Healthcare marketing CTAs, or calls to action, are essential to any digital marketing campaign. They help users understand what steps to take next, ultimately leading to more engaging and effective healthcare marketing plans. 

Even the most well-crafted healthcare marketing content may fail to achieve the desired response if they don’t include CTAs. In fact, according to recent statistics, websites with compelling CTAs have 121% higher click-through rates than those that don’t include prompts to help users along. 

If you’ve always wondered how to make CTAs work for you, you’ve come to the right place. Read on to learn tips and best practices for using CTAs successfully in your healthcare content strategy.

Understanding CTAs

Having a proper understanding of what a CTA is can help you use it effectively.

What is a call to action?

A healthcare marketing call to action is a prompt or instruction that entices your audience to take a particular action, such as filling out a form, clicking a button, or making an appointment.  

When your audience is in the consideration stage of their customer journey, healthcare marketing CTAs may prompt them to download an ebook or take a health assessment. When they are in the decision stage, healthcare marketing CTAs may encourage them to schedule an appointment or request a consultation. 

5 types of healthcare marketing CTAs

There are five main types of healthcare marketing CTAs that healthcare marketers should know about and understand:

  • Information CTAs
  • Transactional CTAs
  • Lead generation CTAs
  • Navigational CTAs
  • Engagement CTAs
1

Informational CTAs

Informational CTAs educate and inform your readers by directing them to other forms of content, such as doctor bios, blog posts, service information, or educational resources about conditions or injuries. Examples of informational CTAs include:

  • Learn about treatments
  • Read what patients have to say
  • Meet our doctors 
  • Explore wellness resources
  • Understand your patient rights
  • Get directions to urgent care
2

Transactional CTAs

Transactional CTAs invite your visitors to take action related to their healthcare needs, which may lead to a purchase or interaction with a healthcare provider or service. Examples of transactional CTAs include:

  • Request an appointment
  • Pay your bill online
  • Request a prescription refill
  • Ask your provider a question
3

Lead generation CTAs

Lead generation CTAs are designed to gather information from website visitors to build a database of patients or clients who have expressed interest in a healthcare service or product. The Indiana Hand to Shoulder Center does an excellent job of using lead-generation CTAs in this blog. Other examples of lead generation CTAs include:

  • Subscribe to get weekly wellness tips
  • Register for the free healthy living webinar
  • Take the at-home shoulder pain assessment
4

Navigational CTAs

Navigational CTAs make it possible for visitors to find what they are looking for on your website quickly and easily. Examples of navigational CTAs include:

  • Find a doctor
  • Access the patient portal
  • Check insurance coverage
  • View all locations
5

Engagement CTAs

Engagement CTAs invite users to build their relationship with your healthcare organization or get educated about a healthcare topic without necessarily leading to an immediate transaction or lead capture. Examples of engagement CTAs include:

  • Connect with us on social media
  • Join our online community for breastfeeding mothers

CTAs in healthcare web design

Well-designed healthcare marketing CTAs improve user engagement, encourage exploration of the website, and ultimately lead to higher conversion rates. 

However, it’s essential to balance visual appearance with functionality. While visually appealing websites and healthcare marketing CTAs can attract attention, they must also be clear, concise, and easy to understand.

Best practices for creating CTAs for healthcare websites

The following best practices for healthcare website CTAs can ensure you strike the right balance between driving conversions and overall user experience. 

  • Design: Colors evoke emotions and influence behavior, so choose colors that attract attention but also align with the website’s color scheme. Larger and more prominent CTAs are more likely to be clicked on in a digital setting. If using a button format, consider typography and color contrast, too.
  • Placement: Insert healthcare marketing CTAs prominently. Use plenty of white space around CTAs in printed and digital marketing communications and place them where they will stand out. For example, if included on a web page, design so that your primary CTA is “above the fold” (or visible to users before they scroll down the page)). 
  • Wording: Choose short, precise words that encourage action and a sense of urgency. 

It’s also vital to analyze, measure, and test the effectiveness of your healthcare marketing CTA. Some metrics to track include:

  • Click-through rate (CTR) is the measurement of the number of times a user clicks on a CTA compared to the total number of people who view the page.
  • Conversion rate (CR) is the measurement of the percentage of people who complete a desired action after clicking on the CTA.
  • Bounce rate (of a website landing page) is the measurement of the percentage of people who navigate away from the page after viewing only that page, without interacting further with the website.

Some of the techniques you can use to analyze your healthcare marketing CTAs for effectiveness include: 

  • A/B testing: This method involves testing two versions of different CTAs (with all other elements and factors kept the same) to determine which one performs better.
  • User experience testing: With user experience testing, you gather input from users to evaluate how they interact with your m marketing asset.
  • Heatmaps: If you are specifically analyzing a webpage, you can use heatmaps to visualize where users click, move cursors, and spend the most time.

Measuring and testing are only half the battle. The most important part is using that information to continuously improve your healthcare marketing CTA based on what you learn.

Using CTAs in healthcare email marketing

CTAs are powerful in healthcare email marketing, as they drive recipients to take specific actions. As with CTAs created for webpages, the same best practices apply when they’re included in email marketing.

Additionally, in email marketing, it’s important to write strong subject lines and develop persuasive preview text. These elements act as CTAs in your subscribers’ inboxes, helping to demonstrate relevance and build intrigue and curiosity to increase opens.

Healthcare social media marketing CTAs

Your healthcare organization’s social media channels are an excellent space to build brand awareness and community. They also provide an organic way to broadcast news, health tips, and other relevant information to your patient leads and existing patients in a place where they are already spending time.

When sharing content with followers on social media, get the biggest bang for your buck by including CTA language as part of each post’s content. 

Healthcare marketing CTAs can be used in social media marketing strategies as well, driving your social followers to take desired actions, like visiting your website or signing up for a webinar.

Pro-tip: Avoid using medical jargon that your patients won’t understand in CTAs. Instead, focus on making your message clear, honest, and simple.

Remember to track and analyze your results so that you can update messaging and ensure you achieve the greatest possible results from your healthcare social media CTAs.

Powerful healthcare marketing CTAs make a difference

When you understand the five types of healthcare marketing CTAs and have the strategies to apply them correctly to your website, emails, and social media, you can get great returns from your healthcare marketing efforts.

Partner with TBH Creative for strategic healthcare marketing

If you’re not sure how to use healthcare marketing CTAs to achieve your objectives, the experienced team at TBH Creative can help. We can help you identify the type of healthcare marketing CTA that would work the best, give you tips on optimizing your existing CTAs, and make your outreach efforts a huge success.  

Ready to get started? Contact the experts at TBH Creative today, and let’s schedule a time to talk.