Your bounce rate is one of the “quality traffic” indicators you can find in your Analytics account. According to Google, a bounce counts as  “a single-page session on your site. In Analytics a bounce is calculated specifically as a single session that triggers only a single request to the Analytics server, such as when a user opens a single page on your site, and then exits without triggering any other requests to the Analytics server during that session.”

To put it simply, if a person views your website and leaves promptly, this is considered a bounce. We view bounce rate as an indicator that your website is getting the type of traffic you need that would result in a conversion. A very high bounce rate means users are not finding the information on your website they are searching for.

Finding Your Bounce Rate

To find your bounce rate, go to your Analytics page and Acquisition > All Traffic > Channels. From here, you’ll see “Bounce Rate” listed under the “Behavior” column.

Measuring Bounce Rate

According to gorocketfuel.com, “a bounce rate in the range of 26 to 40 percent is excellent. 41 to 55 percent is roughly average. 56 to 70 percent is higher than average, but may not be cause for alarm depending on the website. Anything over 70 percent is disappointing for everything outside of blogs, news, events, etc.”

Excellent: 26-40%

Average: 41-55%

Above Average: 56-70%

Very High: Above 70%

What to Do If Your Bounce Rate is High

If you fall into the “Above Average” or “Very High” categories, it’s time to take a deeper look at your website. There are several reasons your bounce rate might be less than ideal, which we explore below.

Load Time

Site speed is incredibly important. In fact, we recently wrote an article on the subject, “Is Your Website Speed Killing Your Business?” Kissmetrics reported that just a one second longer load time could cost you 7% in conversions.

To test your website speed to find if this is a problem for your company, visit PageSpeedInsights, a free tool offered by Google.

Ease of Use

If visitors can’t find what they are looking for on your site they will leave and go to a more user-friendly site quickly. Make sure you have everything laid out so people can plainly see the actions you want them to take. To test this, have a group of people outside your organization attempt to complete various actions on your page. If they are unable to do so in a timely fashion, make sure you optimize your site as soon as possible.

How to Determine Whether Your Website Needs a Better Conversion Funnel

Content

If your website has a lot of thin or outdated content, you will lose visitors fast. Creating high-quality, relevant content is absolutely crucial for your website. If your bounce rate is particularly high, it’s worth doing a full-site audit to ensure your topics are relevant to your business.

How to Find the Best Content Opportunities with Google Trends

These are just a few of the things you can do to improve your bounce rate. To learn more about getting quality traffic to your website, contact us via our online chat!

By Amara Young