One of marketers' primary goals is to continuously drive ROI, but they may miss conversion opportunities if their CTA placement is poor.

Industry: Telecommunications
Content: Custom graphics
Highlights: Increasing conversions with more strategic Calls to action

The whole point of building a content-driven SEO strategy is ultimately to generate conversions. However, some companies may not reach their goals for newsletter signups, demos or purchases no matter how high they climb in SERPs if calls to action on their websites are poorly placed.

It’s important that CTAs are visible above above the fold because 80 percent of people will never scroll down. Burying them beneath text at the bottom of any page is a mistake that may be more costly than anticipated. Brafton’s Content Marketing Strategist team recently worked with a client to find out just how important this is, using on-site metrics as evidence.

The data is compelling: A landing page with a well-placed CTA was responsible for 16 percent of all the site’s conversions for the third quarter. A lookalike CTA that was pushed to the bottom of a separate landing page generated just 1.6 percent of all conversions in the same time period.

Of course, there’s the possibility that other factors are at play. If the stronger-performing page contains especially compelling content than the other, or offers information that draws a more qualified audience, then it will naturally contribute to more conversions.

However, the findings were consistent across the site: all landing pages with well-placed CTAs generated a high volume of clicks and similar conversion rates.

Findings were consistent across the site: all landing pages with well-placed CTAs generated a high volume of clicks and similar conversion rates.

Brands run into similar problems with form fills. When newsletters signup fields are featured first and foremost on landing pages, conversion rates hover around 15.5 percent. On the other hand, when form fills fall below the fold underneath stock images and contact data, it’s estimated brands sacrifice a significant number of conversion opportunities.

There’s no silver bullet for increasing conversions, but calls to action are a smart place to start. To generate stronger ROI, marketers must make it easy for customers to see where they can convert and clear what next steps are expected.

Lauren Kaye is a Marketing Editor at Brafton Inc. She studied creative and technical writing at Virginia Tech before pursuing the digital frontier and finding content marketing was the best place to put her passions to work. Lauren also writes creative short fiction, hikes in New England and appreciates a good book recommendation.