CTR Manipulation: A Technique For Gaining An Unfair SEO Advantage

One way to build a click-through rate (CTR) is to manipulate the results.

CTR manipulation can be legitimate or illegitimate, although the latter brings a quicker yield with more risks.

A robust CTR will, by default, increase your interaction with your audience and bolster your revenue, sales, or engagement if you offer products or services people need.

Every entity, from businesses to political campaigns to sports teams, can benefit from CTR manipulation, provided they do it right.

Here is all you need to know about CTR manipulation and how you can use it to bolster your web response rates.

What Does CTR Stand For?

The CTR of a website is the number (expressed in a percentage) of people that see a website or digital content link and click on it.

It gets compared against the total number of people that saw the link.  

What Exactly is Click Through Rate?

When people see a website or digital content link and click on it, investigating the attached site, article, or blog counts as a point for their CTR.

A CTR lets managers and searchers gauge the popularity of a website or digital content.

Why Is CTR SEO Important?

Websites or digital content with high CTR are usually popular with end users.

Higher popularity means higher engagement.

What Is CTR Manipulation?

CTR manipulation is a process some managers of web content use to bolster their CTR and make it look like their content is more popular than it is.

There are a few reasons for doing this:

• Generate interest in a website or digital content
• Increase exposure to the content for increased engagement
• To justify advertising on a website by a third party

How CTR Manipulation Works in SEO

CTR manipulation aims to either prompt more people to respond or make it look like more people are organically responding.

There are two suspect ways to prompt responses or make it look like your content is getting a huge response.

Both exploit inherent flaws in algorithms that manage internet search processes.

The first is through bots. The second is through people.

Bots

Bots are called different things, including “traffic bots” and “bot farms.”

They are used to drive web traffic to targeted websites or online content.

Bots are programs that repeatedly access a website or web content (like an article), and once they activate a website, they cease their activity.

Traffic bot farms are run on a program and include multiple engagements targeted toward specific websites or content.

A bot farm can be used to access content hundreds or even thousands of times, artificially bolstering that content’s engagement rate.

That, in turn, helps with search algorithms that use engagement to rank popularity and relevance.

Traffic bots are a clear violation of Google’s terms of service.

If you get using a bot, you can have your content suspended. However, the risk of discovery and suspension is worth it to many marketers because of the short-term boost in user traffic.

People (Micro Workers)

Micro workers are paid employees that work for a company that is contractually committed to visiting content on a planned basis to engage in CTR manipulation.

A marketer might hire a micro worker farm to Google a specific search term or a list of keywords and then click on a specific site.

Each micro worker gets a proxy or Virtual Private Network (VPN) to hide their location and make their engagement look real.

This way, without really digging into user activity on a site, a micro worker can access a site multiple times a day or boost specific keywords, and there is no way of telling if they are a legitimate user.

Ways to Implement CTR Manipulation

Bots and micro workers are the two methods of CTR Manipulation and multiple forms of implementation.  

What is the Most Popular Method of CTR Manipulation?

By far, the most popular way to implement a CTR Manipulation scheme is to use automated software (bots)

Automated Software

It is popular because human error is not possible as long as the input is accurate, and the development of automation is much less expensive than paying 25 workers.

Developing your bot or bot farm is cheaper once development gets done than paying humans to physically perform searches.

Mobile Proxies

Proxies are ways to mask an IP address.

There are a few different methods of using proxies to perform CTR manipulation.

Mobile proxies are portable devices, such as a smartphone, that provide access to the internet.

Most CTR Manipulation schemes using a mobile proxy will have multiple connections assigned to devices that are programmed to access search terms.

A mobile proxy masks an IP address because it uses random and numerous devices to search on the same term.

How Can You Use Emails as a Method of CTR Manipulation?

Emails and newsletters can be used by including links in either body to prompt users to access web content.

The content might or might not be as advertised, or it might be disguised under related but different content.

To be effective, an extensive distribution list must be used.

How Can You Use Social Media to Help With CTR Manipulation?

Social media can use bots or humans to promote different sites using catchy headlines (called clickbait) to prompt users to explore a link.

Another approach is to have a list of human workers send out social media posts asking their followers, friends, or supporters to click on a link.

Social media can artificially boost performance one time over a short period.

It is also easily trackable.

Organic Social Media Posts

Another way to engage in CTR manipulation is to use organic services.

Organically driven SEO includes tailoring your SEO content on your website and in linked content to drive traffic to you via wide use of search terms.

So if you are a plumber looking to get people to your company’s website, all your content must be search term rich, with links to your site.

There are other ways to boost traffic organically (which is technically CTR manipulation):

• Designing the site to be easy to access
• Driving traffic by vague information that prompts a user to visit for specific information
• Making the website or content user friendly
• Including a lot of other links to build a reputation as a source of information
• Tailoring your site and content to be search engine friendly

Paid Social Media Posts

The paid social media approach is similar to organic social media strategies, but you pay a company to post the information with your content link to commercially managed lists of users.

The paid social media entity can be a corporately managed account or can be the account of a specific influencer or influencers.

They recommend a link, and traffic gets driven to your content.

Sharing Social Media Platforms Via Email

Sharing social media platforms via email follows the same email strategy outlined above.

The difference is that you encourage users to click on a social media account recommending your content as worth investigating.

Can You Use Google Ads to Manipulate CTR?

The best way to use Google ads to build CTR is through sound SEO strategies.

Some of the strategies you can use to perform CTR manipulation are:

• Create multiple website listings with alternative titles and descriptions
• SEO enriched titles and descriptions
• Rich snippets
• SEO enriched copy

In terms of less than legitimate CTR manipulation, it is challenging to do in Google Ads, and the risk of getting caught is not worth the return.

When Is the Best Time to Implement CTR Manipulation?

CTR manipulation works any time it is used (for the short term at least,) but the most effective strategy is to use it when your webpage is stuck at a certain engagement rate and not moving.

Another time to consider a manipulation strategy is when your links are stuck on page 2 or 3 of the SERP.

Are There Any Risks Associated With CTR Manipulation?

The answer is that it depends on what type of CTR manipulation you use.

You should be fine if you use legitimate ways of manipulating CTR, like SEO enrichment.

Google Penalties for CTR Manipulation

If you use illegitimate CTR manipulation techniques, like bots or worker farms, you risk suspension of your Google account if caught and even banishment.

Does CTR Manipulation Still Work?

In the short term, any CTR manipulation can work.

Getting caught using illegitimate methods, however, is a significant risk.

It is so much of a risk that the question becomes whether the reward justifies the risk, and in most cases, the answer is no unless you use legitimate CTR Manipulation.

Where Can You Learn CTR Manipulation?

The best way to learn CTR manipulation is to search online for courses from organizations that offer marketing classes.

What Companies Teach CTR Manipulation?

1. Hussle Marketing
2. Link Daddy
3. Chris Palmer Marketing
4. CTR Geeks Course
5. Rank Fortress Academy

Top CTR Manipulation Tools

Multiple websites offer tools to help with building CTR.

• This site offers a massive toolkit to help you build CTR
• GMB Crush: This site can help you build a CTR strategy and track it
• Klicktr: This site provides real humans to perform searches on your behalf

Do CTR Manipulation Services Actually Work to Improve Rankings?

It depends on what you do and how you do it.

Illegitimate methods almost always work in the short term but are also usually found out.

Legitimate CTR manipulation, such as using SEO-enriched copy, can work if your SEO is sound.

Frequently Asked Questions

Here are a few commonly asked questions regarding CTR and CTR manipulation.

What is a Good CTR Value to Aim For?

According to Google, a 2% CTR is a good and realistic goal.

That might seem low, but consider how many people, on average, will look at a search page or specific content during a day.

What is an SEO Strategist?

An SEO strategist helps you determine the best CTR strategy to suit your specific content.

They will offer you several different methods to improve your CTR.

Is CTR Manipulation worth it?

If you use legitimate CTR, yes.

You can bolster your engagement naturally and effectively.

However, the risks of using illegitimate CTR are not worth the risk.

Final Thoughts

There are good and bad types of CTR manipulation.

Good methods can help you improve your SERP results and drive more traffic to your site.

The bad can do the same, but the risk is much higher, and the penalties are not worth the risk in most cases.

The type of CTR manipulation you use should be tailored to your specific needs with SEO and SERP ranking and not driven by how effective something might be in the short term.