First, the data. I look at the CTR data monthly using a tool that measures click-through stats from hundreds of thousands of searches each month. The image below is a measurement based on keyword length. One keyword through four keyword search length.  

 

The one thing you will notice, regardless of the length of the search term, the First Position result gets about 30% of all clicks. The results for the four categories are all within about a point of each other.

 

This trend continues under different filter types as well. Different industries typically are within a few points, and the largest variant is branded vs. non-branded. That category differs by about 7 points on a first position click.  

 

The next oddity, or if you like consistency, here is the first five results. Generally speaking, each position you drop within the first five locations cuts about half of the previous position. So if position one gets a 40% click-through rate, the second will get about a 20%, then a 10% for the third, and so on. When those first five positions are added up, it typically is around 60%-65%, meaning most clicks during search happens on the top of that organic result page.  

 

It should be noted that only about 1% click through to the second page.

 

What Does That Mean And Why

 

With well over half of the click-through rate occurring in the five positions of the organic results, it underscores the importance of occupying that space as a business. This really is Main Street if you are a business. It used to be difficult in the brick and mortar era of just packing up and moving a business. Expensive, timely, and not always available was a prime real estate space with more qualified foot traffic strutting past your window. 

 

Why is there such consistency between position and click-through? I don't know that we have a conclusive study to prove this, but I have my own hypothesis.  

 

Much like the layouts in other advertising mediums like magazines, flyers, brochures, and newspapers, the important information sits on top. I often use the term above the fold and below the fold mentality. I think we naturally gravitate towards believing the results to trust sit higher than others. This is certainly true for newspapers, but not so much for search results.  

 

One additional and important element that is part of this equation is trust. While our trust in such things as headlines may have diminished over time, the organic channel that drives website traffic is the most trusted channel there is. The most engaged visitors to a website typically come through Organic Avenue. This is where your buyers derive from in most cases.  

 

To put a fine point on this whole topic. It could be summarized like this. If your website isn't appearing in the upper tier of page one rankings, you miss out on being placed smake dab in front of a relative and qualified audience. 

 

 

 

 

 

There is a psychological influence, I believe, for why we see consistent click-through data on organic listings—Google, to be specific. Month in and month out, this data is consistent and consequently very telling and important.

 

Would you like to know where your active audience is online? Additionally would be important for your business to understand how users react to different parts of a search result page and why Digital Marketers strive for increased visibility? Here is a short explanation addressing those questions.