Laila Naqvi

Like Me? Follow Me.

The bounce rate is the percentage of web visitors who only visit a single page on your site or stay on it for a very short period of time before leaving without further interaction. The term ‘bounce’ refers to the users pressing the back button, closing the page, typing a new URL or a timeout session.

What Does High/Low Bounce Rate Suggest About Your Website?

A bounce rate above 40% is usually considered high, it suggests that visitor didn’t find the information they were looking for on that page, therefore it’s worth investigating why a website has a high bounce rate.

However, what may be considered as a high bounce rate for one site may not necessarily be high for another website. This can depend on the industry and type of audience, whether it is retail, services, content (information based) or if it’s a simple landing page with a call to action.

The info graphic by Kissmetrics below shows what can make someone leave your website, including:

  • Bad Navigation
  • Too many ads
  • Obstructive use of audio and video
  • The registration requirement
  • Boring content, boring design
  • Poor legibility
  • Lack of frequency

Other factors that can affect the bounce rate or why people leave your website include:

  • Page speed ( low speed = high bounce rate)
  • Surveys

bounce_rate.jpg

Source: What Makes Someone Leave A Website?

Improving a High Bounce Rate

If your website has high bounce rate, it is recommended that you fix it by examining user intent and tweaking your site so that its design and content is focused on what your visitors want. Some factors to consider include:

Keywords: Which keywords are visitors typing in to land on your site? And is your landing page relevant to these key phrases? This should be used as a guide to improve how useful your site is for your target market.

External links: It is important ensure that there are not too many external links on your page. Having links that open in a new window may drive visitors away from your website.

Testing: It is good idea to carry out A/B testing, so you can compare two versions of the site and which is most effective.

If you’d like more advice on how you can improve the bounce rate of your website, get in touch with the SEO team at I-COM. You can call us on 0844 704 6830 or fill in our online enquiry form.

Tags: Search Engine Rankings, Seo, Website Content