Odds are, the first things that you think of when you think of display advertising (also known as pay per click or PPC) are banner ads and pop-up ads. The next thing you think is “do people still actually click on those things?”
While banner ads and pop-up ads on third-party websites are definitely forms of display advertising (PPC), they just scratch the surface. Other forms include ads on social networks (like Facebook), ads on video services (like YouTube) and mobile advertising, which includes banner ads and in-app ads.
Impressions and clicks are where things start to get complicated. Since it is nearly impossible to gauge how many people actually looked at your ad and thought positively (or negatively) about it, think of it like a billboard on the highway, the click-through rate (CTR) was created to try to measure the effectiveness of the ad. The truth is with so many intangibles, it’s difficult to get an accurate return on investment (ROI) and it becomes extremely easy to spend way too much way too fast.