Instead of fretting over achieving higher rankings in search engines or increasing website traffic, another logic suggests that your energy is better invested by encouraging conversion & reader response with a clear call to action.

The first step is in the realization that, it’s not about how many hits your website receives or how many visitors pass through the digital turnstiles, it’s about measuring reader response and conversion into sales, lead generation or building a following for your blog.

Doing less with more seems to be the focus, call it efficiency, strategic planning or whatever you like. Knowing how people respond to your message, your web pages and your blogs is essential for you to move beyond the realm of assumption into a solid premise, full of potential, reward and consistency. If you are struggling to ascertain the collective opinion of the web at large, taking a brief glimpse at your analytics and tracking software can help you get a clue and “flow with the go” for your web pages garnering rock star status.

How do YOU create new content?

If you host a blog or are creating new content for your website, do you (a) assume that you know what is best for your reader (b) research hot topics that are active in your industry (c) simply, don’t care and write what you want or (d) a mixture of sorts?

It’s better to build on a strong foundation of what works and what you know works vs. taking your visitor on a wild goose chase or excursion to the outermost regions of your psyche struggling to maintain coherence? People enjoy great writing, so long as it creates a problem / solution suggestion, fulfills the need and then supports it’s claim with examples. Writing in this fashion only represents one of many tactics one could employ to increase readership or sales, but it is a fundamentally proven practice.

If you are clueless about the pages with the highest traffic and reader retention in your site, it may be time to parse your server logs or take the time to set up analytics software to glean the needs of your audience and get the gist of what they enjoy about your content. There is a fine line that separates those who continually dial in the pulse of an industry and can summarize and provide value and pique the curiosity of their readers vs. someone who for lack of better terms fails to hit their target.

Content that fails to impress is often met with criticism or “the back button” with high bounce rates back to search engines for another attempt at hitting the mark.

The idea is to engage the reader and encourage them to take action. Each person who takes the time to read your content should take action in some way, shape or form. It is your goal to make sure that the reader trusts you with their time feels valued, respected and engaged on a personal level. If you make the grade, social bookmarking can result to increase your back links to your site based on merit or you just may score another lead to pass off to your sales team.

Do you feel the squeeze or are you above the influence?

We all know when we are being sold, my favorite thing to do is sometimes read squeeze pages, you know that at the bottom of the page there is going to be a link asking for the close, but at least it is so straight forward in the approach that as we read through it, we know the lurking underpinnings that lie ahead. I usually read the entire page (despite the consistent need to scroll) just to see if we can avoid the call to action and leave the page unscathed without purchasing. It seems about 9 times out of 10 I get away, but there are those times when the mind’s defenses are down, the page clearly identified a problem and solution based dilemma and naturally had the cure for the circumstantial crisis (for a fee of course).

Despite the formula known as A.I.D.A (attention, Interest, desire, action) putting it into practice in the root of your content can mean the difference between a thriving online presence and failing to reach critical mass to engage your audience. Without digressing into the consequence of boring people with your message, think of every sentence as an opportunity to pull them along a little further into the originating thought that spawned the need to write it in the first place. In this instance, this message is about:

1) Writing with purpose.
2) Finding the right voice and tone for your communication.
3) Appreciating the call to action.

So, instead of thinking about more traffic to offset the conversion (sales, leads) or lack of conversion occurring on your pages. This is like the old adage of quality over quantity, make each page sticky, clearly identify your points and support them, pique the curiosity of the visitor, and above all don’t be afraid to ask for something conclusive. The call to action is inevitably why you wrote the page to begin with, so keep the objective focused, concise and on topic and the reader will reciprocate.

Related posts:

1. How to Use “Action Words” to Increase Traffic & Reader Response.
2. How to Get SEO, Call to Action and Conversion on the Same Page!
3. Action Words and Conversion
4. Increase SEO Conversion With Action Words
5. Context is Currency: Keywords and Sales Conversion