Digital location marketing: Advertising clicks best in these cities
Digital location marketing is becoming increasingly important for local companies and stores. Higher visibility, sales increases and trusting customer relationships are just some of the benefits that local online measures offer. In addition to the choice of advertising channel, the actual location can also be crucial to the success of a campaign. But in which cities is it particularly worthwhile to place online advertising? This is the question we at Localyzer have been investigating. For this, we analyzed more than 9,600 local digital marketing campaigns across Germany according to their click rates.
The result: Facebook and Instagram advertising is most promising in Gütersloh. When it comes to Google Ads campaigns, advertising clicks best in Bottrop, with a rate of 11.8 percent. Smaller to medium-sized cities in particular offer the most potential with regard to local online campaigns.
Local Instagram and Facebook ads are particularly popular in Gütersloh
The click-through rate – also called CTR – indicates the percentage ratio between the number of clicks and the number of views of an ad. If you want to advertise locally via Facebook or Instagram, Gütersloh is the place to be. With a rate of 2.87 percent, advertising is most promising there. This means that 287 clicks are in proportion to 10,000 impressions. Second place goes to Paderborn, where the average click rate is 2.85 percent. Advertising in Leverkusen also generates a comparatively large number of clicks, with the city securing third place with 2.73 percent.
Overall, smaller cities fared best in the survey. Western Germany in particular seems to be open to location-based, digital advertising measures. Looking at the Facebook and Instagram advertising channels, a proud nine North Rhine-Westphalian cities are represented in the top 10.
Google advertising clicks best in Bottrop
With a click-through rate of 11.79 percent, ads on Google in Bottrop offer the greatest potential. No other city can boast a higher click-through rate in the study. The Lower Saxony city of Salzgitter follows with 9.76 percent. Residents in Gütersloh are not only open to social media, but also to Google advertising – the CTR is 5.74 percent.
The situation is different in Freiburg: Here, the average click rate is 1.35 percent. This puts the city in last place in Baden-Württemberg in the survey. Würzburg and Ulm follow with 1.43 and 1.69 percent, respectively. Although cities bring up the rear, however, click rates are good overall.
Bielefeld and Münster lead the major city rankings
Two North Rhine-Westphalian cities also lead the survey of Germany's 20 largest cities. Branches or companies that place social media ads in Bielefeld can rejoice: the average click rate there is 2.37 percent. Those who rely on Google Ads have particularly good chances in Münster (4.09 percent).
About the investigation
A total of more than 9,600 campaigns were studied from 2018 to 2023, with a cutoff date of June 11, 2023. The click-through rates are taken from the Localyzer database. For better comparability, only the 20 largest cities in Germany and cities with a population of 100,000 or more were included. The formula for the click-through rate is: total number of clicks divided by impressions multiplied by 100. Google ads include Google search campaigns, Google display ads, and ads on YouTube. For social media campaigns, video ads on Facebook and Instagram were considered, as well as LinkAds. Google ad click-through rates tend to be higher due to Google search campaigns, as users are already searching for specific products or services. How effective an online campaign actually is depends on many other factors.
