A bounce rate is the percentage of people that come to your website and leave after visiting only the first page. If you are selling a product or service, a high bounce rate is very bad, because it means that many of the people who visit your website will never see your storefront or store page. A high bounce rate means a lower conversion rate as well. As a result it is important to look at improving bounce rate.
A website should have about a 20-60% bounce rate. A bounce rate, especially a high one, only tends to get higher with time, and is important to keep under control.
A low bounce rate is also bad, despite what you may think. So, why would a bounce rate under 20% be a bad thing? It means more of your visitors are visiting other pages, which indicates one of several things. It can mean that there is an error with your analytics implementation. It could also mean that you are “forcing” visitors to visit another page through a third-party add-on. Because a bounce rate is meant to track the engagement of a visitor, a forced low bounce rate is not a good thing.
How do you improve a bounce rate?
The first thing you need to have to maintain a good bounce rate is a good website. People will leave your website immediately if it is not clear and concise. Make it easy and quick to understand what products or services you offer.
Second, improve the speed of your website. Users value their time and will NOT wait for a slow website to load. There are many free SEO and website analysis tools that will tell you your website speed if you enter your URL. One popular tool that we use at Cutting Edge Website Development is GT Metrix. If you have a slow website loading speed, this can be improved by simplifying and removing unnecessary code. It can also be improved by removing third party systems from your website, changing to a faster hosting system, or removing large files stored on the website. If you are getting a lot of traffic, this can be the cause of slow loading speeds. To address this, you may need to switch to a dedicated server with a large bandwidth. Your cost for hosting will probably go up, but it is worth it for a better bounce rate.
Third, use fonts and website colors that represent your website. For example, if your target market is kids, use fun fonts in colors that kids would like. This improves your overall user experience and will keep your visitor engaged. If the visitor is engaged, they are more likely to visit other pages of the website, therefore lowering your bounce rate. .
If your website supports a cause, tell the visitor this on the first page. This will encourage the visitor to stay on the website to learn more about the company. Paying for marketing (primarily through Facebook ads), can improve your bounce rate because it leads to more targeted traffic. SEO (Search Engine Optimization) can also improve bounce rates in the same way that paid advertising does.
If you’re interested in improving your website bounce rate, or establishing tools to track key web metrics, please feel free to book a call with one of our team members using the form below!
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