What Is A CTA? Using CTAs To Grow An Email List
Reading Time: 6 minutes 
If you are wondering what CTA means, we have the answer.
CTA stands for call-to-action and it is a term used to describe the action you want a customer or potential customer to take, once they view your content.
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In this guide, we will show you how and when to use a CTA and provide you with some CTA examples you can use today.
Ready to grow your email list with ease? Read on!
What Is A CTA And How To Use CTAs Strategically In Your Content
If you aren’t using CTAs in your content to grow your business, you are missing out!
A CTA (call-to action) should be included at the end of every type of content you publish.
Think about it, are you crafting a compelling CTA at the end of your blog posts so you don’t leave your blog readers hanging?
Do you remember to invite your TikTok viewers to check out the offers in your link in bio?
It’s OK if you haven’t used CTAs on your content yet. You can start adding them in now.
The next time you write a blog post, before you hit the publish button, take a minute and think about what you want your readers to do when they’re done reading your post.
And then craft a compelling CTA to get them into your email funnel.
A Call to Action (CTA) usually comes toward the end of a blog post. It doesn’t have to be complicated.
In fact, it should be clear and convincing.
Sometimes you want to push hard and get a little aggressive, but most of the time, keep it easy and casual.
The one thing you don’t want to do is leave them hanging at the end.
Not only is it not beneficial to you if all they do is leave and bounce away from your blog or scroll past your video, you’re also doing the viewer a disservice if you leave them hanging.
You’re taking them on a journey with your post or video, so tell them what they should do next. It’s part of your job as a content creator.
When To Use A CTA
Technically you will want every blog post, newsletter and TikTok reel to end with a strong CTA.
Consider the topic of your content and ask yourself “What do I want my viewers to do next?”
Whatever the answer is, that should be your CTA.
Examples Of Great CTAs
When choosing your call to action, you have quite a few options.
3. Maybe you want them to read another post of yours.
Let’s run through a few CTA examples…
1. Ask Them to Comment
Ask your readers to leave a comment on the post or to reply to your email.
Most people wouldn’t even think to leave a comment or reply to a newsletter, so INVITE them and let them know that you would love to hear from them.
2. Ask Them To Connect on Facebook
No matter how many shiny new social media platforms pop up year after year, Facebook still remains one of the best places to forge relationships with fans of your content.
You can create a CTA that invites your audience to join your FB group, or interact with your FB business page.
Example: Do you have questions about crafting calls to action? Or building a profitable blog as a business? Then you should be a part of our Creator Community where we can support you! – join HerPaperRoute’s FB Community here!
3. Ask Them To Share Your Post On Social Media
Similar to tip #1 about leaving comments, most people won’t think to use your share buttons unless you ask them to.
Simply suggest that they share your post on Facebook or Twitter, or pin it to Pinterest.
And make the share buttons easy to find. I have share buttons in a few places. One right at the top of every blog post, and one on the left that stays sticky as a reader scrolls (see the image below which shows what those look like).
As well, I have a share button bar at the bottom of each post.
4. Email List CTA
The most important asset you have in your business is your email list.
I don’t care if you have 8 million followers on social media – if they aren’t on your email list, you could lose contact with them at ANY time.
Stop avoiding starting your email list, and just do it =)
Create a simple lead magnet freebie and mention it everywhere. Invite your audience to join your email list by giving them a great freebie in exchange.
Example: Thanks for reading the Ultimate Guide to [post topic], to learn how to put what you’ve learned into action, download my free guide on How To [Win with topic] – [sign up form to your freebie].
Here’s an example of one of my freebies, a blogging startup kit that people just go nuts for:
By the way, if you want to score a copy of this kit for yourself, enter your email below and I’ll send it to you right away:
Get The Blogging StartUp Kit: FREE!
There’s a lot more to be said about growing your email list. Take a look at this guide to learn more.
5. Product Recommendation CTA
CTAs are also used to close the sale, too!
Invite your potential customer to buy something – either your own product or something you’re an affiliate for)
You can use ‘Add to Cart’ CTAs to highlight a product or service and encourage them to enter the checkout.
6. Keep Reading CTA
A CTA can be as simple as mentioning a related blog post, and recommending they read it.
This keeps people AND search engine crawlers clicking through your website which is good for SEO, and it also helps reduce your website’s bounce rate too.
Related: How to monetize a newsletter.
7. Audience Segmentation CTA
You can also use CTAs to segment your audience, to get certain content to certain people, and not others.
For example, at Niche Investor we serve two types of clients:
- People who are looking to buy a business (buyers)
- And people who want to sell their business (sellers)
In order to direct the buyers to the business-for-sale listings, and direct the sellers to the free valuation page, we use a double segmentation CTA which looks like this:
This is not an all-inclusive list of CTA examples, but we have the big actions covered.
What Is A CTA – Conclusion
CTAs aren’t hard to write and they give your readers clear directions on what to do next.
Plus, when you use them to invite people to join your email list they become a very important lead-generation tool that can grow your email list fast, passively, and for free!
What are your favorite ways to end your blog posts? Do you use a particular call to action? Leave me a comment below and let’s talk. <— (Hey, that’s a CTA in the wild!)
For more helpful blogging resources, get yourself onto my Creator Economy Newsletter <— (Woohoo, another CTA right there! See how easy this is?)
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