CTR (link click) is the percentage of impressions on a Facebook or Instagram ad that led to a click on one of the ad’s links. Meta calculates it as link clicks divided by impressions, multiplied by 100, so 40 link clicks from 2,000 impressions is a link CTR of 2%.
How CTR (link click) works
Ads Manager reports two click-through rates side by side, and they measure different things. CTR (all) counts every click on the ad: likes, comments, shares, taps to expand the text, taps on your Page name and clicks to view a photo full-screen. CTR (link click) only counts clicks that try to take someone to a destination you chose, such as your website, an app store listing, a lead form, a call or a Messenger conversation.
That distinction matters because CTR (all) can look healthy on an ad that sends almost nobody anywhere. A striking image might get plenty of taps to enlarge it and a lively comment thread, while the number of people who actually went to your booking page stays low. Link CTR strips that out.
A link click is still only an attempt. It is counted when the tap happens, not when your page loads, so a slow site or a broken redirect can turn a respectable link CTR into very few real visits. That is why I read it next to the click to landing page view ratio, which shows how many of those clicks arrived. Meta also offers outbound CTR, which narrows the count further to clicks that leave Facebook or Instagram altogether.
Why it matters for a UK business
Link CTR is the clearest early signal of whether an ad’s message and image are persuading the people Meta shows it to. If a London salon’s ad reaches the right local audience but almost nobody taps through, the problem is usually the offer, the first line of text or the creative, not the budget.
It also feeds into cost. A higher link CTR means each thousand impressions produces more visits, so your cost per link click falls even when the price of reaching people stays the same. During busy UK periods such as Black Friday and the run-up to Christmas, when the cost of impressions often rises, a weak link CTR gets expensive quickly.
What it does not tell you is whether the clicks were worth having. A provocative headline can lift link CTR and fill your site with people who leave within seconds. Judge it alongside the outcome you actually pay for: enquiries, bookings or sales.
Common mistakes
- Reporting CTR (all) to a client or manager as if it were the rate of website visits.
- Comparing link CTR across campaigns with different objectives. A traffic campaign is shown to people likely to click; a sales campaign is shown to people likely to buy, who may click less often.
- Comparing placements without a placement breakdown. Audience Network and Reels can behave very differently from the Facebook feed.
- Rewarding the ad with the highest link CTR when another ad with a lower rate brings cheaper sales.
- Ignoring a slow decline over several weeks, which is often the first sign of tired creative.
How to act on it
Add CTR (link click) and CTR (all) as separate columns in Ads Manager and stop using the “CTR” shorthand in reports. Look at link CTR by ad, not just by campaign, because one strong ad can hide two weak ones.
When link CTR is low, test the parts people see first: the opening seconds of a video, the first line of primary text and the image itself. When it falls over time on the same audience, check frequency and refresh the creative. When it is high but sales are poor, look at the landing page and the match between what the ad promised and what the page shows.
If you want someone to set up these columns, read them each week and decide what to change, that is part of my Facebook and Instagram ads management work.