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Bounce Rate

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18 Nov 2022
Nirlep Patel


Bounce Rate


Everything You Need to Know About Fixing High Bounce Rate

Bounce Rate: Demystified

Bounce Rate can perpetually confuse someone who has little or no knowledge of website traffic and the nooks and cranes of it. Maybe you are witnessing your website engagement dipping at an alarming rate, yet cannot figure out the reason why. Afterwards, you analyze all the metrics and stumble upon a certain bounce rate. Before you panic and get all frenzied, take a calmer approach to the problem at hand. In layman's terms, the rate refers to the percentage of website visitors who end up on a website and then leave. They do not visit page 2 or do not click on any link. In other words, they leave the website immediately without performing any action.

Example and Formula

Looking at an example will clear it further. Let's say your website had hundred visitors on a certain day. Out of those hundred people, twenty people went back after landing on the website. So the bounce rate of your website will be twenty per cent. The bounce rate on any given day is derived by dividing the total number of visits by visitors who left the page without doing anything.

High, Low and Everything In Between

Tracking the bounce rate will give a clearer idea of website engagement. To be more precise, it gives you the exact number of how many people who aren't interested in your website. A high bounce rate indicates that visitors are not interested in engaging with your website. They are pressing the back button just after landing on the website. This may indicate technical SEO errors on your account. On the other hand, a low bounce rate indicates visitors are spending time on your website, generating good traffic. However, the bounce rate can be relative depending on the number of pages a website has. It also depends on whether the session can be done on one page or not. For example, in terms of a blog where single-page sessions are most common, a high bounce rate is considered to be a normal phenomenon. Similarly, for an e-commerce website, a high bounce rate is an ominous sign. To generate a steady flow of visitors to your website, professional tracking tools are required to measure the bounce rate. The bounce rate can be labeled high once they reach 56 per cent. And if the number stands at 90 per cent or more, there may be some glaring error scaring away the visitors. This can only happen due to bad website design, incompatible browsers or excessive bots. The obvious errors can easily be done away with to lower an abysmally high bounce rate.

Good Bounce Rate and How to Achieve So

A high bounce rate can be a discouraging number to look at. A collection of data shows that a good bounce rate ranges from 26 per cent to 70 per cent. The optimal bounce rate ranges from 26 per cent to 40 per cent. The possibility of scoring less than 20 per cent is highly unlikely. Depiction of such a number may indicate any wrong input from your end. Another aspect to take into account is the devices of traffic generation. Mobile phones produce the highest rate of 51 per cent while desktops' bounce rate stands at 43 per cent. Taking into account the devices is also crucial to determine the correct bounce rate.

The Secret to the Optimum Bounce Rate

Generally, a high bounce rate indicates the irrelevance of the site to the visitors or some lingering confusion. To address the issue, you have to take care of some basic details. Before that take a look at the points which can elevate your bounce rate:

  • Unnecessary and annoying pop-ups
  • Plug-ins
  • Reduced speed
  • Poor user interface
  • Technical Error
  • Un-synced content and keywords

However, one has to take into account the fact that a bounce rate that it simply indicates the number when someone leaves after visiting the first page. It does not accurately show the engagement in between the events. Therefore, it's important to employ other metrics as well to get a clearer picture.

Make the Site Mobile-Friendly

Mobile users constitute more than half of the web traffics. This accounts for a mobile-ready experience. Engagement with the mobile interface is the greatest weapon to lower the high bounce rate. A complex idea is better conveyed through a video. To attract mobile users, one must at all costs avoid deploying large videos on websites. Mobile users prefer short videos which can crisply convey the message. Overall, an all-around mobile experience can lower the high bounce rate effectively.

Analyzing the Analytics

A balanced analysis of all the available sources will create a detailed look into the problem. Comparing the bounce rate with other metrics, such as time on site, can help to identify the problem accurately. This will effectively let you understand whether the problem is site-wide or on a particular page.

Avoid Disruption

Disruptions like frequent pop-ups can damage the mobile-viewing experience. While a limited number of pop-ups are necessary, too many of them can result in a high bounce rate. The goal is to let the visitors stay as long as they want. Unwanted disruptions make them leave early.

SEO to the Rescue

Effective keyword insertion, link building, and rank tracking are different aspects of a successful SEO. Deploying them will make your website rank higher in the search engines and thus will generate more targeted traffic.

Keywords Are the Key

Keywords are the greatest weapon at your helm to generate organic traffic. Using the right keywords which match your content is another way to attract more organic visitors to your website. Therefore evaluation of your keyword alignment with your content is essential. This will result in the correct grouping of the pages according to the subject and the right visitors. There is no panacea for a high bounce rate. Each case needs a detailed solution to its problem. But in general, once your analytics are showing a high bounce rate, check the surface problems at first. Then delve deeper to do away with the problem. The correct marketing strategy will be able to redirect traffic to your website.