Last week I wrote about email newsletters.
This week, I’m writing about calls-to-action aka CTAs.
The call to action is the reminder to your prospective client to do the thing that you want them to do. Register, Buy, Subscribe, Donate, Call, or whatever the heck you want them to do. So many of us don’t include a CLEAR and SPECIFIC call to action in our marketing materials. From print to web to email newsletters to face-to-face selling, you will make more money if you include a clear and specific CTA. One of my favorite anecdotes about being clear and specific is a story about a great salesperson who started out working at the local gas station.
In the beginning, he asked “How much gas would you like? ”
He then graduated to asking “Would you like 5 or 10 gallons today?”
And, the sales-maximizing question was… ”Shall I fill ‘er up for you?”
For those of you interested in ‘why’ this works- there are theories about how we tire from cognitively challenging tasks and that it’s easier for us to say YES (or no) than to figure out how much gas we want. And, of course, there is lots of testing that you can do in the area of calls-to-action. From color of the button, to font, to placement on the page, etc. But the first thing to do is to make sure you have a call to action on ALL of your marketing materials. It doesn’t have to be a request for an immediate purchase either. Often it’s better to ask for a smaller ‘yes’ in the beginning. Sign-up for my free newsletter or get a free consult, for example.
So, start noticing the calls-to-action from your favorite companies & make sure you’ve got them in your own marketing materials!