Today, I\u2019ve got a special treat for you, something most companies won\u2019t share: a peek at one of our losses.<\/p>\n
A \u201cbest practice\u201d that failed so hard we had to pause part of the test early. And, if I can wax clickbait-y for a moment, it\u2019s a tactic you may be using in your calls-to-action as we speak.<\/p>\n
So come for the trainwreck, but stick around for the lesson, because what we learned led to 4% more leads from our CTAs.<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n And I\u2019m going to show you how to recreate it. (The improvement, that is. Not the trainwreck.)<\/p>\n I turn to AJ Beltis, principal marketing manager of conversion strategy, when I need absolute authority on two things: 1) pop-culture movie references, and 2) content conversion.<\/p>\n So when I read an internal brief where a supposed best practice caused a 14% loss <\/em>in conversion rate, I ran to him like Luke flying back to Obi-Wan.<\/p>\n\n It all started with a test of the wording on our CTA buttons. Long-time readers may remember that our anchor texts were once a grab-bag of different styles.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was up to the bloggers\u2019 discretion because each of those CTAs was individually placed,\u201d AJ explains. \u201cSo sometimes it was \u2018Get the template,\u2019 sometimes it was \u2018Download now.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n And because we test everything<\/em>, when we set out to make our CTAs more consistent, we started by testing different language options. The test variants were:<\/p>\n The Control: <\/strong>\u201cGet the [Product Type]\u201d The Best Practice: <\/strong>\u201cGet the Free [Product Type]\u201d <\/p>\n Same as above, only now we add \u201cfree\u201d as an enticement. A pretty non-controversial tactic you\u2019ll see in every CTA guide. The Wildcard: <\/strong>\u201cGet the Free [Specific Product]\u201d <\/p>\n Here we add a description of the offer to the button itself. At the time, this felt redundant because there was already a description above the button, but hey, let\u2019s try it. We were so confident in the results that we put our money where our mouse was and slapped the test on 25 of our highest lead-driving blogs.<\/p>\n \u201cWe felt pretty comfortable with the risk because we weren\u2019t removing anything or changing anything drastic,\u201d AJ says. \u201cSo it was a reasonably safe way to test something.\u201d<\/p>\n John Hammond felt the same way in Jurassic Park<\/em>.<\/p>\n Within two weeks, Variant B cratered our conversion rate by 14%, until we finally paused that branch to mitigate losses to our heavy-hitting lead generators.<\/p>\n So, why didn\u2019t the best practice work?<\/p>\n \u201cOne theory is that whenever you see something labeled as \u2018free\u2019 on the internet, it might have a spammy connotation.\u201d<\/p>\n In other words, like Pavlov\u2019s dogs, we\u2019ve all been trained to see \u201cFree Download\u201d and immediately scroll past what is surely a scam and\/or an ED cure.<\/p>\n Ah, but what about Variant C? The one we dismissed as redundant?<\/p>\n That one actually boosted our conversion rate by 4% overall, and by 7% among new visitors.<\/p>\n So, why did this variant work where the other failed?<\/p>\n AJ believes it\u2019s all about using visual cues to highlight keywords the reader is looking for.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen people are reading a blog post, they\u2019re often just kind of skimming as quickly as possible to get an answer,\u201d he says with a shrug and a sideways smile. \u201cI\u2019ve been a blogger and it sucks to say, but no one is typically reading all 1,200 words that you put your time and effort into.\u201d<\/p>\n (But not you, dear reader. Not you \u2026 Right?)<\/p>\n Say a visitor is skimming to learn about social media content calendars. Suddenly they see a big orange button that offers a social media content calendar template.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the specific thing that I want and <\/em>it\u2019s free? I\u2019ll get it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n To see the biggest takeaway, scroll back up and check out the CTA button right beneath the title of this very blog. You\u2019ll see that we no longer include descriptive text above the button, and instead use the description on the button itself.<\/p>\n Some of AJ\u2019s other insights:<\/p>\n Trusting best practice alone would have damaged our conversion rate, and we might have never known why.<\/p>\n Similarly, if we hadn\u2019t tested what we assumed was the redundant option, we would never have found a win.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we had just tested \u2018free\u2019 versus the control, the test wouldn\u2019t have worked,\u201d AJ points out. \u201cBut because we tested \u2018free\u2019 versus the control versus \u2018free [specific thing]\u2019, that extra layer worked.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIf you can use those buzzwords they\u2019re looking for, that\u2019s going to be more successful. Using the words \u2018content calendar template\u2019 or \u2018planning template\u2019 when they\u2019re reading a blog about social media content calendars \u2026 they\u2019re already thinking about that word, so psychologically, it might hook them a little faster.\u201d<\/p>\n Placing keywords in your anchor text is also a win for accessibility, as it helps folks who use screen readers to know what they\u2019re clicking on.<\/p>\n After getting beat worse than Rocky by Apollo, you might think we switched to testing on less important pages, but that\u2019s not the case.<\/p>\n As Rocky says: \u201cIt ain\u2018t about how hard you\u2019re hit, it’s about how you can get hit and keep moving forward.\u201d<\/p>\n As AJ says: \u201cWhen we look at testing our top pages, that\u2019s also where the biggest opportunity for growth is. If we were to be a little safer by testing pages that don\u2019t convert as well, we might not have been able to detect the magnitude of how successful or unsuccessful a tactic might be.\u201d<\/p>\n\n And that includes me, AJ, and Obi-Wan.<\/p>\n Always trust your audience\u2019s reaction over what you find in any guide.<\/p>\n \u201cRespond to your audience,\u201d AJ says. \u201cSome audiences might find a test that we ran to not be a good match. Whereas, we might look for inspiration from other companies, run it on the HubSpot blog audience, and find that their test doesn\u2019t work for us.\u201d<\/p>\n Amid all this talk about CTAs, AJ drives one final point home: Your CTA is only as good as what it\u2019s offering.<\/p>\n So test what you\u2019re offering, too.<\/p>\n \u201cWe use templates because templates work for us. We don\u2019t do webinars because webinars don\u2019t work for us. Some companies, all they do is webinars, because that\u2019s what works for their content sphere.\u201d<\/p>\n Unlike in Rebecca\u2019s test of paid ad landing pages<\/a>, for this one you do <\/em>want to test one element at a time. So be sure to test your anchor text and content offers separately.<\/p>\nThe Best Practice That Wasn\u2019t<\/h2>\n
Cut and dry. Straight to the point. A great example of our old anchor text strategy.\u00a0
Example: \u201cGet the Template\u201d <\/p>\n
Example: \u201cGet the Free Template\u201d<\/p>\n
Example: \u201cGet the Free Social Media Calendar Template\u201d<\/p>\n\nWhat Went Wrong (and What Went Right)<\/h2>\n
The Takeaways About CTAs<\/h2>\n
1. Test Every-freaking-thing. (Or \u201cDon\u2019t take best practices at face value.\u201d)<\/h3>\n
2. Use Keywords in Your Anchor Text<\/h3>\n
3. DO Test on Your Biggest Lead Drivers<\/h3>\n
4. Trust your audience above authority.<\/h3>\n
5. Test your offers, too.<\/h3>\n
How to Test Your CTA Button Text and Offers<\/h2>\n