Estimated reading time: 5 mins
Websites are full of different statistics that you can view through analytics software. You’ll find things relating to your traffic figures, how people find your site, and your bounce rate.
What is bounce rate?
Like pretty much everything else relating to website, bounce rates are complex. Figuring out your bounce rate involves different calculations, but there is a simplified definition. Basically, it refers to the amount of people who visit your website, then leave without completing any other action. They’re on there, then they bounce; simple.
What is a good bounce rate?
Bounce rate is displayed as a percentage, and it’s usually found that anywhere between 41% and 55% is good. Any higher than that and you’re entering bad territory – a bounce rate over 70% is considered dreadful.
Okay, this is all interesting, but why the heck is it important? What’s so special about your bounce rate that makes it the most critical statistic for your site?
Bounce Rate Influences Search Ranking
We’ll start off with the biggest reason to be wary of your bounce rate; it influences your search ranking.
There have been plenty of reports that state Google uses bounce rate as a way of ranking websites. The logic behind this is pretty sound. Google wants to rank websites that are useful to searchers and contain good content that will actually benefit them. So, if a site has a high bounce rate, then this means it doesn’t have anything good on it to keep people there.
Think about it; if everyone lands on a site then leaves almost instantly, it must be a pretty lousy website. Google sees this and considers your bounce rate when ranking the site. As a result, you have to ensure you’re getting into the excellent range if you want to rank highly.
Remember, a lot of traffic comes from search engines – it’s how most people find out about your website. With a lousy ranking you will see less traffic, gain less exposure, and find it challenging to grow.
A Bad Bounce Rate Indicates Poor Web Design
You will learn a lot from this statistic, the least of which is that it shows you your site is poorly designed. Remember, web design refers to everything on your website – not just the way it looks. But, an aesthetically unappealing site can deter people right away. Lots of users may bounce just because they hate the way your website looks and don’t trust it.
So, if you have a shockingly bad bounce rate, then it should be a kick up the backside for you. Hire a web design agency to look at your site and improve it. You’ll be amazed at how quickly you can drop your bounce rate by just upgrading the design and changing the way things look. Good design makes an excellent first impression. If you make an excellent first impression, you encourage people to stay for longer and complete an action.
All of this is made more vital when you consider the impact web design has on your brand. If you’re rocking a poorly designed site, it makes your entire organisation look poor. So, to maintain a good reputation, you need a great website.
A Good Bounce Rate Tells You Which Pages Are Doing Well
Typically, when you use Google Analytics to check your site stats, you will see a sitewide bounce rate. This is the average bounce rate for your entire website. It can still be a useful figure, but things are better when you filter it down to individual pages.
As a consequence, you can compare bounce rates between landing pages or different parts of your site to see which ones are doing better than others. Therefore, you can work on improving the weaker pages and boosting your overall sitewide bounce rate.
Consider the importance of this for landing pages that people end up on after clicking on an ad you published. If you find that some landing pages have a better bounce rate than others, then you need to explore why. Try and make the other landing pages as good as the best ones, and you will get a better return on your advertising investment. More people will actually complete actions after clicking on your ads, which can lead to more sales!
A Bad Bounce Rate Shows A Bad User Experience
User experience is definitely a key term in the world of web design and business. I would go as far as to say that your business website should be built around the idea of creating a positive user experience.
When you do this, you get people visiting your site and enjoying their time there. This makes them more likely to make purchases, sign up for newsletters, etc. They’re also more likely to have a positive perception of your company. They see you in a good light, and they might recommend you to other people.
But, if someone has a bad user experience, all of the opposite things happen. Your brand suffers as people are unhappy about your site. The thing is; how do you know if people have a bad user experience? There might be some negative reviews or social media comments, but most people only leave these after using your service or buying your products. When it comes to websites, bad user experience is typically shown by a bad bounce rate.
If you can’t keep people on your website, then it must be creating a bad user experience. This is dreadful for your public image, and you need to work on improving things.
Summary: Improve Your Bounce Rate!
What should take away from all of this? Mainly, you need to pay attention to your bounce rate. It’s a statistic that tells you so much about your website and can influence things like lead generation and sales figures.
Therefore, you should also work on improving your bounce rate. There are lots of ways you can do this; but, start with an excellent site design that offers a brilliant user experience.
