Call-to-action improvement

What call-to-action improvement is

Call-to-action improvement is a small, targeted job on a page that already reads well. Three things change: the words on the button or link, where on the page that ask appears, and the sentence beside it saying what happens after someone presses it. Nothing else on the page is touched.

It is not a page rewrite. A rewrite decides what the page should say at all, and replaces most of it. This assumes the page is right and that only the asking is weak. It is also not the lines written as a job in their own right across your emails, ads and posts. This is the button on a page you can point at, and the two lines around it.

When you need one

You need this when a page holds people and still produces nothing. They read to the bottom, some of them come back a second time, and the enquiries do not arrive. The page has done its work and the last step is asking badly.

The other common case is a page carrying four asks of equal weight: book a call, download the guide, see pricing, contact us. A reader given four choices tends to make none. One page, one action, and the others demoted to plain links.

You do not need this if the page itself is wrong. If it addresses the wrong buyer, describes an offer you no longer sell, or reads as though it was written for a different company, a better button changes nothing and you should buy the rewrite instead. If you cannot yet say which page is losing people, a content audit finds it first and this becomes the cheap follow-up.

What gets looked at

There are only three variables, and they are handled in this order.

• The wording. “Submit”, “Learn more” and “Get started” describe nothing. The replacement names what the reader receives, in their words rather than yours, and is short enough to sit on a phone button without wrapping onto three lines.
• The placement. Where the ask sits relative to the point at which a reader has enough to say yes. On most pages that point arrives earlier than the bottom, and on a long page the ask belongs in two places rather than one.
• The promise. The line underneath, saying what actually happens next: who replies, how soon, what the first conversation covers, and what it costs to find out. This is the variable nobody fixes, and on most pages it is the one doing the damage.

The promise has to be true, so it is agreed with you before it is written. If nobody in the business can reliably answer within a working day, the line says two working days and the page keeps its credit. A promise that is quietly broken is worse than none.

What you get

The wording. For each page, two or three button labels with a note on which I would use and why, plus the short line of text that sits above or below it.

The placement note. Marked against the page as it stands: where the ask appears now, where it should appear, which competing buttons come out, and what each demoted one becomes instead.

The promise. One or two sentences per page, written from what you confirmed the business can genuinely do, and worded so it can go live without anyone checking it with a lawyer.

A worked example

An illustration. A Winnipeg bookkeeping practice has a page on year-end filing for small companies. It explains the work clearly, it is the second most-read page on the site, and it produces almost no enquiries. At the foot sits a grey button reading “Submit enquiry” above a form of nine fields. Higher up, two buttons of the same size offer “Our services” and “About us”.

The wording becomes “Book a 20-minute call about your year end”. The ask moves up to sit directly under the paragraph explaining what the filing includes, which is where a reader has enough to decide, with a second identical button at the foot. The two competing buttons become plain links in the footer. Under the button go three sentences: the call is with the practice owner rather than an assistant, it happens within two working days, and nobody is added to a mailing list. The form drops from nine fields to three, since the rest can be asked on the call. Two pages, one week, and the practice can apply the pattern to its other four service pages itself.

How it runs

1. A half-hour call. Which pages, what you want a reader to do on each, and what you can honestly promise happens after they do it. No charge.
2. A fixed price in writing. Per page or per set of pages, agreed before anything starts.
3. The pages and the figures. Links to the pages, and read-only access to whatever analytics you keep, so placement is settled by where readers stop rather than by taste.
4. The work. Two to four working days for up to five pages. Longer only if the promise needs settling with more than one person in the business.
5. Delivery. Wording, placement notes and promises in one document. Putting the changes on the site is yours, or mine as a small website update.

What it costs

Quoted as a fixed price in CAD after the half-hour call. The size varies more than you would expect: five pages that all make the same promise is one decision applied five times, while five pages with five different offers is five separate jobs. The pricing page shows the four ways of working and how quotes are built. The number is fixed in writing before anything starts.

What happens next

Most people do one of three things afterwards. If the form behind the button is still long and unexplained, the labels and hints are the next small job and cost less than this one. If the promise turned out to be the weak part, the page shown after a form is sent usually needs the same treatment. And if the exercise showed that the page around the button is doing badly too, that is the moment to buy a rewrite rather than another small fix. None of it is assumed. This is a complete piece of work on its own, and a page with the right ask in the right place is finished.