CTA

(Call To Action)

A CTA is a prompt in the form of a button, link or phrase that is used to entice consumers into taking a specific action. CTAs are found on almost all adverts - often in the form of words like ‘sign up’, ‘buy now’, ‘download’, ‘call’ or ‘learn more’. They’re often designed to be bold and enticing by using fonts and colors that contrast with other text in the advert. This guide explains more about how to create CTAs that convert.

CTR

(Click Through Rate)

When measuring the effectiveness of an online advert, the CTR is sometimes used. This is the percentage of people that click on a link, ad or email after viewing it. It’s calculated by dividing the total clicks by the total impressions and then multiplying the number by 100 (for example, if 1000 people see an advert and 60 people click on it, the CTR is 6%).

DSP

(Demand Side Platform)

A demand side platform is a software platform that allows advertisers to buy digital ad space across various websites and apps at once. Instead of having to approach individual websites, you can use a DSP to easily determine who you want to reach, how much you want to pay and what your ad looks like. Examples include Google Display and Amazon DSP.

PPC

(Pay Per Click)

Pay Per Click is one of the most common advertising models. You pay a fee every time someone clicks on your ad - often setting a budget at the beginning which will allow your advert to display within a certain period of time until a certain number of people have clicked on it. The likes of Google, Bing and Facebook all use PPC models.

ROAS

(Return On Ad Spend)

This is a metric used to measure how much money you’re getting back from your advertising campaigns. It’s important to measure to make sure that you’re not wasting money on adverts that aren’t converting leads. Just be wary that it may not always be possible to measure the direct leads with some adverts.

RTB

(Real Time Bidding)

RTB is another advertising model in which ad impressions are bought and sold automatically through instantaneous auctions. Most online ads work on an RTB basis, making it possible to target niche users across the internet through various webpages or apps using parameters chosen via a DSP.

SEM

(Search Engine Marketing)

This is the process of advertising on search engines via paid ads. It is different to SEO, which involves organically improving the rankings of webpages via keywords, link building and other tactics - instead SEM involves paying for your webpage listing to display as an advert at the top of the search engine results page. Google Ads are a classic example of SEM.