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Masooma Memon on June 1, 2021 (last modified on March 29, 2023) • 13 minute read
The perfect CTA button on your Facebook ad can make the difference between driving home significant results and ending up with zero response.
Why?
Because Facebook CTA buttons tell your audience what you need them to do if theyâre interested in the ads they see and ready to take the next step.
Without it, youâre likely to lose business from interested leads since they have no idea how to learn more about you or the deal you are offering. Few, if any, would bother to google and find your business website or the deal youâve put out.
But what makes an effective CTA button?
A result-driven CTA button clearly specifies the next step a prospect needs to take after seeing the ad. Once clicked, it also meets your audience’s expectations by delivering what it promises.
Letâs walk you through at all these details and more as we cover the following today:
On we go:
Adding a Facebook CTA button isnât rocket science. Follow these steps and youâll be able add a call to action to your ad in no time:
Remember: the list of call-to-action buttons that you can see differs according to the marketing objective you pick. Not sure what the most common ad objectives are among Facebook experts, here’s what we learned in this study on Facebook ads.
Good read: Facebook Ad Formats: Which Are Best for Driving Awareness, Traffic, & Conversions?
And what about eliminating the CTA button altogether?
Thatâs not what the experts recommend.
78.1% of them say that ads with CTA buttons performs significantly better than ads without CTA buttons.
The reason? A call-to-action button clearly specifies users what they need to do after they see an ad (if theyâre interested).
Want to make sure your Facebook ads are performing and trending in the right direction? There are several types of metrics you should track, from costs to campaign engagement to ad-level engagement, and so on.
Here are a few weâd recommend focusing on.
Tracking these metrics in Facebook Ads Manager can be overwhelming since the tool is not easy to navigate and the visualizations are quite limiting. Itâs also a bit time-consuming to combine all the metrics you need in one view.
Weâve made this easier by building a plug-and-play Facebook Ads dashboard that takes your data and automatically visualizes the right metrics to give you an in-depth analysis of your ad performance.
With this Facebook Ads dashboard, you can quickly discover your most popular ads and see which campaigns have the highest ROI, including details such as:
And more…
You can easily set it up in just a few clicks – no coding required.
To set up the dashboard, follow these 3 simple steps:
Step 1: Get the template
Step 2: Connect your Facebook Ads account with Databox.
Step 3: Watch your dashboard populate in seconds.
Youâve a few options to choose from. Letâs broadly divide them below based on the marketing funnel slice each option falls into.
These buttons are for prospects who donât know about your company but will do once they see your ad.
Buttons for this part of the funnel: âlearn more,â âapply now,â and âdownload.â
These ad CTA buttons are for prospects who are aware of your business offer and are exploring the solution that you provide. Ads in this funnel stage help prospects decide if your business is good for them.
Buttons for this funnel slice: âlearn more,â âdownload,â âcontact us,â and âbook now.â
Lastly, these button options are for converting leads that are interested in buying from you. At this point, leads are ready to buy and your ad is the push they need to call their final shots.
Buttons for encouraging conversion: âmessage us,â âapply now,â âsubscribe,â âsign up,â and âget quote.â
Over 40 people that we talked to for learning about Facebook CTA buttons use these buttons and a few others such as âplay now,â âwatch more,â and more this year.
Of these, the âlearn moreâ button is the most widely used CTA button for Facebook ads.
âLearn moreâ also happens to be the button that drives the most results for our contributors. âShop nowâ and âdownloadâ are two more effective buttons for ad campaigns.
Related: How to Write a Call to Action: Increase Your Conversions with 16 Proven Tips for Crafting CTAs
In this section, weâll discuss the top 4 Facebook CTA buttons that perform the best.
But before we dig in, itâs essential to be clear on this: select the CTA button for your ad based on your ad objective. Or, to put it more simply: âchoose the CTA that is the best fit for the action you want consumers to take,â Jackie Kossoff from Jackie Kossoff – Marketing & Design says.
âFor instance, if you want them to download a free guide, choose âDownload.â If you want them to purchase a product, choose âShop Now.ââ
Acronym Mediaâs Gellena Lukats shares more examples: âIf the goal is purchasing a hotel room, we would use a âBook Nowâ CTA. If the consumer is taken to an informational page for more details, âLearn More.ââ
Picking the relevant CTA helps you send a clear message about what you want your potential customer to do. And as Lukats adds, âthe goal should really be to guide the consumer along the user journey, and give them the best user experience, utilizing CTAs that will resonate for each vertical, advertiser, campaign, audience, and ad unit.â You can measure the effectiveness of your CTAs using these social media dashboards.
Editorâs note: Learn how ads in your campaign are performing on an individual level using this Facebook Ads (Ad Drilldown) dashboard template. It shows you metrics like CTR by ad, leads by ad, ROAS by ad, impressions by ad, and a lot more on one screen.
With that, letâs look at the most popular Facebook CTA buttons:
âTime and time again, we see that the ââlearn moreâ CTA outperforms others â even when weâre asking someone to schedule a call or download a lead magnet,â shares Amanda Sexton of FocusWorks Marketing.
Sexton observes, âwe havenât determined whether itâs due to Facebook or just user preference, but it consistently gets more and better leads than any other CTA for both B2B and B2C.â
In fact, Hockertyâs Salva Jovells goes on to say, âIf you doubt between âshop nowâ and âlearn more,’ choose âlearn moreâ as people on Facebook are not ready to buy directly and they expect to elaborate their decision process before taking action.â
This makes sense as almost everyone wants to learn more about something before they share their email address with you or buy from you. This is true irrespective of where people are in their buyerâs journey.
Want to drive better results with the âlearn moreâ CTA button? James Pollard from The Advisor Coach LLC. has the answer for you: âuse emojis.â
âIn my experience, the âlearn moreâ CTA button provided by Facebook drives the most clicks,â Pollard admits. âHowever, when youâre running an ad, you should put your desired CTA (such as a link) in the text above the image/video and highlight it with emojis to draw attention. Some popular emojis include the hand/pointing emojis, as well as the arrows.â
That said, itâs worth keeping in mind the point we discussed earlier â choose your CTA button based on the action you want your target audience to take.
To this end, Pollard shares their experience. âThe only time âlearn moreâ isnât my highest-converting button is when Iâm sending people directly to a webinar signup page. In that case, âsign upâ wins. So, my advice to people trying to create a good CTA is to start with âlearn moreâ and split-test against that.â
This is another popular CTA not only in Pollardâs case but also something that the Incorporation Insight team has had success with.
Michael Knight, however, emphasizes the need to be specific with your ask.
âMake your request as specific as possible,â Knight comments. âConsider writing your CTAs like this: âSign up for (your product/service you offer) now to receive (benefit to the reader)!ââ suggests Knight.
Why? Because âcreating specific propositions will encourage your readers to sign up because they will understand the benefit of the deal.â In fact, people only take action when they know whatâs in it for them.
So make your CTA about them by being clear, concise, and specific.
Summing up, Knight advises, âcreate a call-to-action that clearly communicates the benefit of taking that action to the reader. Itâs not enough to simply state what your company does; try to pique readersâ interest by telling them exactly what you can do for them.â
Like the âlearn moreâ CTA, the âmessage usâ button helps readers get more information without forcing them to make an immediate decision.
It is somewhat more applicable for those toward the end or, at least, middle of their buyerâs journey. Even so, someone early in the journey might also not hesitate to message a business if the offer is relatable enough for them.
The best part? This CTA button helps businesses qualify leads better. Depending on which leads are high quality, the brand can follow up with them, aiming to build strong relationships to drive them to conversion.
Last on this list is the âdownloadâ Facebook CTA button.
Hereâs why it works: itâs fast, easy, and gets a prospect the lead magnet within a few clicks. Prospects donât need to stick around to share more information or read more information to get to their objective.
Think of it like this: only a few clicks and they get what they opted for. Smooth, isnât it?
Another reason why this CTA is so effective: prospects interact with your content at their convenience.
However, keep in mind what CocoFaxâs Olivia Tan shares, âusing the âdownloadâ button for a paid eBook will help you improve the cost per click (CPC) of your ad campaign, but there are only a few chances that the person will buy.â
Why? Because âthe user clicked on your ad considering the product was available free to download,â Tan explains.
So why not use the âbuyâ button here? Tan talks about it too. âUsing the direct âbuyâ button may not increase your cost of getting a lead, but there are better chances of converting that lead to a sale because the person was already into your product and was ready to buy it.â
The takeaway: One, the âdownloadâ and âbuyâ CTAs are different â mainly because users have different expectations from them.
Your audience expects a freebie or app download/installation when they hit âdownloadâ and theyâd only click âbuyâ if theyâre lower in the marketing funnel and are ready to buy from you.
And, two, the âdownloadâ CTA button is way more popular than the âbuyâ one.
Although you know now what the most popular Facebook CTA buttons are, we recommend you select the button that best meets your ad campaignâs goal.
For example, âif the goal of your campaign is to drive purchases from your eCommerce site, then using âShop Nowâ is a must. Furthermore, if the goal of your Facebook ad campaign is to drive app installations, we strongly recommend you use the CTA âInstall Now.ââ Larry Li from Verum Ecom elaborates.
Keep in mind, âthe goal of choosing your CTA button is encouraging viewers to ultimately complete the purpose of the ad campaign. Choosing an irrelevant CTA button may cause confusion and drive users away from performing the action.â Measure the performance of your chosen CTA using this social media dashboard software.
You can also start with one of the popular CTA buttons for your Facebook ad campaign (provided it is relevant) and split test to see which delivers the best result from there.
The impact of the CTA (call-to-action) button on Facebook ad’s CPM (cost per thousand impressions) can vary depending on several factors, such as the campaign objectives, ad creative, target audience, and bidding strategy. Choosing the best CTA will help reduce Facebook Ads CPM.
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