If you run banner ads, you may wonder what kind of click-through rate (CTR) you should be targeting. Well, according to MarketingSherpa… don’t worry too much about it!

The thinking is that since display or banner ads are primarily a branding tool, CTRs are a by-product rather than an objective.

Still, as MarketingSherpa point out, the higher your CTR, the more successful your ad is likely to be in terms of resonating with your target audience.

My take: accept a lower CTR (compared with paid search ads), but keep track of industry benchmarks. While the aim may not be to get clicks, the CTR is still an indication of the effectiveness of the ad.

So what are the industry standards? What is a reasonable CTR to aim for? A study by MarketingSherpa reveals different average CTRs for different banner sizes:

• 160 x 600: 0.14 percent
• 300 x 250: 0.37 percent
• 120 x 600: 0.18 percent
• 728 x 90: 0.27 percent
• 468 x 60: 0.10 percent
• Overall average: 0.21 percent

So now you have some benchmarks. But remember, a lot will also depend on your target market, where you run your ad, and the placement of your ad on a given website and webpage, among other things.

Source: MarketingSherpa, “Banner Ad Size and Click Rate: Bigger a Bit Better, But It’s Clicks that Count”, MarketingSherpa, September 16, 2008

This entry was posted on Monday, September 22nd, 2008 at 6:50 am and is filed under Kikabink Lab, Online Advertising. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.