The most important things to know about Call to Actions: Design and Copy — Part 2

Aurélio Jota

Published in

Youse | Design Chapter

3 min readDec 8, 2016

Go to part 1

Copy: verbs, trigger words, urgency, easy and expectation.

Start with a verb

They’re action-oriented. Your CTA button should begin with an action verb like “Get” or “Download”.

In a test run by Michael Aagaard (Unbounce’s Senior Conversion Optimizer), he found that changing CTA button copy from the second person (i.e. Get your free template) to the first person (i.e. Get my free template) resulted in a 90% lift in click-through rate.

Trigger words

Instead of barking orders at them, substitute words like “Submit” or “Sign up” with words like “Get” or “Try”. Jared Spool calls these trigger words. Trigger words are the words and phrases that trigger a user into clicking. Give them a good reason to take the action you want them to take.

If the user is looking for ‘pricing’, and your link says ‘pricing’, they’re going to click on it. So in this case ‘pricing’ would be the trigger word. Owen & Fred’s email capture box has ‘subscribe’ as the call to action. I think everybody gets what happens after clicking the button. But they should work on the value proposition of the for.

Sense of urgency

Phrasing of the action by using bold, confident, and commanding words can alter the user’s perception in such a way as to convince them that they shouldn’t wait any longer to take action and that waiting to take action would result in a penalty or a missed opportunity.

Easy

Often, a user’s hesitation to take action stems from thinking that an action will be difficult, costly, or time consuming. By taking care of these concerns, your call to action buttons can lead to more conversions.

Expectation

Most web users are hesitant to take things they’re presented on the web at face value. By experience, their trust has been burnt before by links that promise free service only to find out that they’d have to put in their credit card numbers to get what they want. To increase click conversion and to build trust, anticipate users’ scepticism and tell them what they will gain by taking the action you’ve presented to them. When designing a call to action button, think of all the potential questions users will have, and make sure that you answer them in time.