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You are here: Home / blog / Bounce Rate – Good or Bad???

Bounce Rate – Good or Bad???

in blog, search engine optimization on 06/24/15

Bounce House like bounce rate DPC 2Unless you are a kid at a birthday party on one of those Bounce Houses – for us adults, bounce rate is usually considered a bad thing. But why?

The term bounce rate is used when a visitor navigates away from the site it was directed to, after only viewing one page.  It is calculated, in percentage, by the number of site visitors who leave after only visiting one page, essentially.  Let’s not forget that this doesn’t always (depends on the analytics) include a length of time on one page. For example, if you land on this blog, read it and leave, it might be considered a bounce. So, you still think this is a bad thing? Not necessarily.  Bounce rate isn’t always bad

A bounce rate is typically seen as a bad thing because if someone comes to your site, looks at one page and leaves, it must be bad, right? Wrong.

Why a bounce rate wouldn’t be a bad thing:

  • The visitor was driven to your page, they found what they wanted and left
  • They went to your site to find your contact info, and well, if you have that on every page or in the header, they will easily find that. (phone number, address, email)
  • Sometimes I like to find out that a place is open before I go there – duh, what are their hours, and when doing a search for xyz store near me hours – the Google Gods should get me to the page with their hours. Check out how to search better here.
  • They were looking for your rates and the page they landed on was your pricing page so they got what they wanted.

Bounce rate could be bad

Of course there are always two sides to the coin, so if the bounce rate isn’t good, it must be bad. You either get the right people to your website, or the wrong people.  So, take a look at why they might have bounced and work on your website. Your website isn’t a one and done thing, so you should be working on it monthly!

  • Is your website ugly? Well, yea, that could be a reason to bounce, for sure.
  • Is it user friendly? If your website isn’t up to the website standards (location of the search function, contact us page, navigation, etc) then they might be confused on where to look
  • Your website should be easy to read – your website might be killing your traffic, hmmm, that sounds familiar! Your website might be overly wordy, no visuals, crazy colors all of the place and etc…you’ll lose em.
  • What about boring? As if! Could your website be boring? See above, do you have pages and pages of words with no spacing, no pictures and etc –so if you aren’t Wikipedia – do something!
  • Your site loads slow, this could be a huge turnoff as well
  • Simply stated, they were directed to your website, by search engines and just didn’t see what they were looking for, on one page.
  • Expectations could be out of whack – like you had a PPC ad promising something for free and when they got to the page, it was 19.99 – false advertising – not good.
  • Responsive websites are huge these days so be sure that when mobile users are looking at your website, that it is easy enough to read, from all types of devices. When was the last time you looked at your site on your mobile device?

How to fix your high bounce rate?high bounce rate doesn't indicate bad site

Well, I’ve given you some suggestions above, but we can cover them some more here:

  • Be sure your website content is easy to read, easy to follow, with white space and headings breaking out the sections. Don’t forget visuals
  • Make sure you have easy to follow navigation just in case someone lands on the ‘wrong page’ of your website, they can easily find another. However, reminder, the point here is to NOT make the user work on your website!
  • Check out your analytics and find what terms people are getting driven to your website for. If you are a fitness trainer, online only and the search engines are sending searchers your way looking for a gym – that would be a good reason for them to bounce.
    • So, in this case, take a look at your content and your meta tags and be sure you are customizing them for THAT page and your website as a whole. If they are still clicking through, they are either – an idiot or –open for other options.
    • You could adjust your analytics so it tracks the amount of time spent on that one page to a lesser amount to be closer in line with a true bounce. (This is a coding thing)
  • Check out your load time and/or pop ups that may be sending folks away – ads and extra distractions can be a turnoff
  • Be sure your site is mobile and device friendly.

Food for thought – Mashable indicated in 2013 that the average bounce rate was 50%.

All in all, a lot of what can deter folks from your website is the speed/load of your page and then the look and feel of it. So, be sure it looks visually friendly and is user friendly. On the same note, be sure that each of your pages’ meta tags and content are specific to that page. Ultimately, this is what they will see in the search engine results page snippet and what search engines use to determine the authority of the page/website and relate to the search query.

Bottom line

Make sure your website isn’t ugly and slow – or your traffic will bounce. C-ya! Click To Tweet

Hopefully this has been a little helpful to you. One last thing would be to check your bounce rate and keep track of it, so if you have a 65% bounce rate every month for 6 months then all of a sudden it spikes or drops, it should be something to check out.  Let me know if you have any questions about bounce rate, website readability or search engine optimization. I’d love to help.

~Kristen

41 Comments

About Kristen Day

Kristen is a small business owner and thus dedicated to other small business owners by helping them improve their online presence with having a professional and mobile responsive website, then implementing search engine optimization and pay per click advertising all of which are necessary 'evils' in the digital marketing sphere but enables small business owners the opportunity to compete with larger companies. When not in the digital arena, you can find her hanging with her girlfriends, husband, drinking a margarita or shooting competition (not in that order).

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Comments

  1. Beth Niebuhr says

    07/01/2015 at 9:51 AM

    Nice article. You really made the possibilities clear and told us what to do about the things that might need fixing. You’re right in that people may just find what they want quickly and then leave. Nothing wrong with that though we do wish they’d read our every word, right!

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/01/2015 at 9:59 AM

      Girl.. no lie, sure do wish they read it all, they might understand a lot more things, right!?

      Reply
  2. Lisa Mason says

    07/01/2015 at 9:52 AM

    Great advice. A lot of people are confused about bounce rates and what they mean, It really can contain valuable info about how to change or improve your website.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/01/2015 at 9:58 AM

      So true, and ultimately the point is to provide an easy experience for the user.

      Reply
  3. Roslyn Tanner Evans says

    07/01/2015 at 11:59 AM

    Good info regarding bounce rate. I had assumed f hi no good, but I can see your explanations. As always easy to understand.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/01/2015 at 4:01 PM

      Thanks Roz! Glad it’s clearer for ya!

      Reply
  4. Beverley Golden says

    07/01/2015 at 2:59 PM

    Thanks for the explanation of how bounce rates might not actually be bad. I see a lot of people come to a specific post on my blog and then don’t necessarily navigate through the rest of the site. One of my ongoing issues, is my load time and it is a challenge to identify which plugins are actually slowing it down. We continue to tweak and modify so that bounce rates will improve. I think people often believe that bounce rate is always bad. I appreciate hearing the times it is bad and the times it isn’t, Kristen. Many thanks for the clear explanation!

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/01/2015 at 4:02 PM

      My pleasure Bev and you know, a lot of times, folks are doing their job well and getting Google, or search engines, to direct their traffic to the right pages, go figure. Get what you want and boom!

      Slow load time isn’t good at all.. so hopefully you can figure it out. Katrina, in our group, knows of an app to test the site and plugins and see which ones are slowing you down. Might try reaching out.

      Reply
  5. Lisa Swanson says

    07/01/2015 at 4:21 PM

    Great info and guide to check our website against! Very curious now to go see what keywords people were searching to get to me site!

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/02/2015 at 8:10 PM

      LOL.. always keeping you on your toes, love it! 😉

      Reply
  6. Carol Rundle says

    07/01/2015 at 7:28 PM

    I never really thought about bounce rate before. Thanks for the info, Kristen.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/02/2015 at 8:11 PM

      Just one more thing you have to think about, right Carol? lol

      Reply
  7. Michael Kawula says

    07/01/2015 at 7:37 PM

    Great explanation of Bounce Rates and when it’s good and bad. Seems it would be bad when someone leaves your page quickly but this proves it isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/02/2015 at 8:11 PM

      Thanks Mike… very true!

      Reply
  8. Lorii Abela says

    07/02/2015 at 4:16 AM

    Great effort in explaining thoroughly the good and bad sides of bounce rate.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/02/2015 at 8:13 PM

      Thanks Lori!

      Reply
  9. Janell McIlwain says

    07/02/2015 at 10:23 PM

    Great article. Nicely explained. Very enlightening. Thanks for sharing.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/06/2015 at 9:00 AM

      You are quite welcome Janell!

      Reply
  10. Katarina Andersson says

    07/03/2015 at 7:44 AM

    Thanks Karen, great tips and info as always. And I hope my website will not be boring…;-)

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/06/2015 at 9:00 AM

      Thanks Katarina.. your website isn’t boring…very enlightening for us non travelers, for sure! BTW, it’s Kristen, btw.

      Reply
  11. Erika Kalmar says

    07/03/2015 at 4:47 PM

    Great post, thank you! I never considered that a bounce rate doesn’t necessarily have to be bad…

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/06/2015 at 8:59 AM

      Good Erika, glad to help!

      Reply
  12. Beth says

    07/03/2015 at 6:01 PM

    I know I shouldn’t admit this but this is exactly why I really don’t pay attention to analytics . I feel like to some degree they are based on what one person or company decided is “good”. I used to work for a research and marketing company and totally believed in the product we provided but always told my clients to read the actual comments that people made about their business and not worry so much about percentages. So many more stories to be told when you listen rather than just analyze a bunch of numbers.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/06/2015 at 8:59 AM

      Well, I see why you may say that.. and that’s okay… so maybe you just follow it to see if it changes… like if you have an 80% bounce rate.. but one day it goes to 100… might want to check it out.. the numbers may be totally skewed, but they just made a drastic change, enough to check it out.

      Reply
  13. Coach Natalie Palombi says

    07/04/2015 at 2:41 PM

    Hm,. Yep I have a kinda high bounce rate 😮 I figure it will take time to get my blog/site to where I want it to be. That’s the fun of it though – always learning ways to improve!! 🙂

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/06/2015 at 8:57 AM

      High bounce rate isn’t so bad either.. just keep an eye on it and practice some good SEO and see if it changes. 🙂 Always learning and always improving! 😉

      Reply
  14. Liz Benoit Cozby says

    07/05/2015 at 9:28 PM

    Kristen, you’re going to laugh at the irony here. First, thank you for explaining meta tags. I’m having a hard time being a neophyte. Second, your meta tag hyperlink did the same thing mind are doing. 🙂 You might want to fix it, lol. Love ya, cupcake!

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/06/2015 at 8:56 AM

      So glad to help you with the meta tags… it’s okay, there are lots of neophytes out there… we are all one in some area, right? lol The hyperlinks on my page stay on my website, so that’s the difference. When linking to another website, they should open in a new window, when staying on your website, they can open in the same window, but thanks for thinking of me sparkly cupcake. <3 ya right back. https://www.avisualbusiness.com/down-dirty-link-building/

      Reply
  15. Jackie Harder says

    07/06/2015 at 2:22 PM

    I was so glad when you first explained why a big bounce rate is not necessarily a bad thing. You have great tips here for people to start searching for the reasons why so many people come and leave their sites.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/08/2015 at 8:37 AM

      So glad it was helpful Jackie! Thank you!

      Reply
  16. Ginny says

    07/06/2015 at 9:41 PM

    I learned a lot in this article. Bounce rates always cause a sick feeling in my stomach but the thought that they got what they came for is comforting!

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/08/2015 at 8:37 AM

      Sorry that bounce rate makes you ill Ginny, but glad that you know a little more now and know, it’s not always bad!

      Reply
  17. Alicia says

    07/08/2015 at 12:11 AM

    Reading this article clearly alerts me that I have some work to do on my site. My website is clean and user friendly. Unfortunately I don’t have a lot of sign ups or calls from my opt-in. I see that I have some work to do. Love this article.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/08/2015 at 8:38 AM

      I’ve heard from others Alicia that reading my blogs ALWAYS remind them that they have work to do on their own site, which is great, because we need to give our own websites love on a regular basis!

      Reply
  18. webly says

    07/08/2015 at 3:50 PM

    Great tips and I intend to apply some of them. The one thing I find that makes me run like Forest Gump for website. Some experts rave about them but I just find them obstructive unless the offer is really really juicy.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/09/2015 at 9:03 AM

      Thanks so much and I surely hope that you do apply some of there… there is a lot of value. I missed the 1 thing… what is it?… Offers? Pop ups?

      Reply
  19. George Marie says

    07/14/2015 at 11:03 AM

    This is a good, informative blog article. Sometimes, a higher bounce rate can be a signal that things on your website are working as they should, especially after a change is implemented. Mobile bounce rate will be higher, especially after you implement a mobile-friendly implementation.

    I’ve found that mobile bounce rates will be a little bit higher if you put your phone number somewhere obvious on your mobile homepage. Most people, when looking at a business website, are just looking for a phone number, which leads to a call to your business.

    I’ve also seen a few comments on this blog that address hyperlinking on your website. These can influence your bounce rate in a wide variety of ways. A trick I’ve learned to keep my referral traffic down is to find good websites to feature mine.

    Keep up the great work with your blogs and feel free to shoot us a question here at diib if you’d like.

    Reply
  20. George Marie says

    07/14/2015 at 11:03 AM

    This is a good, informative blog article. Sometimes, a higher bounce rate can be a signal that things on your website are working as they should, especially after a change is implemented. Mobile bounce rate will be higher, especially after you implement a mobile-friendly implementation.

    I’ve found that mobile bounce rates will be a little bit higher if you put your phone number somewhere obvious on your mobile homepage. Most people, when looking at a business website, are just looking for a phone number, which leads to a call to your business.

    I’ve also seen a few comments on this blog that address hyperlinking on your website. These can influence your bounce rate in a wide variety of ways. A trick I’ve learned to keep my referral traffic down is to find good websites to feature mine. A good website for generating referral traffic via backlinks is ezinearticles.

    Keep up the great work with your blogs and feel free to shoot us a question here at diib if you’d like.

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      07/14/2015 at 1:26 PM

      Thanks George!

      Reply
  21. Elizabeth O. says

    02/11/2016 at 6:52 PM

    I love those pointers, definitely helpful. If your blog hasn’t been doing well for a while I think it’s time to check those on the list, especially the ugly and boring part!

    Reply
    • Kristen Wilson says

      02/15/2016 at 5:45 PM

      Thank you Liz, glad you find the value.. even the boring stuff. lol

      Reply

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