Increasing Click Through Rate

A listing on Google is like a classified ad in a newspaper. Like a classified ad, people need to notice it. This newsletter explains how to get people to notice your listing. After all, a Google listing isn't much good if people don't click on it.

Here are the search engine marketing terms. You can find these for your site in Google's Webmaster control panel:

1. An impression is when your site comes up on Google. If your site comes up on a search, whether it is clicked on or not, that is one impression.

2. A click through is when your site comes up in a search AND someone clicks on it. When someone actually clicks over to your site that is one click.

3. Click through rate (called CTR) is the percentage of impressions to clicks. For example if you have 1000 impressions per month and 100 clicks you have a click through rate of 10% (10% of people that saw your listing clicked on it).

The goal is to get your click through rate as high as possible. With free listings a click through rate of 100% is ideal. On a Google page you're up against 22 other listings. Here's how to stand out.

A Google listing consists of a heading, a description, and a link. Three lines are all you get. To get clicks, make the most of your title and description. However, Google controls these elements. Here is what you need to do to take control of your listing's title and description:

1. The Google listing title comes from the web page title tag. It is located inside the html, in the head section. The title tag doesn't appear on the web page. It appears at the top of the browser window. It is located in the html, about an inch from the top, between the title and /title tags. If you want to punch up your listing's title at Google, change your title tag.

2. The Google description comes from the meta-description tag inside the head section. If you don't a have meta-description tag Google will arbitrarily take the description from your web page text. You don't want that. The meta-description tag is valuable. Write an accurate, compelling, and descriptive meta-description tag for every page as though you were writing a classified ad. This description tag is what compels people take action.

Google uses your title tag and the meta-description tag to create your listing. To increase your click through rate, punch up these two elements. You've done great to be on Google in the first place. Now polish your title and description tags and get prospects to the site.