Getting people to your website is great, but what happens once they are already there?
If people are visiting your website but not calling, booking, downloading a freebie, buying or making an enquiry, it’s easy to think you need more traffic. Sometimes, the problem is much simpler - visitors aren't sure what to do next.
We see this regularly with small business websites. Firstly, it could be the user experience that could be impacting the journey, think incorrect navigation, poor mobile experiences, pop-ups, and ads distracting users from the content.
Then secondly, the service is clear, the website looks good, and people are finding it through Google, but the next step is difficult to find or is opposed by too many other choices.
That's where a good call to action (CTA) matters.
A CTA helps turn someone from a visitor into someone who takes action, whether that's demanding a quote, booking an appointment, buying a product or learning more.
But there's more to an effective CTA than adding a "Contact Us" or “buy now” button to every page. The wording, placement and what your visitor is ready to do all play a part.
A good call to action (CTA)makes the next step clear that could be requesting a quote, booking an appointment, buying a product or visiting another page.
The wording matters, but so does where the CTA appears, what comes before it and what the visitor is ready to do.
A call to action, or CTA, is a prompt that encourages someone to take the next step on a website, that could be Book an appointment, Get a quote, Shop now, View our services, Download the guide or Start your free trial.
CTAs aren't limited to buttons, they can also appear as text links, forms, banners or within page copy. The format isn't the important part; what matters is that someone understands what they're being asked to do and what will happen next.
Imagine landing on a service page, reading everything and deciding the business sounds like what you need. Then you reach the bottom, and there's no contact button, booking link or explanation. You find the contact page yourself, but the website has created pointless work at the point you're considering becoming a customer.
A good CTA makes a natural path from reading to doing.
Research referenced by Wix suggests that clear, specific CTAs can increase conversion rates by up to 161%. Wix also references research finding that personalised CTAs convert 42% more visitors than generic or unclear alternatives.
Those figures don't mean changing one button will quickly increase conversions by 161%. Results depend on the audience, offer, page and traffic they do show why CTA wording earns more consideration than automatically adding "Click Here".
If you want someone to do something, tell them what that something is. "Click here" tells someone to click, but doesn't tell them why, compare that with Book a consultation, See our SEO services or Download the checklist gives the visitor a better idea of what will happen next.
Wix also recommends using action-focused language words such as book, get, download, view, start and shop work because the action is easy to understand.
There's no need to make CTA copy creative for the sake of it. If someone has to stop and work out what a button means, the wording is doing their job harder.
One mistake we see is businesses picking a CTA based on what they want the customer to do rather than what the customer is ready to do. The business wants a sale, so every page says Buy Now, but the visitor is still researching, so there’s a mismatch in the journey.
Someone reading an early guide might be more comfortable with “See how it works", someone comparing providers could be ready to View our services. A visitor who has read your service page, checked your pricing and looked at your reviews might be ready to Book a consultation.
Figma uses Jira as an example of this approach, showing how its CTAs become more specific as someone moves through the page.
Source: Figma. Jira changes its CTA as visitors move further through the customer journey.
Jira uses different CTAs based on what the customer is ready to do, from “Get it now” and “Try it free” to “Contact sales” for enterprise customers. It’s a good example of how businesses can match their CTA to the customer’s needs and stage in the buying journey.
As visitors learn more about a product or service, the action you ask them to take can change too. Someone arriving on a page for the first time may need more details before they're ready to ask or buy, while someone deep into their research may be ready to take that next step. Matching the CTA to that stage can make the journey feel more natural.
The point isn't to copy Jira. It's to think about what your visitor needs at that particular stage.
A great CTA isn't much use if nobody notices it. Colour contrast, spacing, button size and positioning can help make the next action clear. It's also worth checking how the CTA appears on mobile rather than thinking something that works on desktop will work equally on a smaller screen.
But visibility doesn't mean putting buttons everywhere. If numerous different actions are competing for attention, you've given the visitor another decision to make.
There's no rule saying a page can only have one CTA. On a longer service page, you have a CTA near the top for visitors who already know what they want. After explaining the service and answering common questions, you can give them another opportunity to query.
Headspace is an example of providing chances to start a trial at different points in the browsing journey.
Here’s one where you can trial the product for $0 to start a trial:
Here’s another where they offer the product for free via a popup CTA:
And another where they capture your newsletter sign up:
Source: Headspace - Headspace gives visitors multiple opportunities to take action as they move through the page
The lesson isn't to repeat the same button anywhere, visitors shouldn't have to go looking for the next step once they're ready.
Sometimes the problem isn't the button, it's everything around it.
Book now isn't mostly convincing if someone doesn't understand what they're booking, what they'll receive or why they should choose your business.
The content leading up to the CTA has to do some of the work.
HelloFresh is a useful example from Figma's research. Its CTA is supported by an offer in the form of a discount or coupon that gives the visitor a reason to take the next step.
Source: HelloFresh supports its CTA with a clear offer rather than relying on the button alone.
It makes the next step easy by clearly showing what users can do, from choosing meals to tracking deliveries and earning rewards. For business owners, it’s a good example of how clear benefits paired with simple CTAs can give customers a reason to take action. Your CTA should make the action clear; the page needs to make that action valuable.
There isn't one best CTA for every website.
An ecommerce store, an accountant and a local plumber have different customers and conversion journeys, what works for one business won't automatically work for another. Test different wording, placement and offers, then look at what visitors actually do.
An example from Xero, multiple CTAs that may not work for a service based business.
Figma recommends testing and repeating CTA variations rather than assuming the first option is right.
Changing a button because you prefer one colour isn't much of a test, looking at whether more visitors complete the chosen action after a deliberate change gives you something useful to work with.
If you're not sure where to start, keep the action specific to what you want the visitor to do.
For a service business, a clickable call to action for your website could be Get a quote, Book a consultation, Talk to our team or View our services.
For ecommerce, that might be Shop the range, Add to cart, View best sellers or See what's new, for informational content, Read the guide, Download the checklist or See the results may make more sense.
Rather than searching for a supposed CTA that increases visitor clicks and copying it, start with the visitor. What have they just read? What do they need next? What would be the logical next step?
This is the part businesses can easily miss, if a page is getting traffic but not generating enquiries, changing the button isn't necessarily the answer. We'd look at auditing the page first.
Is the traffic applicable? Does the content match what someone searched for? Is the offer clear? Is there enough information to trust the business? Does the page work properly on mobile?
If those things aren't working, changing Contact Us to Get Started isn't going to solve the underlying problem.
This is where SEO and conversion start to overlap.
Ranking gets your business in front of potential customers, your website needs to help those visitors understand what you offer, decide whether you're right for them and take the next step.
A CTA is part of that journey, not a shortcut around it.
There isn't a magic combination of words that guarantees more clicks. The best CTA for your website is one that's clear, related to the page, easy to find and appropriate for what the visitor needs at that point.
Before changing button colours or copying a CTA from another website, read your page as if you were a potential customer seeing the business for the first time.
Getting people to your website is great, but what happens once they are already there? If people are visiting your website but not calling, booking, downloading a freebie, buying or making an enquiry, it’s easy to think you need more traffic. Sometimes, the problem is much simpler - visitors aren't sure what to do next. […]
Every day, emails are flying around the world for everything from invoices and meeting invites to abandoned cart reminders, newsletters, order confirmations and the message you don't remember subscribing to. Despite predictions that social media, messaging apps and other platforms would make email less important, the numbers are still climbing. According to Statista, 376.4 billion […]
I decided to make this blog on how to turn off double sided printing mac after a printer problem at work. I was in the office with my team recently, and we had just got a new printer. I'm usually the person everyone comes to for technical things, so when it started causing issues, it […]
