Stop Losing Sales: 7 Calls-to-Action Tips That Get Results

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I’ve always said the money you spend on advertising isn’t nearly as important as the return on investment (ROI). One surefire way to kill that ROI is to put too little thought behind your call-to-action (CTA).

A CTA tells your customer their next step. It makes their journey more effortless.

If you’ve engaged your audience emotionally, spoken to their desires or pain points, set yourself apart from the competition, and persuaded them that you’re the answer to their burning desires, don’t drop the ball now by forgetting the all-important CTA.

​And don’t suffer the fate of a sucky CTA. Weak calls-to-action are silently killing your revenue. The good news? Fixing it is easier than you think.

I created a 10 Commandments, if you will, of direct response advertising. Those rules can prevent costly mistakes with your business. The first four are especially appropriate for creating your next CTA:

If your ad doesn’t propose something, it’s like inviting someone to dinner and forgetting to feed them. Don’t be that fool.

Prospects are procrastinators. If you don’t light a fire under their feet, they’ll wander off and waste money elsewhere.

Don’t let confusion cost you a sale. Tell people exactly what to do next. Do they click a button? Call a number? Enter in information? Be specific.

You don’t put a juicy T-bone on the grill and then NOT keep an eye on it to see that it’s cooking. Don’t create marketing materials that you can’t (or don’t) track. Know what works, tweak what doesn’t, and scale what does.

​Keep these top four rules in mind when creating your CTA, or face the consequences.

Your CTA isn’t a treasure hunt. Don’t make people work for it. Place it where their eyes naturally fall—beginning, middle, and end. Don’t assume they’ll read the whole thing. Hit them early and often.

Every hoop you make your customer jump through loses you money. Complicated checkouts are conversion killers. People are lazy, distracted, and skeptical so don’t give them an excuse to bail.

In an age of stolen information, your customer wants to know their private information is in good hands with you. Protect yourself and your customers from cyber criminals with the best payment and data security.

​Some best practices for ensuring a more seamless and user-friendly experience include:

Leave no doubt in your customer’s mind what they should do next. Use simple and direct terms, like “Buy Now,” “Schedule your FREE in-home estimate,” or “Begin your 14-day free trial.”

​It’s best to avoid some ambiguous language that doesn’t fully explain what’s in store for the customer. Avoid using wording like “Get Started” or “Learn More.”

Urgency isn’t just a trick, it’s survival. People act when they fear losing out. If they don’t feel like this is their LAST chance, they’ll forget about you faster than last night’s dinner.

Light a fire under your customer’s decision-making by creating scarcity or urgency in your CTA. Tap into their FOMO (fear of missing out), using words like “limited time” or a ticker that shows time or stock quantities dwindling.

​Highlighting genuine scarcity with words like “Today Only,” “Before It’s Gone,” or “Offer Ends at Midnight” could mean the difference between a sale today or no sale at all.

Offer your audience a reason or benefit for clicking that CTA. Let them know what’s in it for them.

​Use beneficially-charged action words like “Start Saving Today,” “Claim your 50% discount,” or “Unlock Instant Access.”

Nobody wants to be the sucker who misses out. Show them the proof—testimonials, reviews, five-star ratings. People trust people, not ads.

​Try words like “Join Thousands of Happy Customers… Sign Up Now” or “See Why Customers Love Us!” to boost conversions. Show a satisfied customer’s review and their five-star rating nearby.

What does well now doesn’t mean something else couldn’t work even better. What does well now doesn’t mean it’ll stay that way. Continually test everything from your wording to placement and design because what works well now doesn’t last forever.

​Always A/B test your CTA to rake in the most conversions. Suppose “Claim Your Free Trial” works well for you. Might “Subscribe and Save” be even more effective? There’s no telling until you try.

Here’s the cold, hard truth: Your prospect needs to be told exactly what to do, why they need to do it NOW, and what’s in it for them—or they won’t act.

Your CTA is the tipping point between success and failure. Don’t leave it to chance. Make it bold, clear, and impossible to ignore.

Companies with good marketing strategies pay close attention to their CTAs. A weak CTA could spell business disaster—it wastes precious time and money.

CTAs guide the reader to act quickly. Those quick actions dramatically drive conversion rates, which can increase your revenue.

Stop letting weak CTAs bleed your sales dry. Let’s fix this. Test relentlessly. Track obsessively. And watch your hard work pay off.

​Stop losing sales and fix your CTAs today, or pay the price tomorrow.