Quick PPC Question, that would really help me out!

[Tom Lazenby]

I'm testing out some banner ads on the display network at the moment. I've got 18 different designs I want to try and find out which has the highest CTR.

My default bid is $0.30...I aways thought that the higher the CTR the cheaper the CPC? As you can see below, my results certainly differ...

Banner 1, has the lowest CPC at $0.15 but also the lowest CTR at 0.29% - Why?

Banner 2 has a higher CTR of 0.45% but also costs more at $0.21 - HUh? It has roughly the same amount of impressions too.

Banner 3 has a CTR of 0.55%, the highest CTR of the three but also is the most expensive CPC at $0.22.

This makes my brain hurt. Could anyone explain why the "better" ads with the higher CTR are actually costing more? I don't understand.

Banner 1
Clicks: 336
Impressions: 115,682
CTR: 0.29%
CPC: $0.15

Banner 2
Clicks: 514
Impressions: 114,420
CTR: 0.45%
CPC: $0.21

Banner 3
Clicks: 218
Impressions: 39,976
CTR: 0.55%
CPC: $0.22

[rtg20]

Maybe the average positions are different...?

[Tom Lazenby]

Originally Posted by rtg20

Maybe the average positions are different...?

Hey, thank for responding...

It says number 1 for all of the banners.

[Mike McAleer]

I am not sure. I didn't think they were directly related anyway...

It all depends.

[ankur420420]

You said "the higher the CTR the cheaper the CPC"

I guess there are lot many factors than just the CTR

thanks
Ankur

[Tom Lazenby]

Any idea what those other factors are?

[superlever]

You can ignore the position aspect. Really position only matters on search where there is a true auction system for the ads. You'll almost always get position one.

It's also not true that the higher the CTR, the cheaper the clicks. Google uses a weighted assessment of CTR on the search (as position one always will get higher CTR than position 8). I expect there to be the same thing at play with display for ads that appear below the fold etc.

So the pricing isn't a great indication in this case. I'd just keep running a huge amount of impressions, look at CTR and hope that your ads were fairly evenly distributed. Most of the time it's a great exercise what you're doing so keep it up.

[Lucid]

Yes, there's usually only one banner ad per page so your position will almost always show one.

Your cost is figured by CTR but also for each site where your banner appears and also compared to the banner size. Therefore, the same ad in different banner sizes will likely result in different CPC on different sites. If you drill down to each metric, I'm sure you'll see large differences there too.