How Many Clicks Does A No1 Ranking In Google Get Compared To No2, 3, 4 & 5?
Interesting. Google Webmaster Tools now shows click though rate and position in SERPS.
I picked a term I know I have had the top 5 positions at various times, and it’s interesting to see the clickthrough rate on particular keyword searches…. and how many clicks the top position in Google gets compared to the number 3 position, no4 and no5.
| Position 1 | 58 | 46 | 79% |
| Position 2 | 91 | 46 | 51% |
| Position 3 | 210 | 73 | 35% |
| Position 4 | 260 | 46 | 18% |
| Position 5 | 110 | 12 | 11% |
Obviously, this is just one example – it will take a while to look into the new data and look at an average – but it shows a number 1 getting nearly 30% more of the clicks than a no2 ranking. You might find some useful nuggets of information at Google Webmaster Tools for your own site…..
Of course, click through rate can be skewed by any number of factors – the nature of the query or how compelling your call to actions are in your title and your meta description, to name just a couple.
This info might prove interesting once aggregated.
EDIT – There’s plenty of discussion on the web about this data now – and how it doesn’t quite tally up with other Google sources (surprise suprise) and some even claim this info might have been published by mistake lol
- http://www.davidnaylor.co.uk/google-webmaster-tools-2.html
- http://www.distilled.co.uk/blog/seo/new-google-webmaster-tools-keyphrase-data-is-70-useless/
- http://www.holisticsearch.co.uk/2010/04/15/webmaster-tools-now-showing-clickthrough-data-lines-blurring-with-ppc/
- http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/4115916.htm
- http://www.seobook.com/google-serp-ctr-data-search-rank
Written by Shaun Anderson
I just logged into my account few minutes back and was just wondering from where the stats are coming from. For once I thought that maybe the stats are coming from my adwords account but then realized that it is showing SERP position and all. Looks really interesting.
Really looking forward to the next few days when people start properly aggregating this information
Will be interesting to see if what Google reports seem to match the studies we have done
(And more importantly how close it is to our analytics)
Rob
[...] on from Shaun Anderson’s earlier post on aggregated clickthrough data for Google, I rushed straight off to Webmaster Tools to have a look at the new features offered by Webmaster [...]
Think your table needs a header row to show what the two figures mean – impressions and clicks?
Apparently we had 1,300 No1 and 1,000 No2 impressions for “happy easter” (WTF?) without a single click-through!
I have gone through the data for one of my clients site. I have noticed that the data on webmaster tools for clickthrough rate on particular keyword searches is under reported. The same term in Google Analytics for the same period shows much more clicks. Also one must keep in mind that Google Analytics cannot record the clicks where javascript has been disabled so the Actual clicks are a lot higher than actually reported.
This really proves it Shaun… So many of my clients were getting nearly no traffic even though they are around the second page of the search results. It’s really saddening to see that for each result, clicks decrease by biblical proportions
Thanks for this Post and your Mail.
I have an interesting question.
There are any differences between position 1 and 2 in relation to the CTR when postion 2 has a better named title (trigger title, copywriting title) than postion 1?
To my mind the CTR is higher in AdWords campains but also in organic search results?
There are any data?
Regards from Germany
Thomas
Interesting, didn’t realise the gain of being 1st would be quite so high.
First of all i must say it’s great new feature from Google!
As some of you said here, it need to be compared to each and every one of your web analytic program, before you jump out of your sit and running to publish a post on your new ranking.
Any way, i tend to believe that the features in WMT will get stronger and stronger, up until we’ll have everything we need to measure convertions / goals…
This is probably the most golden nugget of information that Google have given us poor webmasters in years. I can see a real benefit in us being able to test different page titles and descriptions and actually be able to get a clear measure of which one works better.
This has got me thinking way too much, a very welcome distraction though
I’ve always been curious an can’t say I’m surprised. Personally, I tend to click #1 always, without fail. IF it’s not what I want, only then do I search lower.
hey Shaun,
Which is easier said than done. But for now I will go off your stats, which if I understand correctly, would all reflect the same title and “call to action” and would thus say where you rank on the page is HUGE!
Thanks for pointing this out! I don’t look at my google webmaster stuff very often, but now I will. What a COOL feature! Of course, to see how the different positions work, you have to get into them first.
Thanks again! Steve
I think the results displayed will also effect the click through results. If you have an obviously inferior site that managed to fool Google and get a high result, I think you’ll see higher numbers for click throughs in sites following it.
A lot of “niche” phrases only get a handful of monthly visitors so this blog post goes to show that being at number 3 for a phrase that only brings in 150 searches per month is really not going to bring you much business. In the SEO game for low traffic phrases it’s #1 or bust.
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