Click Through Rate (CTR)

Click through rate refers to the ratio of people who see your ad or link and click on the call-to-action. It doesn’t matter whether it’s an advertisement on Facebook, Google, YouTube, your own website or email newsletter, etc. the same term applies.

You’ll also notice the term click through rate used in the field of email marketing. Similarly, this just refers to the proportion of people who view your email and click on any of the links included within your email copy.

How Do Click Through Rates Work?

To put it simply, to calculate the click through rate, you divide the number of link clicks you receive by the number of times your ad has been seen. So, if you achieved ten clicks and 100 impressions, your CTR would equal: 10%—make sense?

Understanding this metric is essential for digital marketers because the click through rate gives a better idea of how well ads or email marketing campaigns are performing. The higher your click through rate percentage the better, because it suggests that you’re resonating with your audience and capturing their attention.

However, it’s worth keeping in mind that the click through rate doesn’t take into account those who failed to click on your link, but then went over to your site at a later time because your ad intrigued them. So, remember: Click through rate is just an indication of the number of people who responded to your ad immediately, not the total number of people who acted as a result of seeing your advertisement.

It’s also worth highlighting that just getting people to click through to your site doesn’t necessarily equate to making sales—that’s what your conversion rate refers to. It’s important to remember that a high click through rate also doesn’t always guarantee an impressive conversion rate, although sometimes it can indicate that.