When it comes to measuring online advertising, clicks aren’t everything. Often, it’s the users who don’t click that may deserve more of your attention. That’s why we depend heavily on both click-through and view-through activity to measure conversions for online display media.

A click-through conversion refers to the instance in which a user clicks on your ad and proceeds to perform a specified activity (e.g. make a purchase, or sign up for an e-mail alert). A view-through conversion happens when the user is exposed to your ad, does not click on it, but later returns to your site and completes the conversion.

While clicks can certainly mean that the user has an active interest in your brand, those users who don’t click can absolutely still view, experience, absorb and understand your message, and that can lead to higher brand awareness, improved consumer opinions of the brand, and increased intent to purchase. In some cases, the impact of your brand message or call-to-action may have enough power to drive a consumer to visit a store, request more information or even make a purchase.

So you don’t necessarily need immediate clicks to be successful in online media.     

Even if the online media placement doesn’t receive direct interaction (as mentioned above), it can still have a major impact on targeted search queries. Obviously, if a user hasn’t heard of your product, then he/she will not search for it. However, if that user is exposed to an ad that introduces your product or brand to that consumer, he/she may be interested in learning more and search for your product online (maybe not right away, but perhaps tomorrow, or in a few days, or next week).

In order to fully understand the effects of online media placement, we need to consider the full interaction that users have with online ads. And that’s why we measure more than just the click.

For more information about online display media and our ClearSaleing analytics program, please contact us.