Digital marketing gives us a lot of data! Which is a great thing, but it can also lead to confusion. Impressions, clicks, click-through rate… with all these numbers, how do you know what to pay attention to? Here’s a simple explanation of how to decipher the numbers you’ve got!
First up, impressions. These definitely matter! But not all impressions are created equally. For example, getting 1,000,000 impressions per month in a mass traditional advertising campaign may be great for a brand that appeals to just about everyone (ie. Coca-Cola), but using digital marketing to achieve 100,000 highly-targeted monthly impressions from those most likely interested in your products and services is going to be much more effective for most brands. (And come at a lot lower price tag.)
Next up, clicks. Clicks are really important in digital marketing, and we want to see them generally go up over time. After all, a click means someone saw your ad and was interested enough to want to learn more. This is great news, as immediately upon the click, you’ve gotten someone to your website or landing page where they can learn more about your brand!
The ratio of clicks to impressions is what gives you click-through rate (CTR). This is a highly-meaningful metric and possibly the most important to track! If your impressions drop slightly month over month, but your clicks are going up, your CTR will improve. An improvement in CTR means your ads are being shown to people who care. This is a metric to watch over time.
At the end of the day, all three metrics – impressions, clicks, and CTR – are important pieces of the puzzle, and they all work together to give you insight into your campaign performance. At Hookd, we use these metrics and more to optimize campaigns on a weekly basis… always striving for better and better results for our clients!
If you’re not seeing the results you were hoping for, drop Sarah a note. She’s a great resource to listen to your concerns and offer potential solutions. [email protected]
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