What does impression mean?
Impressions reflect the success of online content in measurement figures. For the most part, this relates to the user’s visual contact with the respective online element. The focus here is on the visual display of the content. An example of this is the display of a URL to a website as a search result that any person has searched for.
When do we speak of an impression?
In general, we speak of an impression as soon as it is purely a matter of visual contact with online content. Scrolling by the user over individual elements is also included in this measurement. Further interactions with the content are not taken into account.
Example:
An advertisement is displayed 30 times on the user’s screen and therefore 30 individual impressions are measured.
Evaluation of performance with impressions
Knowledge of the visual contact of online elements is indispensable for the digital world. The performance of ads and content on the Internet can be assessed using impressions. The impression is also included as a criterion for other advertising services, as it serves as the basis for calculating important key figures. An example of this is the Click Through Rate (CTR) for which the impression is required. Among other things, the impression can be used to determine the size of an advertisement or page.
However, it is not just the impression alone that is decisive for the evaluation of content and campaigns, but the combination of considerations of other metrics. The relevant measured values include clicks on the advertising material and reach.
SERP Impressions
To analyze the behavior of your website visitors, you can use the search analysis report from Google’s Search Console. This report shows how often the URL of the domain was displayed in a specific search query. The impressions are filtered according to individual keywords. The CTR (Click Through Rate) can be calculated using the number of clicks and the impressions in question.
Social Media
Advertising operators can reach their target groups via social media in particular, so impressions are also used here. The respective definition of the impression varies depending on the network.
Example: Twitter
As soon as a Twitter user sees a so-called “tweet”, this is included in the calculation of the impression. Whether the tweet appears in the feed, as part of a conversation or as a search result is irrelevant. Unlike other social networks, Twitter does not record reach.
Example: Facebook, Instagram and Co.
On Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, etc., the definition of an impression is similar. However, the key figure of reach must be differentiated. The reach indicates how many real people have seen a piece of content in a certain period of time. In social networks, on the other hand, multiple impressions can be generated through multiple views of the posts. Impressions are therefore not a measurement of the total number of people reached. Normally, impressions are higher than the reach, as this records individual visual contact with the content. Such content includes posts or stories, for example. Snapchat, like Instagram, differentiates between reach and story views.
Google Adwords
The impression is an important parameter for Google ‘s advertising network for the calculation according to the CPM (cost per impression) cost model.
Classification
The impression is used in a different context, depending on whether the online element is the URL of a website or an advertisement. The context therefore determines what is considered an impression.
The two most important applications, namely the page impression and the ad impression, are explained below.
Page Impression
Page impressions are used to determine the value of content or production in relation to their internet presence. The page impression is also referred to as a page view. This is created when a user clicks on a website or a subpage. The page impression is also used as the basis for calculating the thousand-contact price, or CPM for short, for quantitative cost analysis.
Ad impression
The focus is no longer on visual contact with a URL (page impression), but on the visual display of an advertisement in the ad impression. Ad impressions are also referred to as ad views. The ad impressions are logged and stored on ad servers. Ad impressions are also used as the basis for determining the aforementioned CPM. Since billing models often include payment for 1000 ad impressions, measuring the advertising media contact is elementary. The ad impression can therefore be described as a kind of currency for recording pure visual contact with advertising messages.
Due to the advertising algorithms, page impressions and ad impressions may differ.
Since the impression as a counted visual contact with an online element provides information about the performance of ads and websites, it is one of the most important key figures of digital advertising.