When you're running an Ad Campaign from scratch, or even if you've been running one for a couple of years, it can be tough to know how you're comparing to your competition. Wordstream recently used their huge dataset to show the average click through rate, across 16 industries (Advocacy, Auto, B2B, Consumer Services, Dating & Personals, E-Commerce, Education, Employment Services, Finance & Insurance, Health & Medical, Home Goods, Industrial Services, Legal, Real Estate, Technology, and Travel & Hospitality).
The search results confirm an age old saying - "Sex Sells", Dating and Personals leading the way with an average click-through rate of 3.4%; over 1.5% higher than the average CTR across all industries. Understandably, it's easier to write emotional copy, capturing the imagination of a lovesick audience.
Other noticeable CTR's include the Financial industry (2.65%) who are seeing a surge of interest in the Digital Marketing activities, B2B (2.55%) and Consumer Services (2.40%)who rely heavily on search activities and Technology (2.38%).
Some of the industries that struggle to grab the user's attention include the likes of Legal services (1.35%), this could be due the cost associated with the legal industry from both a customers perspective and an internal perspective. Some of the most expensive terms in AdWords are "Lawyer" and "Attorney" averaging at around $100 per click, suggesting long-tail geo-targetted terms is the way to look. Other industries with low CTR for the SERPs include eCommerce (1.66%) and industrial services (1.40%).
The Google Display Network (GDN) has a noticeably lower CTR to that on SERPs. Tech companies are in a strong position as they have a better than average CTR for the SERPs and the best-performing display CTR at 0.84%. Looking at the lowest performing GDN, this belongs to the Employment Services industry with an average display CTR of 0.14%. This could be because of the difficulty of writing enticing content, along with the somewhat tainted perception of Display Ads.
By Alexander Clark
A former member of the Smart Insights team, I’m always on the look out to collaborate with the finest minds in Digital Marketing. Currently working at Silverbean, I have a distinctive interest in all things outreach, content, strategy, and measurement. If you’d like to get in touch, you can do so through my LinkedIn or Twitter accounts. When I’m not planning new campaigns and content, I love playing the Bass Guitar and Drums (not necessarily at the same time) also racking up as many hours as possible on Football Manager and the Rugby pitch.
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