Using the Senses in Your Call to Action

How can we increase the likelihood that customers will click on our call to action?

NLP, or neuro linguistic programming has been around since the 70’s. Part of NLP is using the senses to communicate.

There is no scientific evidence to support NLP, and many people call it pseudoscience, but I find it a helpful basis to really think about the way I communicate with others.

I first went on an NLP course when I was about 22, and I was hooked. Before then it had never really occurred to me that different people have different ways of communicating and thinking. I assumed that everybody was like me!

In part of the course I learned that we all have different “favourite” senses.

 

Some people, like designers or photographers, may be more visual than the rest of us. My husband is a designer, and he very much cares about the subtle difference between Pantone colours. There’s no “red” or “black” to him. People who work with sound or music may be better at listening. A audio-tech friend of mine not only listened to music, but listened to the way it bounced off different walls and surfaces, whereas I am happy enough with my £1.99 headphones.

Some people, like my mother who is a scientist, are more analytical thinkers. She likes numbers, data and facts. If you take her to an art gallery, she couldn’t tell if you if the artwork is good or not, she struggles to answer a question if there is no “correct” answer.

Some people, like my son, are more tactile. He will always give me a tap on the leg when he wants something, rather than vocalising. He prefers to give vigorous nods and hand gestures than sentences. On the other hand, some people love to talk. Ask them a simple question and they will give you a full verbal essay in response.

 

Part of marketing is working out who your customer is. What senses have they honed? What is important to them? How do they prefer to communicate? How can you make communication with your business more appealing?

Does your website offer people something to analyse? Something visual?

It can be difficult to use the senses on your website, after all you can’t smell or touch the internet (yet). But you can use sensory language. Are you using phrases like “get in touch” for tactile people, “learn more” for analytical people, “tell me about x” for the talkers?

Have you ever considered using different terminology for different thinkers?

Are you offering multiple methods of communication? Or are you relying on everyone making a phone call, or using a contact form? On my website people can phone, email, fill in the contact form or message me on What’s App or Linkedin, each of them get responses equally.

Improving your calls to action can vastly improve the conversions on your website. If you’re getting no conversions but plenty of traffic, it’s time to up your CTA game and experiment with many different forms of language, visuals and communication.