Creating a Call To Action
Now, you’ve determined a sexy-greedy-professional-fearful appeal. You’ve designed a headline and perhaps a graphic to grab their attention, and you’re offering something they want. But, you still have to do more – you have to get them to act.
You see this many times combined with an offer, to make a time-sensitive offer. For example, “…for the first 10 callers/customers.”
We ran an offer one time to give the consumer preferred status for the first 50 people who filled out a form and sent it back. It worked amazingly. People from a targeted mailing list were sent the opportunity to have priority status which included no waiting time, and that was about all. Over 500 people who we had never met before sent the form in and scheduled an appointment.
We couldn’t really guarantee no waiting time, but it didn’t matter. What mattered was the consumer thought we were doing the best we could to not make them wait, and that equated to referred status. That’s what appealed to them, and got them moving.
Coupons have always been a call to action based on price and time-sensitivity. That almost always works, but coupons do not always work for certain types of services, especially healthcare. Also, discounts don’t always work very well when it comes to healthcare. If you use a discount, you’re probably going to attract the cheapest customers who are the hardest to please.
So, what can you offer your consumers to get them moving? A Free Consultation can work, or a Free Sample. You may also offer them a try it out period.
Depending on what service or product you’re offering, there is something you can offer and make time-sensitive to get people moving. And, if you can’t, then don’t forget to TELL them to get moving! That’s right, just telling the consumer to take action makes a lot of difference in any ad.
For example, putting your phone number or email address for them to contact you is a must anyway, right? But, don’t just put your number, tell them to call you. Call 555-5555 Today. Call Now.
These types of calls to action actually work to improve your response rate. They might not be the end-all, but to not put something in your ad to tell them to call is a mistake and will diminish the response you get.
