Click Through Rate

         Click through rate  or CTR, as you may have heard it. On the surface CTR is just like playing Temple run. It is easy to understand on a surface level. Yet things get a lot more complicated if you want to get advanced with it. Also, crocodiles are involved.

The basics of CTR are simple. You take the number of clicks during a specific time period, divide it by the number of impressions received over that same time period. You have your CTR. One hundred clicks coming from 1,000 impressions? You have yourself a cool 10.00% CTR. Your job is done. Pack it up, time to go home right?

Well, yes and no.

           Technically yes, that 10.00% conversion rate is impressive if you look at just the overall number alone but is that really what is going on? A closer look at your account may show that 60% of the clicks you received are from brand-name terms which should always have a high click through rate. Let’s say that those 60 clicks have a click through rate of 30%. That would mean that the non-brand terms in your account would have a click through rate of just 5.00%. Now a 5.00% CTR in most verticals is really strong, but it’s nowhere near the 10.00% you thought you had going for you in this completely made up scenario that I have presented. It is just a cautionary tale about calculating CTR and how you can’t just take the overall account number at face value. Here is a visual of what that scenario would look like:

                The brand numbers for CTR are strong but those are expected to be strong. Seeing that all non brand terms have half the CTR as the overall account means that some work can be done to bring that number higher.

              However the same can be said of the opposite. If you have an abysmally low CTR (something below 0.10%), there is a good chance that you are opted into Google’s Display Network. The Display Network is a good source of cheap traffic but it is very low conversion AND very low CTR. Just as a refresher any of your campaigns that are opted into Google’s Display Network will serve ads on the sidebar or the bottom of related articles across the web. In other words your ads will show up thousands of times a month in front of people who are not searching for your company or services so the Display Network traffic always has extremely low click through rates. CTR for Display Network traffic is usually around 0.01% to 0.03%It’s important to separate Display Network traffic from regular search traffic. More times than not, you’ll see that a 0.02% overall CTR actually has a CTR of 3.00% to 4.00% for search engine traffic. In paid search you never miss out on a chance to show what an awesome job you are actually doing.

              CTR measures the effectiveness of an advertisement It is calculated using the following formula that involves the number of clicks and impressions:

CTR = (Clicks/Impressions) x 100

A high CTR means that it attracts attention and get clicks often. A low CTR means the ad is under-performing and should be evaluated further. Other similar terms include: response rate, click-thru ratio.

Example

A 1.0% CTR means that for every 100 impressions there is 1 click.

Monitoring CTR

You should measure each ad's CTR regularly and make appropriate changes to improve its CTR. An ad with a low CTR should be modified, or even removed from the rotation. An evaluation should be performed when an advertisement gets at least 1,000 impressions. If this impression threshold is met and it still has a low CTR, less than 0.1%, it should be checked for the use of headings, hot spots, an appropriate call to action and other effectiveness factors.

Gross CTR

Gross CTR = (Gross Clicks / Gross Impressions) x 100

Unique CTR

Unique CTR = (Unique Clicks / Unique Impressions) x 100

Author Info:
The primary objective of Sunlight IT is to deliver natural and affordable SEO services. Sunlight It provides natural SEO services which insensibly provide naturally driven traffic. SEO services comprise of thorough keyword research and analysis. It forms a major part in the entire search engine optimization process.