalty, trust, or brand awareness. The term usually refers to sending email messages with the purpose of enhancing a merchant's relationship with current or previous customers, encouraging customer loyalty and repeat business, acquiring new customers or convincing current customers to purchase something immediately, and sharing third-party ads.

Online advertising, also known as online marketing, Internet advertising, digital advertising or web advertising, is a form of marketing and advertising that uses the Internet to promote products and services to audiences and platform users. Online advertising includes email marketing, search engine marketing (SEM), social media marketing, many types of display advertising, and mobile advertising. Advertisements are increasingly being delivered via automated software systems operating across multiple websites, media services and platforms, known as programmatic advertising.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Advertising management</span> Part of the advertising industry

Advertising management is how a company carefully plans and controls its advertising to reach its ideal customers and convince them to buy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Advertising campaign</span> Advertisements based on a theme

An advertising campaign is a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme which make up an integrated marketing communication (IMC). An IMC is a platform in which a group of people can group their ideas, beliefs, and concepts into one large media base. Advertising campaigns utilize diverse media channels over a particular time frame and target identified audiences.

In marketing, lead generation is the process of creating consumer interest or inquiry into the products or services of a business. A lead is the contact information and, in some cases, demographic information of a customer who is interested in a specific product or service.

In online marketing, a landing page, sometimes known as a "lead capture page", "single property page", "static page", "squeeze page" or a "destination page", is a single web page that appears in response to clicking on a search engine optimized search result, marketing promotion, marketing email or an online advertisement. The landing page will usually display directed sales copy that is a logical extension of the advertisement, search result or link. Landing pages are used for lead generation. The actions that a visitor takes on a landing page are what determine an advertiser's conversion rate. A landing page may be part of a microsite or a single page within an organization's main web site.

Mobile marketing is a multi-channel online marketing technique focused at reaching a specific audience on their smartphones, feature phones, tablets, or any other related devices through websites, e-mail, SMS and MMS, social media, or mobile applications. Mobile marketing can provide customers with time and location sensitive, personalized information that promotes goods, services, appointment reminders and ideas. In a more theoretical manner, academic Andreas Kaplan defines mobile marketing as "any marketing activity conducted through a ubiquitous network to which consumers are constantly connected using a personal mobile device".

The target audience is the intended audience or readership of a publication, advertisement, or other message catered specifically to the previously intended audience. In marketing and advertising, the target audience is a particular group of consumer within the predetermined target market, identified as the targets or recipients for a particular advertisement or message.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Advertising media selection</span>

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A squeeze page is a landing page created to solicit opt-in email addresses from prospective subscribers.

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Customer engagement is an interaction between an external consumer/customer and an organization through various online or offline channels. According to Hollebeek, Srivastava and Chen S-D logic-Definition of customer engagement is "a customer’s motivationally driven, volitional investment of operant resources, and operand resources into brand interactions," which applies to online and offline engagement.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Content marketing</span> Form of marketing focused on creating content for a targeted audience online

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Social network advertising, also known as social media targeting, is a group of terms used to describe forms of online advertising and digital marketing focusing on social networking services. A significant aspect of this type of advertising is that advertisers can take advantage of users' demographic information, psychographics, and other data points to target their ads.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Social media marketing</span> Promotion of products or services on social media

Social media marketing is the use of social media platforms and websites to promote a product or service. Although the terms e-marketing and digital marketing are still dominant in academia, social media marketing is becoming more popular for both practitioners and researchers.

Dialogue marketing emerged in the early 2000s as companies engaged willing consumers in an ongoing dialogue to create lasting relationships. For example, based on data, marketers invite groups of likely consumers to connect with the company. The engagement process provides value to both the consumer and the company. Marketers use these opportunities as data collection points. The companies use the data to further customize their marketing messages and personalize the experience for their consumers and market segments. In exchange for sharing opinions, buying patterns, product preferences, etc., consumers receive perks such as discounts, tips, and free trials as well as appropriate messaging from the company.

Data-driven marketing is a process used by marketers to gain insights and identify trends about consumers and how they behave — what they buy, the effectiveness of ads, and how they browse. Modern solutions rely on big data strategies and collect information about consumer interactions and engagements to generate predictions about future behaviors. This kind of analysis involves understanding the data that is already present, the data that can be acquired, and how to organize, analyze, and apply that data to better marketing efforts. The intended goal is generally to enhance and personalize the customer experience. The market research allows for a comprehensive study of preferences.

References

  1. ↑ Kennedy, Chris (2019). Web. Write. Sell.: Write Ads, Headlines, and Calls to Action That People Can't Help But Click. Questing Vole Press.
  2. ↑ Eisenberg, B., CALL TO ACTION: Secret Formulas to Improve Online Results, Nashville, Tennessee, Thomas Nelson, 2006, p. 20
  3. ↑ Oliveira, Alex, If You Build It, Will They Come?: The Golden Path to Lead Generation Success For Your Business, 2022, p. 118
  4. ↑ "Writing a Better Call to Action". MarketingProfs. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  5. ↑ Eisenberg, Bryan; Eisenberg, Jeffrey (2006). Call to Action: Secret Formulas to Improve Online Results. HarperCollins Leadership. ISBN   9781418566630.
  6. ↑ Niblick, J., The Profitable Consultant: Starting, Growing, and Selling Your Expertise, Wiley, 2013,
  7. ↑ "'Call to Action' Ads Give Clients Results They Can Measure". WSJ. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  8. ↑ Liflander, R., The Everything Online Business Book: Use the Internet to Build Your Business, Holbrook, MA, Adams Media, 2000, p. 25
  9. ↑ Bashinsky, Alex (2016-01-13). "6 Easy Ways to Incorporate Emotional Appeals Into Your Website's Call to Actions". Entrepreneur. Retrieved 2023-04-11.
  10. ↑ "Enhancing Blog Engagement Using Effective Calls to Action" . Retrieved 2024-04-25.
  11. ↑ "How to Add an Effective Call to Action in a Cold Email". Glaark. Archived from the original on 2022-04-03. Retrieved 2022-08-31.
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