What is the click-through rate (CTR)?
Click-through rate, or CTR for short, is the number that measures how many people have clicked your ad. The higher the click-through rate, the better your ad campaigns are performing because a high click-through rate usually goes hand in hand with a high conversion rate.
You can get your click-through rate if you divide the number of clicks your ad has received by the number of times the ad got shown. Every ad and keyword that you use has its own CTR that shows how successful it is.
But CTR is also found outside advertising and can be gained organically. In fact, the #1 result in Google’s organic search has an average click-through rate of 31.7%. Additionally, the #1 organic result is 10 times more likely to receive a click compared to the 10th result.
This blog post will be all about click-through rate and how to increase it for your blog posts.
How to increase the click-through rate?
CTR is affected by a number of things, such as keyword use, meta descriptions, meta titles, Power Words and questions in titles, and ad copy.
So, let’s dive into how you can improve these things and increase the click-through rate for your blog posts.
1. Content quality and relevance
The first logical step for increasing the click-through rate of your blog posts would be to analyze your content and see how you can improve it.
The more relevant content is to the current events and interests of your readers, the click-through rate will be better. Similarly, the more quality the content is, the more people will be coming back to read more of it. But what does quality content entail?
Quality content contains the experiences of the writer, their predictions, educated opinions, interesting topics, and so on. All of these things have something in common: they make a blog post unique and interesting.
Coming up with topics is never easy, but if you follow the current events and trends, you will always have something to write about.
Avoid overly generic topics and keep in mind that people also love posts that offer solutions to their problems.
2. Meta tag elements – how to increase CTR with meta data?
Meta titles and meta descriptions are meta tag elements. Meta tags are basically what describes the content of a web page and they tell search engines what your web page is about. This is exactly where their importance lies: because of this, they affect SEO.
In fact, some experts even consider them to be one of the most important things that affect SEO.
But in order for them to have a good effect on SEO, they need to be optimized and used properly. Here are some tips on how to improve your meta titles and meta descriptions.
Meta title tips
When it comes to meta titles, they’re the title of your article in the search pages, browsers and on social media, when shared.
They’re important because, in a single short sentence, they tell people and search engines what your blog posts are about (Moz itself considers them one of the most important on-page SEO elements).
If they’re badly written and not related to the content of the post, the search engine will think there’s some foul play involved and your page will receive a bad ranking.
To make sure your meta title is well written, include the necessary keyword in it and keep the length between 50-60 characters, including spaces. If it’s too long, people who are using devices smaller than desktop will not be able to read the full titles.
Make sure that every post has a different meta title because search engines greatly appreciate originality and uniqueness. Also, don’t overuse keywords because it is not a good (or legal) tactic and search engines really don’t like it.
To grab people’s attention, don’t put your meta title in all caps. Common tactics include using numbers (‘10 great SEO tips’), power words (‘Shocking difference in conversion rate before and after website redesign’), and using words such as ‘examples’, ‘tips’, ‘guide’, ‘tutorial’ (‘5 examples of modern websites’ or ‘A guide for creating a minimalist website)
Meta description tips
Meta description is a meta tag used for summarizing a page. They’re the brief snippets of web pages that we read before deciding whether we want to click the link or not. That’s exactly why they’re important: they help you convince people that your page is exactly what they’re looking for.
The aim of a meta description is to summarize what a webpage is about as shortly and accurately. To write a good meta description, include the necessary keyword and keep it between 155-160 characters long.
When it comes to products, businesses try to say as shortly how useful the product is and how it will make people’s lives easier. As for blog posts, tell people what they will learn if they decide to click your page.
For example, if you’re writing an article about SEO and tips, the meta description would look like: ‘Learn what SEO is and useful tips that will improve your website ranking’. Short, sweet, and accurate.
3. Image use and click-through rate
Images are important for a number of reasons. In text, they create breaks for the reader so they can rest their eyes and look at something interesting.
In advertising, they attract the attention of customers, and when it comes to blog posts when they’re getting shared on social media, images also help attract attention and therefore also clicks.
Statistics show that posts shared on social media that contain images do better than posts that don’t.
Tweets with images receive 18% more clicks and 150% more retweets, and Facebook posts with images get more than 3.2 times more engagement than posts that don’t.
Also, the click-through rate is 42% higher on websites that contain images.
Do’s and don’ts of image use
Avoid using really generic stock images. Everyone is tired of looking at businesspeople smiling at laptops while there’s a boring white background behind them.
Instead, use free high-quality stock photos that look more genuine and unique. Websites such as Flickr, Freeimages.com, StockSnap, Unsplash, Pixabay, and many more offer free images that you can use.
You can also always make your own graphics and shoot your own photos; this will make you more unique and help you stand out from your competition.
If you have a certain style of shooting photos, editing them or creating graphics, even better.
The blog posts containing these images that you share on your social media platform will make your profile look uniform and more coherent, which is one of the biggest social media trends in 2022.
4. Call-to-action buttons for increasing CTR
We all know how important the proper use of call-to-action buttons is.
They enable visitors to perform actions on your website, such as purchasing products, booking services, or signing up for newsletters. They play a role in the increase of blog post CTR, as well.
Let’s say someone saw one of your blog post shares on social media. The image and title captured their attention, so they clicked the link. Turns out they really liked the article, so they read the whole thing and reached the end of the page.
And what did they find there? Snippets of other blog posts that you wrote that they also find interesting and are now going to click and read as well.
Include a list of your previous blog posts on the bottom and call-to-action buttons next to them that says something like ‘Read more’.
Final thoughts about CTA
Having a high click-through rate is something that every website aspires to. Thankfully, there are a number of steps you can take to increase yours.
They include improving the quality of your blog posts, making sure they’re relevant and interesting, as well as the proper use of meta titles and meta descriptions. Their proper use of entails length, keyword use, and accuracy.
Another thing that you can do to increase the click-through rate for your blog posts is the use of images, even better if you edit or take them yourself.
Hopefully, these tips help you increase the CTR of your blog posts and thank you for reading!
