Click-through rate (CTR) is an important metric that search engines take into consideration when assigning rankings to web pages. It’s categorized as a user intent KPI, alongside bounce rate and time spent on a page, showing algorithms whether users are interested in your post.
Unfortunately, getting higher CTR usually depends on your SEO rankings, creating a “the chicken or the egg” situation. It’s only natural that web pages that are on top of Google’s page one will get the majority of these clicks. So, it’s hard to boost CTRs without high rankings, and you can’t reach top spots without above-average CTR.
While CTR is a direct ranking signal and can significantly boost your rankings and search volume, it’s also affected by other optimization practices. In this article, we’ll share a few tricks on how to increase the organic click-through rate and what makes this metric so important.
How is CTR calculated?
Understanding how the click-through rate is calculated isn’t that hard. Basically, Google’s algorithm compares the overall number of clicks on a link against the total number of impressions. Here’s how the formula would look like in practice:
Organic CTR = Impressions/total clicks
So, if 1,000 people saw your link in the search results and only 20 of them clicked, that means you have a CTR of 2% (1,000/20). It’s worth noting that organic CTR can vary significantly based on keyword and website authority, as well as the industry you’re in. In fact, getting 1% or 2% click-through rates for a new website might be considered a major victory.
It’s worth noting that the first three results in Google get more than 50% of all clicks. That said, even if you can write great titles, that doesn’t necessarily mean your CTR will instantly shoot through the roof. In the end, if users don’t see the link, they simply won’t click on it, which is why it’s crucial to implement other best SEO practices for maximum efficiency.
What are the benefits of high CTR?
Aside from being a ranking factor, a high click-through rate provides other benefits:
- Getting above-average CTR tells you that the content matches search intent. In other words, if you’re beating the average rates all the time, it shows that your content strategy is on point. As such, you can use CTR as a vital performance metric
- Naturally, the higher the click-through rate, the more organic traffic you’re getting from the Google search engine
- Getting lots of clicks will also affect your sales and brand awareness. Just seeing your brand name in the search result pages all the time will establish you as one of the biggest players in the industry.
You should never calculate CTR in a vacuum. It’s a part of a larger SEO effort, and most experts measure it alongside other user engagement metrics. All these KPIs are a good indication of how users perceive your content and whether they feel comfortable interacting with your pages.
Keep in mind there are also cases where people purposely won’t click on your links as they perceive you as a bad source of information. So, gaining more traffic and clicks can also be affected by your branding and PR policies.
Different types of CTR
Given that the MiroMind team mainly focuses on search engine optimization, we primarily analyze CTR from the SEO perspective. However, this metric is also used for other marketing campaigns:
- PPC ad campaigns
- Social media conversions
- Email conversion rate
PPC campaigns
Running Google ads is much simpler than practicing SEO. In the end, a PPC campaign is much less fractioned and doesn’t need as much multitasking.
Similar to organic search, paid search places ads in different positions. The ones on the top will always get the most clicks and better benefits. That being said, your paid ad rank will have a major impact on the click-through rate. Aside from that, you also need to write smart ad copy to entice users to your site.
Once you create a Google Ads account and start running paid search ads, you can check CTRs within the tool’s dash.
SMM campaigns
Whether you’re running paid ads on Facebook or Instagram or focusing on organic traffic, you should measure your social media click-through rates.
All these channels are considered external sources meant to boost your website conversions. While getting lots of shares and likes is great for building brand awareness, your main goal is to reel as many users to your site as possible, where you can sell them your products and services.
Getting low CTR on these platforms is usually an indication of bad targeting or poor messaging.
Email campaigns
Lastly, we also use clicks to measure the impact of our email campaigns. Like previous methods, you’re calculating how many people clicked on the link within your emails against the number of people who read it.
How to boost click-through rates?
For the most part, achieving high CTR hinges on your ability to create good titles.
When people browse organic search results, they have little to start with. They can only see your meta description and title tag while having no other indication of whether a post is good or bad. So, based on these elements, they decide whether to click on the link and give a web page a chance.
To maximize your SEO efforts, you’ll have to master the content writing craft. Both meta descriptions and title tags have character limits, which is why you must make a major impact with a few words. You might also consider using provocative and controversial titles to avert people’s attention.
However, despite everything, your placement still has the biggest impact on click-through rates. Even if you use all these nifty tricks to slightly boost total clicks, you’ll be limited by the placement of your page in the search results.
If you wish to improve your average click-through rate, you also need to rank at the top of Google search pages. Here are a few things you need to consider:
1. Paid ads
Google paid ads can ensure you get more traffic from search engines. While this isn’t an SEO tactic, you can combine it with your organic ranking pages. By occupying one of the top spots for organic search results and then investing in paid ads, you can monopolize certain queries.
That way, even if your ad doesn’t get enough clicks, you can still rely on the result within organic rankings to do the heavy lifting.
However, that doesn’t mean you should overspend on pad advertising. They are only good for a specific keyword that has a strategic value for your company. You should always remember that your main focus should be on increasing sales and conversions, so there’s no point in wasting money on ads that don’t provide monetary benefits.
2. SERP features
Ranking a SERP feature is another cool way of boosting your overall click-through rate for a specific keyword. Similar to ads, they give you the chance to double-rank (feature + organic result)
Basically, these features appear at the top of organic search, highlighting specific information. For example, when users ask a question, SERP features can give them a direct answer to that question without forcing them to browse through content.
Unfortunately, queries with features have a few drawbacks. Most notably, if users can get an answer straight away within the search engine result page, they don’t have any incentive to browse further, which would reduce CTRs of all organic results and paid ads.
Besides that, if you can’t rank for the SERP feature, this means that someone else can “steal” a part of your organic traffic. In other words, even if you manage to get the first position, the sheer presence of the feature can diminish your returns.
3. Branded keywords
Another fantastic method of increasing your CTR across the board is by focusing on branded phrases. You can easily rank for these queries with your website, as you’ll get an inherent advantage over other non-branded pages. Furthermore, you can easily match search intent for these keywords, ensuring that your result is always the best choice for users.
It doesn’t take much to rank a branded keyword, as Google always gives an advantage to these companies. So, you can gain a lot of value with minimal effort. Relevant results gain much more traffic and better CTRs than non-branded keywords, so pursuing these queries will also make sense in terms of sales.
Conclusion
All in all, the click-through rate is a major ranking factor for Google and other search engines. It shows their algorithms whether a particular web page is relevant to a query and if people are willing to read the post based on its title. By simply boosting this ranking metric, you can propel your post higher within search engine ranking pages.
If you have any additional questions about CTR or want to learn a few tricks for boosting this metric, contact the MiroMind team today!