Most Important Factors for CTR
January 2nd, 2007
Search Engine Watch
thread talking about most important things affecting CTR.
Title
Ad Copy
Display URL
Position
Narrowness/Broadness of Keywords in Groups
Dynamic Keyword Insertion
Other
As of this writing, there were only 6 votes, but let me take a swing at describing what i have found through my testing.
Title - Title is the most important piece of copy. That said, it can become useless if everyone else’s title says the exact same thing. If you are a brand name, then putting that brand name in the title can be huge CTR boost- double to triple. Price in title can be a double edged sword. If someone else has a lower price you are toast. We found that when we had lowest price, our CR went way up, but CTR suffered, perhaps because users already knew our price and shopped to see if they could do better.
Ad Copy - When I worked for a brand name, I had the theory that as long as i had the “keyword - brand name” in the title, that I could write anything at all I wanted in the ad copy, nothing I did or tried budged the CTR or CR. Now that I am on my own, I write keyword rich ads. If you can get several bolds in the copy that can help the CTR. I have also discovered that if it is a 2 or 3 word search term that it is not necessary to have all of the words repeated for bolding. I also strongly believe that non-bolded words between bolded words helps rather than hurts.
Display URL - If you have a domain that has the keywords you want, your CTR will go up. That bolded copy works. Short of having a strong brand name, using subdomains or folders with the exact keyword will increase your ad copy.
Position - Position is focused on too much. I can typically profit a lot more in 3rd or 4th position than in 2nd because my margins are far higher. 1st position is usually for name brands and suckers on high volume terms.
Narrowness/Broadness of Keywords in Groups - I put every single keyword into its own adgroup. I want to write different copy for plurals or different terms. Getting that bold is very important dont use the singular version in ad copy if you are bidding on plural version. Dont be lazy, start a new adgroup and make the copy change. Dont forget to track separately as well.
Dynamic Keyword Insertion - Tricky. I dont like DKI. What if someone types in a misspelling you broadmatch to? what if someone does an odd search that does not read well in Print. I want my ads to read exactly as I write them. Exception - Brand Names that Google will not allow you to use. With DKI you can get bolding where you otherwise would not have been able to bid on a brand name.
Other - Avoid gimmicks. Curiosity clicks do not convert well, so you are paying for traffic that does not work.
In closing - I think this poll has the wrong focus. While CTR is important and can significantly increase position in the engines and lower the CPC, the ultimate metric is conversion rate and total profit. If an ad copy that does not use the keywords can pre-sell the customer and get a lower volume of clicks but a higher conversion rate, then you may be better off.
As with everything testing is vital. Test and Measure everything and you will get your own answers to what works best.