Mom or Dad, Who Do We Love More? Paid Search Confirms

Here’s a fun little analysis we did.

Now that Father’s Day and Mother’s Day are behind us, we thought it would be interesting to take a look at the paid search activity around each of these holidays. While it wasn’t surprising Mother’s Day came out ahead, the disparity was.

Let’s start with ad spend. Advertisers doubled down on Mother’s Day. Literally. During the week leading up to Mother’s Day, ad spend for search was 110% higher than spend for Father’s Day. The story was similar with impressions and clicks. Ad impressions were twice as high for Mother’s Day and clicks were 86% higher. Advertisers clearly put more wood behind the arrow when it came to Mother’s Day.

But not all was hopeless for Father’s Day. Click-through rate (CTR) and cost-per click (CPC) were both better for Father’s Day. The CTR for Father’s Day was 6% higher than Mother’s Day and CPC was 11% lower for Father’s Day. Advertisers got slightly more bang for their buck with Father’s Day.

On a social context, the data does seem to confirm people favor Mother’s Day over Father’s Day. Sorry Dads.