Glossary

CTR (click-through rate)

CTR (click-through rate) is the percentage of ad impressions that turn into clicks: clicks divided by impressions, times 100. A banner shown 10,000 times and clicked 150 times has a 1.5% CTR. It measures how well a creative and placement capture attention.

How to use it

CTR is the first metric in the funnel: it tests the creative before the landing page or offer gets a say. Media buyers A/B-test creatives on CTR, then judge the winners on what happens after the click — a high-CTR creative that attracts the wrong audience shows up as great CTR and terrible conversion rate.

Benchmarks vary enormously by format: native and push notifications live around 0.1–1%, well-targeted banners higher, pops do not have a CTR at all (the visit is the "impression"). Compare CTR within a format, never across formats.

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