Five Ways to Create the Perfect Offer (Call-To-Action) for Your Ads

#1 Start Your CTA with a Strong Verb

When creating a CTA, one of your primary goals should be to write in a clear, concise manner. Therefore, your first job when writing a call to action is to tell the reader what they should do if interested.

Start the CTA with the desired action, and make sure it’s relevant to the offer you’re leading them to.

For example, if you own an e-commerce site, and your ad leads directly to a product page, then you would use a verb such as:

• Order
• Shop
• Buy

But that same shop owner, running traffic directly to their product listings, wouldn’t use irrelevant verbs like:

• Subscribe
• Sign up
• Download

Too often, marketers use verbs carelessly. If your goal is to drive sales, then your CTA should be aligned with that goal. That way, you’re more likely to get people clicking through who are primed to make a purchase. The last thing you want is to use an irrelevant verb like “subscribe” if your immediate goal is to drive sales.

The person may click through, and they may find your sign up form. But so what? You’ve just spent money getting an email from a person who may never buy a product from you. Your goal was to drive sales.

However, if you’re instead promoting a newsletter, eBook or white paper, then using a verb such as ‘download’ or ‘subscribe’ makes a great deal of sense. You’re priming the reader to take the action you want them to take by ensuring the verb matches the intent of your ad and the offer on the landing page.

Similarly, if you’re trying to get a prospect to request more information, you would use verbs such as:

• Fill out
• Find out
• Learn more

A coach or consultant certainly shouldn’t use a CTA like, Buy now! The prospect viewing the ad would be a top-of-the-funnel lead, and they would not be ready to convert. The consultant’s goal would be to get these leads to join their newsletter, consume their high-quality blog content or watch their helpful videos. In other words, to build a relationship. The CTA, therefore, would need to match that intent.

#2 FOMO

FOMO, or fear of missing out, is a principle of marketing rooted in scarcity. FOMO, if used appropriately, is an excellent way to push your prospect to action. No one likes missing out on a good deal. If the lead thinks they’ll miss out, they’ll take action.

You can use FOMO in the benefits half of your CTA to give it an extra pop. Examples:

• Shop today! Get 20% off women’s strapless tops, today only!
• Get exclusive access! The first 100 early adopters get 20% off!

Even the implication of scarcity is enough to motivate.

#3 Use Words That Provoke Positive Emotion

Of course, you don’t want to focus on scarcity so much that your CTA sounds dour or negative. Always keep the spotlight on the benefit the prospect stands to gain by taking action. Note that, in the above two examples, while the CTA implies that the prospect may lose out if they don’t take action, the overall message is positive.

There’s an air of enthusiasm that permeates the call to action. It’s saying, Hey, if you take action now, you can get this great thing!

You can use verbs like ‘get,’ ‘snag’ and ‘secure’ to give your CTA zing. These zippy verbs give the CTA energy and flavor them with enthusiasm. The end result is an ad that stands out from its surroundings and demands attention.

#4 Don’t Forget the Why

When crafting the CTA, don’t forget the benefit. What will your product help the prospect do? Lose weight? Make more money? What is the benefit?

The benefit you mention in your CTA should relate to the offer on the landing page. So if you sell women’s strapless tops, the benefit in your ad’s CTA should relate somehow. In the above example, the CTA calls attention to the fact that strapless tops are currently on sale.

If a lead clicks through an ad, but the landing page feels unrelated, they’ll leave.

#5 Know Your Devices

People are using mobile more and more, and this is unlikely to change anytime soon. Consider that desktop and tablets share similar resolutions, and many services, such as Google, consider them to be the same for display purposes. After all, people use them with similar search intent. For instance, if someone sees an ad on television, they might use their laptop or their tablet to get more info on the product. They probably wouldn’t jump to their phone for this search if their laptop, desktop or tablet is nearby.

But if you know that people are looking for information about your product or service on mobile, you should absolutely customize your CTAs to that traffic whenever possible. Instead of asking them to click, use something like, Call us! The first 20 callers get our early bird discount! This more targeted CTA is relevant to the device they’re using, and it will help you cut through ad blindness.

Conclusion

In this post, we explored the call to action and why it’s a crucial part of your toolkit for overcoming ad blindness. We covered several best practices that, when used consistently, can help you outperform your competitors. It’s our hope that this concise guide will help you craft effective CTAs that steer targeted traffic into your sales funnel so you can see ever-higher ROI.