Most SEO agencies over complicate SEO and drown customers in reports, data and jargon.
A fundamental concept we try and get our SEO Audit customers to understand is that SEO is simple, but not obvious.
In this post we’ll share one of the most simple ways too boost phone calls or phone leads from your website. Click play on the video below to see a detailed walk through and more of the background on this concept.
Video transcript: How To Increase Phone Calls From Your Website With This Simple SEO Tactic
0:00Add Your Phone Number to Title Tags and Meta Descriptions
Hey, it's Brendan from WP Speed Fix. In this video I want to share a simple tactic that is really good for local SEO, for increasing the number of calls you get, and also for increasing the click-through rate on a site. It's a really easy optimization, I'll show you what it is in a second. It takes maybe five minutes to do and almost nobody talks about it.
We learned this from Google Ads. In Google Ads, adding the phone number to the ads or having click to call ads increases the number of calls a business gets. You can do the same with SEO. Here I've searched for a customer we've had for 10 years. We did this 10 years ago for them, and they ranked number one partly because of this. I've just searched "physio Armadale", it's a physiotherapy business, and you'll see here that we've added the phone number to the title tag and the meta description.
0:48How To Add It and When It Shows
This is a really easy optimization, and I've got some notes here so let's talk them through. Basically just add it in. As a test you can add it to the homepage, because the homepage is going to get the most impressions, and you can do that really quickly and easily. It takes just a few minutes. Add it into both the title tag and the meta description.
It won't always show. It depends on the device and it depends on the search term. Here I've searched "Armadale physio", and I'm emulating a mobile device. If I search the brand, I even typed that wrong, you can see that for brand queries it doesn't show in the title tag, but it does show in the meta description. So just keep that in mind: it won't always show, but it seems to show for more queries.
1:35Why It Lifts Click-Through Rate and Calls
Like I said, it increases click-through rate, even without an increase in calls. I've searched for a physio in Armadale, and you'll see here that nobody else is doing it. There's a guy here who is, but that's a totally different location and a different state. Nobody else in the search results is doing this, and that is probably why it increases the click-through rate. It's kind of a trust factor, and it just stands out as well, because it looks different to everybody else. We use this for tons of clients and it works really well.
You get calls directly from the search results in some cases, on some devices. On mobile, the phone number in the meta description will actually be click to call as well. Keep in mind that if you're using CallRail or some type of call tracking, those calls won't be tracked unless that number is tracked as well. I wouldn't say it messes up the conversion stats, but you'll get conversions that may not necessarily be tracked because they come directly from the search results. One way to get around that is to make that a tracking number. If you're using something like CallRail, port the main number to CallRail as well, but obviously there's an increase in cost there too.
2:44Using SEO Plugin Templates and Ecommerce Sites
What else do we do? We add it into the title tag and meta description template in your SEO plugin. It's important you populate those templates. In almost all SEO plugins there's a template you can set for the title tag and meta description across the site, and they'll be used if you haven't customized it specifically on that page. So that's a really easy way to do it as well.
If you're an ecommerce site, this also works really well if you have a phone number. We have customers with 1800 or 800 free phone numbers, and it's a really good way of increasing click-through rate there as well, because again it's kind of a brand signal and a trust signal. Especially if you've got a free phone number, it just makes the business look more trustworthy.
3:30Local SEO Impact and When Not To Do It
It seems to have some sort of impact on local SEO as well. I don't know if it's the click-through rate feedback loop, or the mechanism there that pushes rank, or if it's something to do with citations and having the phone number appear in the search results next to the brand. Maybe it's like a NAP citation, but it seems to also help local SEO. You'll see in this case that they rank number one in Maps and number one in regular organic as a result. We did a little bit of SEO for this client 10 years ago and it's just stuck like that, so it's a really simple win. Like I said, do it on the homepage first, it takes about 5 minutes.
You also want to keep in mind that if you have an affiliate site, or a site that generates revenue from traffic, you don't want to do it there, because it's probably going to decrease the traffic or mess with the traffic a little bit if people are calling from the search results. So just be mindful of that if affiliate is one of your monetization methods.
4:15Testing It and Keeping Your NAP Consistent
That's pretty much it. We learned this tactic from Google Ads, where click to call ads work really well, so give it a try. If you're not sure, test it for a month and see how it goes. If local SEO is important, make sure that the phone number you use on the site is in the Google Maps setup, because you don't want to mess up your NAP consistency by using a different number. Like I said, if you want to track it, then it would be worth porting the number across if you have CallRail or something like that. It's a super simple optimization, and if you have any questions, post in the comments below.
4:39SERP Preview Tool and Free SEO Tools
If you want more help with your SEO, here's another tool we use as well. This one is a good tool for messing around with this, a story based CTR tool. Basically you stick in the URL, hit Fetch, and you can preview what's going on there. If you want to test what it looks like with a phone number you can do that, or if you want to change this to "call" instead of "phone", that's something else you can test as well.
If you have any questions, post in the comments. If you need help with your SEO, we have a few tools on our website. We've got a free SEO audit tool, a free site speed test tool and a free Core Web Vitals report. Those are three tools that take about 60 seconds to run, maybe 90 seconds, no opt-in required, so you can just use them without any opt-in. If you're looking for website help, on our homepage you can request a free audit. If you're looking for someone to come in and help you with site speed or SEO, submit a request through there and one of the staff will look at it and come back to you within a day or so. Hope you enjoy that video, leave you to it.
If phone calls are important to you, add the phone number to your title tag and meta description
Add your phone number to your title tag and meta description and you’ll typically see an increase in CTR (click through rate) and call volume.
A bonus here is that the phone number in the meta description will become a click to call number and often you’ll generate calls/leads directly from the search results.
This optimization is very closely related to meta description CTR optimization – we talk about this in more detail in our post on How To Write A Meta Description.
Why This Simple Tactic Works
Most businesses hide their contact info behind a “Contact Us” page. By bringing your phone number front and center in Google search results, you gain three immediate advantages:
Local SEO Boost: Having your NAP (Name, Address, Phone Number) data appear right in the search results can help reinforce your local relevance, potentially boosting your rankings in both the “Map Pack” and organic results.
Increased Click-Through Rate (CTR): Even if users don’t call immediately, having a phone number acts as a massive “Trust Signal.” It makes your business look established and accessible compared to competitors who only show text. If you’re operating in a market with bigger players, adding a 800 free call style number can make your brand or business feel bigger and more serious in the search results.
Direct Calls from Search: On mobile devices, a phone number in the Meta Description often becomes a “click-to-call” link. This allows potential customers to reach you without even visiting your website.
Some Caveats & Things To Be Mindful Of
This will generate leads from the search results so if you’re using call tracking be mindful of this. The solution is usually to ensure the number you use is tracked in your phone tracking tool.
Also be aware that if your website relies on visits, for example an affiliate site, then this may be something you want to avoid as it may reduce affiliate clicks.