- Bounce Rate - What Is It?
- Bounce Rate vs. Exit Rate
- What Is a Good Bounce Rate?
- Other Important Factors Related to Bounce Rate
- Does a High Bounce Rate Hurt SEO?
- Where Can You Check the Bounce Rate?
- How to Reduce Bounce Rate?
- Improve the Layout of Your Website and Take Care of User Experience
- Ensure That Your Website Has a Responsive Web Design and a Mobile Version
- Place a Call to Action on the Most Popular Subpages
- Improve Your Website Loading Time
- Stay Concise
- Diversify Your Content
- Apply Keywords
- Remember About Search Intent
- Define Your Target Group
- Avoid Pop-Ups and Click Baits
- Get Rid of Broken Links
- Link Wisely
- Make Your 404 Page Engaging
- Publish New Content
- Show Your Expertise
- Use Available Tools
- Engage Your Users
- Bounce Rate & SEO – The Takeaway
Bounce Rate - What Is It?
Bounce rate is the percentage of users who visited your website and left it before entering another subpage. It’s calculated by dividing the number of people who entered only one subpage of the site by the number of all visits to the website. It’s shown in the graphics below.How to Interpret Bounce Rate?
You can expect a few scenarios which caused visitors to leave the site.- Internet users didn’t find what they were looking for on your website and decided to leave it by closing the tab or going back to the search results.
- Users already found what they were looking for on the first subpage and didn’t need to go any further.
- There is also the possibility that users clicked other URL on your website and were automatically redirected to another site.
- To consider all possible scenarios, you should also take into account the fact that users might have spent so much time on one subpage of your website that the session time exceeded 30 minutes, without any interaction, and this situation was counted to bounce rate.
- And last but not least, maybe your website has only a homepage, and users aren’t able to enter another subpage. The bounce rate for one-page websites will always be relatively high.
Bounce Rate vs. Exit Rate
It turns out that there is a difference between the bounce rate and the exit rate. The exit rate indicates how many times visitors leave the website after visiting a few subpages. It’s given in percentages and calculated by dividing the number of exits by the number of page views. This parameter can be checked in Google Analytics, in the Behavior Tab.What is a Good Bounce Rate?
Are you wondering if your bounce rate is acceptable? This is how we can evaluate this parameter: 80% + – unacceptable level 70 – 80% – bad level 50-70% – average level 30-50% – desirable level As you can see, the bounce rate ranging between 30% and 50% is acceptable. Is it always the case? This is a very general classification and everything depends on the industry and the type of the website. This scale works well for all classic shops. Besides, this indicator is interpreted differently for landing pages. The infographic below shows proper bounce rate levels for website types: Bounce rate is also different depending on the industry you operate in:
Industry |
Average Bounce Rate |
Apparel |
44% |
Automotive |
45% |
B2B |
75% |
Beauty |
48% |
Consumer Electronics |
44% |
Energy |
38% |
Financial Services |
47% |
Grocery |
40% |
Luxury |
46% |
Travel |
43% |
Other Important Factors Related to Bounce Rate
When talking about bounce rate we have to mention two other factors. Dwell time and pogo-sticking are connected with bounce rate and are also indicators of how well is a website received by users.Dwell Time
Google algorithm also analyzes dwell time - the time between the moment the user enters a page straight from the search results and returns to the SERPs. This metric allows robots to evaluate the quality of the result while verifying the bounce rate and the average length of a user’s session. Based on this, they determine whether the search result is satisfactory and meets user expectations.Pogo Sticking
Pogo sticking happens when users visit several different websites in order to find a satisfying answer to a query. Here’s an example: Let’s say someone is looking for information about “how to repair a washing machine”. They visited result number 1 but didn’t find a satisfactory answer, so they moved to results number 2, 3, 4, and so on. If a lot of people pogo stick after choosing the first results, it’s a sign for Google that something is not right. Apparently, result number 1 is not good enough for users, so Goole will drop it down a few positions, and try to find a more accurate page.Does a High Bounce Rate Hurt SEO?
Does the bounce rate affect your positions in the search results? This parameter doesn’t have a direct impact on the ranking. So although it’s not a ranking factor, it’s a sign that your website doesn’t meet users’ expectations. Good user experience and proper targeting are crucial to engaging website visitors. They help you reach top positions in the SERPs. What to do if your bounce rate increases? Analyze user behavior (Google Analytics) and implement relevant changes.Where Can You Check the Bounce Rate?
You can check your bounce rate in Google Analytics. Log into your GA account and choose the Audience Overview. Here you can check the bounce rate for your whole website: [caption id="attachment_51783" align="aligncenter" width="750"] Source: https://www.monsterinsights.com/[/caption] You can also check the bounce rate for individual pages. Go to the Behavior Tab and then to All Pages: [caption id="attachment_51786" align="aligncenter" width="750"] Source: https://www.monsterinsights.com/[/caption] Remember to check the bounce rate for different traffic sources! Organic, Paid, and Direct traffic will have different bounce rates. Compare them and analyze where you should make improvements.How to Reduce Bounce Rate?
There are many reasons why people leave websites. They don’t find what they need, or the content they are looking for is on the first subpage so they don’t have to go any further. The page navigation isn’t intuitive, etc. The possibilities are endless. What we want to achieve is to increase a dwell time - as we mentioned before, it's the time a person spends looking at a webpage after they’ve clicked a link on a SERP page, but before clicking back to the SERP results. How to solve the problem? What to do if your bounce rate is too high? Below you can see a list of a few tips to start with:1. Improve the Layout of Your Website and Take Care of User Experience
The layout of your website matters more than you think. Focus on these aspects:- Is everything clear and easy to comprehend?
- Is your menu intuitive?
- Is the design user-friendly?