KPIMarketing

Click-Through Rate (CTR)

Percentage of ad or email impressions that result in a click

What is Click-Through Rate (CTR)?

Click-through rate is the percentage of people who saw an ad, link or email and clicked on it. It is one of the most common measures of how engaging a piece of advertising or a message is.

In paid advertising it is a quick read on how relevant the creative and targeting are, and on many platforms it also influences cost, because better-performing ads can earn cheaper placement.

How this KPI is measured

Function: Marketing
Sub-function: Paid Media
Industry: All Industries
Type: Lagging
Impact: Efficiency
Unit: %
Measurement frequency: Daily / Weekly
Formula: (Clicks / Impressions) × 100

How to calculate it

Divide the number of clicks by the number of impressions, and multiply by 100.

For example, if an ad was shown 50,000 times and received 750 clicks, the click-through rate is (750 / 50,000) x 100 = 1.5%.

Compare like with like. Rates differ widely between search, display, social and email, and between branded and non-branded terms, so judge each against its own history and channel.

Where it is used

Testing ad creative
Compare headlines, images and calls to action to see which earns more clicks.
Assessing relevance
A low rate can show that the message does not match the audience or the search intent.
Managing costs
Improve click-through to lower the effective cost of traffic on platforms that reward relevance.

How to improve it

Match the ad to the audienceTighten targeting and keywords so the people who see the ad are the ones likely to want it.
Write clearer, more specific copyState the benefit and the action plainly, and test variations.
Test creative in a controlled wayRun two versions at a time and keep the winner.
Improve ad placement and formatTry formats and positions that suit the platform and the audience.
Check what happens after the clickMake sure the landing page delivers on the promise, so extra clicks lead to results.

Tips and common mistakes

A high click-through rate with poor conversion usually means the ad promised something the page did not deliver.
Beware of clickbait that lifts clicks but attracts the wrong people.
Judge changes over enough impressions for the difference to be real, not random.

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