Click-through rate (CTR) is the percentage of users who clicked through to an offer, after seeing it via an advertisement or campaign.
Examples of where click-through rate is measured include Facebook advertising, email marketing, SEO, video advertising, landing pages, PPC advertising and more.
Your click-through rate can be calculated by dividing the number of clicks by impressions and multiplying that by 100.
CTR = (Total Clicks / Total Impressions) x 100
For example, if your campaigns received 10,000 impressions and 1,000 clicks, your click-through rate will be 10%.
Click-through rate is an important metric for marketers for several reasons.
First of all, CTR can tell you how your campaigns are doing. If your campaigns are getting a high CTR, it means they are being well received.
On the contrary, if you notice you’re getting a low CTR it could mean your campaign or offer is less relevant to your target audience.
Secondly, click-through rate directly affects your ad quality score. Quality score refers to how relevant your ads are to searchers.
A high click-through rate sends a signal to search engines that your ads are relevant. This could help you maintain your positions and also reduce your ad costs.
So what is a good CTR for campaigns? Like most metrics in marketing, the answer is that “it depends”.
A good CTR will vary from campaign to campaign and will depend on several factors like your industry, and the keywords you’re targeting.
A good way to measure how well you’re doing would be to compare your CTR against your industry bench.
Courtesy of HubSpot, you will find below the industry benchmarks for 16 industries. You can check to see how well you compare.
As marketers, we constantly strive to improve every aspect of our marketing campaigns. CTR is no different.
CTR is critical to getting the most of your marketing campaigns as a high CTR means less spend and more results.
Here are a few ways to improve your CTR:
If people are not clicking through on your campaigns, it could mean the copy isn’t convincing them enough. This should be the first thing to look at.
Your call to action is responsible for getting people to act. If your CTA is not provoking enough, they won’t act.
A tip to writing better CTAs is to avoid generic ones like “download now”, “buy now”, “click here” etc. Instead, your CTAs should focus on the specific benefits they’ll get from your offer.
Read our article on CTA to learn more.
The last thing to look at is your audience. Are you targeting the right audience? Because if you’re not then that means they will not click-through your campaigns.
Take a look at the keywords you’re targeting and check the results search engines are serving for these keywords. If your campaigns are not serving this intent, it’s time to look for new keywords.
Click-through rate not quite as impressive as you were hoping for? We can take a look at that - if you get in touch with us today, we’ll set you up with a free strategy session. From there you can organise a plan of action to move forwards.
In the meantime, why not check out our training courses where you’ll find the latest in marketing tips and techniques to help you get ahead of your competition.