Click-through rate, also known as CTR, is defined as the percentage of people who click on a specific button or link out of the total users or visitors who viewed it.
Click-through rate can be calculated for advertisements, emails, push notifications, SMS, and other channels. In each instance, CTR is defined by the number of clicks divided by the number of "impressions," or views.
Evaluating the click-through rate of your messaging campaigns can give you insight into the effectiveness of your engagement strategy.
CTR is considered a valuable performance metric in the marketing and advertising industry. As a performance metric, CTR is used to gauge the effectiveness of an ad or messaging campaign, benchmark results, and measure progress.
Oftentimes, companies will A/B test a marketing or advertising campaign and use CTR to determine which version of the campaign was more effective. Using this method, brands can optimize and adapt their strategy based on what resonates with their audience. Our studies show that A/B testing messaging campaigns improves click-through rates by an average of 8%.
Click-through rate is an incredibly contextual metric — what's considered "good" varies by channel and by industry.
The average push notification CTR can vary anywhere between 1 - 7% depending on the type of app in question, the type of notifications sent, and the use of message personalization and targeting. For email, that number is between 2-5%. Bulk SMS (i.e. text messaging)has an average CTR of 6%.
It's important to remember that these are all averages, so what's "good" for one company might now be the same for another. That's why it's important to benchmark CTR and track your progress against internal benchmarks over time.
There are a variety of factors that influence CTR. Aside from the context (ie the industry and channel), click-through rate can be impacted by the message content, timing, personalization, design, rich media, language, and many other factors. For instance, push notifications that feature images earn 60% higher CTR than those without. Many marketers and advertisers use A/B testing to try to uncover what factors are influencing CTR in different contexts in order to adapt their strategy and improve performance.
OneSignal is designed to help you send notifications and seamlessly manage your user communication across a variety of channels, including mobile and web push notifications, email, in-app messages, and SMS. Our platform is quick to set up and makes it easy to send eye-catching messages without doing any development work. If you don't have a OneSignal account, you can create one for free and start sending push notifications to your users today. Don't take our word for it — simply sign up and see for yourself!