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How To Optimize Mobile Pages To Drive Phone Leads

According to a study of 3,000 mobile searchers by Google & IPOS, nearly half indicated that they are more likely to convert elsewhere if they can’t call a business directly from the search result. That’s kind of a big deal.

No call button.

That same study shows that phone calls are a powerful measure of purchase intent and are most likely to happen when a prospect is ready to convert (see the full study here).

When is the ability to call most important

While the study is focused on mobile search, let’s do some critical thinking about the behavior & mentality behind why people respond this way.

Personally, I know when I’m on my phone, there are times when I’d much rather just talk to someone because it’s way faster to finish what I’m doing. For example, If I’m ordering a pizza, I don’t want to spend 5 minutes building a pizza & filling out a form, when I could just call and place my order with the person on the other side of the line.

While this isn’t the case for everyone, it was found that over half of the respondents said they always or frequently need instant access to the business they’re searching for.

More than half use mobile search

In another study that examines our multi-screen behavior, we see that even though a large percentage of behavior starts on a smart phone, the majority of traffic eventually moves over to the desktop.

start-on-a-smartphone-continue-on-a-computer-e1407345361426

This could be for a number of reasons, ranging from wanting to get more in-depth descriptions to it being easier to enter personal details with a mouse and keyboard.

But could it also be that 96% of users reported encountering websites that were not built with mobile in mind?

While making mobile convert is a rabbit hole on it’s own, one of the benefits of a smartphone is that you can, you know, call someone when you wanted to.

Pillar 1: Turn your mobile landing pages into call-drivers

If your business is already seeing success from phone leads, testing mobile landing pages that focus on getting your visitor to call in might be the perfect next step.

For example, this case study from String Automotive shows just how much impact focusing on Click To Call from a design standpoint has been able to increase conversions to inbound phone calls for their car dealership clientele.

With mobile, it’s crucial you recognize that a different canvas means different tactics. What works on the desktop might not be as effective on a handheld screen.

Take a look at this call-to-action filled homepage from Dish:

DISH

In just the above the fold area alone, there are 8 different calls to action.

If this page were directly translated to a smartphone it would be a mess, as you’d likely click a button while scrolling down the page.

Dish is smart though, because when they re-imagined this page for mobile, they tightened up the language & only focused on 2 calls to action. You can tap Call or Explore Packages—that’s it.

Dish Mobile

While studies show that on the desktop, longer, content-rich pages can dramatically increase conversions for products that cost more or need more explanation, with mobile ( and especially with visitors from mobile ads) it’s been observed that longer call times can correlate revenue increases.

In other words, the need to gather information is the same, but the method of which it is gathered is different, given that your visitor is on a mobile device.

Call Time

If call leads are important to your business, you’d be wise to rethink mobile analytics all-together, as understanding a person’s behavior when they have their phone in their hand is a hell of a lot more complex than when they’re tethered to a desk somewhere.

Give your visitors a (Good) reason to call

Here’s the thing that most developers I know take for granted: Mobile isn’t just a smaller version of the desktop, there are technologies that are unique to mobile that can really encourage the visitor to want to call.

For instance, when Dish worked with agency amobee, they created a 3D banner ad campaign that took advantage of the smartphone’s acceloromter & pinch to zoom to make for a memorable brand interaction and significant lifts in interactions.

dish_multiscreen

“On average, mobile users spent 90+ seconds in-ad, beating industry benchmarks by 3X. Mobile users clicked on in-ad hotspots over 16,000 times, with an overall engagement rate of 83%”

While it’s unclear if/how this translated into phone calls, it is clear that the campaign went beyond expectations & delivered an enjoyable experience for users that was unique to the mobile device.

Something else to consider is the user’s real world environment.

Are they watching television? Are they reading a magazine? Are they in an urban environment? Are they coming from relatively new advertising medium like and NFC Poster?

NFC-Poster-Adoption_11

Depending on the environment, a “good” reason to call will be highly contextual, so it’s important to tailor your value proposition to the environment.

In a hypothetical scenario, let’s say this poster for The Black Keys concert were NFC enabled, posted around the city, and prompted visitors to use their device to purchase concert tickets.

Black keys ad.
Mockup of original poster

After placing their phone on the poster, and landing on the site, visitors would have the option to order tickets by phone or via mobile checkout.

The Black Keys Order By Phone
Please Note – This is a Mockup

Having this option to order by phone would allow the mobile visitor to carry on with the transaction without having to stare into their screen or mess around with clunky mobile interfaces in a potentially busy environment.

Use a vanity number as a branding opportunity

A study by RingBoost found that vanity phone numbers were 33% likely to drive clicks in mobile ads than their generic counterparts.

Even though the context is through ads, it’s important to consider the underlying reasons behind this.

According to a 2011 study, vanity phone numbers had a 75.4% higher recall rate than standard 1-800 numbers, and for Home Health Associates, their 1-800-HomeCare lead to a 38% increase in call volume.

Find Home Care Agencies Providers By Calling 1 800 HOMECARE.com

Make the number instantly clickable

You would think this goes without saying, but it amazes me just how many mobile sites don’t even make their phone number clickable.

How-Is-This-Still-Possible

I’ll just assume that if the number on your mobile landing pages isn’t clickable, it’s because you don’t know the proper code to make it work.

If that’s the case, here you go:

<a href=”tel:+1-800-555-5555″>Call 1-800-555-5555</a>

You’re welcome.

Though simple it really can make a difference. Don’t require your users to copy and paste their number or even type it in on their phone.

Pillar 2: analyze on-page behavior

Once you’ve designed your mobile landing pages, you already know tracking their performance is essential to making improvements down the road.

But, as you may already know, tools that are really good at tracking behavior on the mobile are harder to come by.

Yes, tools like Inspectlet & SessionCam allow you to filter sessions by screen size, but these can be somewhat limited when it comes to mobile as they don’t also let you know which elements resulted in a call or track that call to the individual user. So while they’re extremely effective for the desktop & form behavior, they become somewhat limited once the CTA becomes calling in.

Implement a call tracking solution

Since you’re optimizing for phone calls, the first step is to employ a call tracking system to understand how your web pages are leading to conversions.

Most platforms work by provisioning phone numbers for every visit, which contradicts our recommendation for a toll-free number, above. If branding is a concern, and/or you’ve invested in a memorable phone number, you might consider a single-number tracking system.

With a single-number system, you’re able to retain your vanity number while also marrying the call data to the caller. There are many other benefits to call-tracking in general, for example, being able to view your calls as events in Google Analytics:

Screen Shot 2014-10-09 at 6.27.59 PM

Identify which elements drives calls

Another reason for using a tracking system that integrates tightly with web analytics is that you’ll be able to tell which buttons drives the most phone calls.

With traditional methods, this would require assigning a different phone number to each element, which disrupts branding and easily becomes a hassle, especially if you use multiple calls to action on a single page.

A new breed of heat maps, known as “call heat maps”, solve this by linking web clicks to the phone calls the clicks generated. Outleads’ platform shows a heat map report that aggregates all calls, as well as the element click associated with each individual call.

Screen Shot 2014-10-09 at 6.30.06 PM

These systems track any web element and easily scale to support an unlimited number of elements on any given page. The catch? It only works on mobile devices, though these comprise a sizable – and growing – share of phone call volume.

Analyze in-page behavior

By showing you how far visitors are scrolling down your pages, you can confirm that visitors are seeing your full pitch—or understand which content causes them to stop, convert, and/or abandon your site.

Combining call heat maps with scrollmaps and/or classic heat maps would be an ideal, all-in-one analytics solution.

Pillar 3: Optimize for call quality

Phone calls are expensive, and optimizing for high-quality, new lead calls—as opposed to generic service or general information calls—will help you mitigate costs and filter out junk phone leads.

One of the best ways to accomplish this is through a call tracking system that tracks call outcomes.

The ability to record phone sales, which is starting to surface in some platforms, is one way to distinguish quality calls from lesser ones. Outleads records phone and offline sales as eCommerce transactions in Google Analytics:

Screen Shot 2014-10-09 at 5.27.23 PM

If you’re tracking calls internally, and are able to accurately map phone calls to web visits, you might also consider using Google Ads’ offline conversions tool to selectively import only quality calls into your account.

Another method, involves a subjective determination of call quality. Using web tags, call operators can label a call as “quality” which can later be analyzed in conjunction with other data (such as heatmaps) at a later date.

Call tags.

This is typically performed while updating a call record in another dashboard, such as a call center management software (e.g., Zendesk or Five9) or a CRM (e.g., Salesforce).

Labels are sent to a web analytics system, as extensions of the visits that triggered the calls. In Google Analytics, you can then segment the visits with these labels, and analyze them as a group, whether on its own or in comparison to your site visitors as a whole. You can even create a remarketing list from these segments.

You can also set goals to be automatically completed when a label is applied to a visit as an event, which can be imported into Ads.

Consider this your final “Aha!” moment: you’ve optimized your pages, and can now evaluate exactly which changes are not only driving phone calls – but drive quality ones that increase your bottom line.

Conclusion

Once you’ve successfully optimized for phone calls on your landing pages, you can use many of the same techniques to drive more phone calls from additional mediums. Consider incorporating click-to-call in your e-mail marketing, Facebook posts, Tweets, videos and other properties.

Call tracking plugins like this one for Constant Contact are propping up everywhere, and it’s only a matter of time before they become standardized as a part of the “essential” marketing toolbox.

Big thanks to Dorin Rosenshine, the CEO of Outleads for suggesting the topic and providing the research for this article.

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Join the conversation Add your comment

  1. You give me a best idea for may mobile website. Thanks for such kind information. God bless u.

  2. Great write-up, Peep.

    Have you tested making the buttons look more clickable? (“affordance” in the jargon). This can be done by making them look more button-like (e.g. 3D effects) or with words like “click here to call us for free”.

    That brings me on to another factor – free calls. It’s got to be worth highlighting the free-ness of the call. This would definitely hold true in NZ where I have lived a lot – many people have smart phones but are scared to death of the cost of using the damn thing :-(

    On an unrelated point – the “When pigs fly” page. I would do something with the opening hours. The server knows what day and time it is – why not show the hours plus the words “open now”?

    h/t to Craig Sullivan for linking to your site in the first place.

  3. Sorry it’s Tommy (not Peep). I would also be testing different words for the CTAs. “View Inventory” sounds like the dealer standing in his cabin and looking out at the punters. Maybe try “see our cars” or “47 cars in stock today”…

    You need to test it because YMMV

  4. That’s an excellent article!

    I think that many designers miss out the point of making responsive websites…

    Adding a ‘click to call’ button – which would replace the traditional number displaying – or appear below is something very easy to design.

    Thanks again, this gave me quite a few ideas!

  5. Great work!!
    How does go along way in helping developing African Nations such as Nigeria,Cameroon….with the absent of self service delivery once a phone call is established?
    Thanks

  6. Brilliant Article, I bookmarked it!! Mobile is now not a future, it has become the inseparable part of the marketing, if you don’t have mobile presence, you are surely to miss out on potential customers.

    Mobile optimization is a bit tricky. Putting everything on 5 inch screen would look messy and readers won’t be able to figure out anything. You must learn the art of conveying your message in one line or two with very short description (and it has to be eye catchy and attractive). It has to engage customers. Make sure fonts are legible.

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How To Optimize Mobile Pages To Drive Phone Leads

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