Call-to-Action Best Practices for Social Media

Volume Nine

• Social Media

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What influences a social media user to click-through and read your blog post? How do you make your social content click-worthy, shop-worthy, or engagement-worthy?

A call-to-action (or CTA), is verbiage that instructs a reader on what to do next. In social media, a CTA can be in the post copy, the header in a social media ad, or as the button on a social media ad.

Here are five best practices to follow, the next time you want to spur your social media audience into action.

Best Practice #1 – Provide or Include a Call-To-Action

Sounds like a simple thing to remember, but it’s usually the first thing to go in an extra clever Facebook post or if you’re limited to 140 characters on Twitter.  If you don’t provide a CTA, readers won’t know what to do next. To increase the desired outcome of the social post or ad, provide clear and easy directions for users.

Best Practice #2 – Keep the Funnel in Mind

This best practice is especially true for Social Media Advertising. The CTA you use in paid social media should match where the target audience is in the social media funnel.

If you’re targeting a brand-new customer audience, warm them up with CTAs like “Learn More” or “See Menu”, if you’re in the restaurant industry.

If you’re remarketing or retargeting an audience that’s already in the consideration stage of the funnel, use CTAs like ‘Shop Now’ or ‘Contact Us’.

Since this audience is already familiar with your brand, this type of CTA won’t come across as too aggressive.

Best Practice #3 – It’s called a CTA, not CTAS

There’s great power in a single CTA, not a million. Don’t confuse the user by using multiple calls-to-action in social posts or social ads. Below is a confusing social media ad example. We’re asking the user to engage with the post and contact us.

If the goal of this ad is to increase blog post views and website traffic, and we’re targeting a new audience (refer to Best Practice #2), here’s a better version of the ad:

Best Practice #4 – Use Action Words

They’re calls-to-action, not calls-to-sit-still-and-continue-scrolling. Use words that encourage action, like:

• Start
• Learn
• Join
• Read
• Watch
• Want
• Free
• Try
• Shop
• Order

Best Practice #5 – Be Consistent

Your shoes don’t have to match your belt, but your CTA should be consistent with the content you’re sharing. If you’re sharing a blog post about a company volunteer day, don’t ask for business leads or for users to ‘Contact You’. Instead ask them to ‘Learn More’ about the experience, or encourage them to share the post (Example: Share this post and we’ll donate $5 to this featured charity).

Now that we’ve shared these CTA best practices we’d like to hear from you! Curious about our Social Media Team and what we can do for your brand? Let’s Talk.