Bounce rate in google analytics? 50, 60, or 80%?

Bounce rate in google analytics represents the % of visitors that leave your website without visiting another page and gives a hint to how interesting and/or relevant your content is for your visitor. A general rule of thumb, anyone who leaves a website within 10 seconds, without doing anything else would hit your bounce rate.

Is a high bounce rate bad? Not always…

Keep reading; let us break it down.

What is a good bounce rate?

A good bounce rate is defined as how many users leave your site after visiting one page. It's usually expressed in percentage (%) in your google analytics account.

The bounce rate arguably has a significant impact on the ranking of your page because Google, more than other search engines, sees it as an indication that people didn't like what they saw, so there must be something wrong with the content or trustworthiness of the website they sent visitors to.

What is a good bounce rate? There is a lot of conflicting information regarding a "good" bounce rate, but a good place to start would be 55% or less but it also depends on the content of the page a visitor is viewing. For example, pages that provide a downloadable file or document may experience higher bounce rates because the visitor is finished with their task, you could argue that is good traffic that’s converted into action.

A plumber, car mechanic, or any other call-out service may see high bounce rates in google analytics, but is it a problem? Not really, if most of the traffic is converting into an action such as phone calls or booking requests. If someone needs a service, do they need to stay on a website if all they want is a human to fix a problem? No. Google understands that, which is why your focus should be promoting your brand, and then keywords alongside. Be trusted!

What is a high bounce rate?

A high bounce rate depends on many factors, but primarily it's anything above 55% is worth looking into. Other factors that contribute are how relevant the content is to the page visitors land on, if there are no clear objectives of what visitors should do next or what you're trying to get them to do then a high bounce rate might cause your website issues with SEO or PPC performance. What is the purpose of your webpage? Read a blog or get them to call?

If you are looking at the bounce rate in your analytics, while reading this, you most likely have a problem.

How to improve your bounce rate?

To improve your bounce rate, you first need to know if it's a major issue that is hurting the performance of your website. If you're seeing high bounce rates on certain pages but not on others then it may be due to out-of-stock products, broken images, or outdated information being viewed. Do you need to fix something just because everyone claims a high bounce rate is bad? No. But if you have a page with a high bounce rate, no engagement & zero conversions, then it's probably time to see what can be done about it.

If you spot a page with a high bounce rate, compare it with other pages, what's different? Is anything broken? Is the content of the page outdated? Are visitors easily confused? Are there clear calls to action on the page, if so what do they lead to? Is there a reason for them being on that page?

What is an alarming bounce rate?

A high bounce rate can be seen in most cases as a negative user feedback mechanism and in some cases might tell you they didn't find what they wanted when they arrived at your website.

• Have you spent money on SEO or hired a copywriter?

• You could be optimised for the wrong keywords?

if so, your traffic is uninterested, which makes them leave quickly…. They've wasted a few seconds, and you've wasted hours on your website.

A bad bounce rate is simple, ignore SEO for a moment here

If your website is getting visitors, whatever your bounce rate, but getting no interaction at all, it's a bad bounce rate that needs looking into.

LET US BREAK DOWN BOUNCE RATES IN GOOGLE ANALYTICS

Why is my organic bounce rate so high?

If you have a high bounce rate in the ‘organic’ section of google analytics, it could be your website needs optimisation for the search engines to understand better what your website is about. You might be showing for keywords that are not relevant to your website; you need to be found for keywords that are relevant to your business. Check the pages. Are images loading, is the website fast?

However, is your traffic converting well? if so, an audit might be a good thing to do, could you squeeze in a few more calls or sales?

When you fire up your google analytics, is organic traffic bringing you the most traffic? If not, something could be quite wrong.

Social Media Bounce rate is very High

Think of social media like knocking on someone's front door while they're watching Eastenders; if what you say isn't going to interest them within a couple of seconds, they will close the door. Web traffic from social media will always be high, it is just how it is! People using social media are using whatever platform to be social, not be sold products, so you have to be relatable, trustworthy & within reason be an impulsive purchase.

if you have a high social media bounce rate, check the following: are your posts engaging? Are they just people being nosey? Is your website slow? To convert traffic from a social platform, you have to give everything fast, and let the customer find what you are offering quickly. Have you checked to see who really likes your social channels? Are they friends, family or people you work with, if so they already know what you do right?

How can I reduce the bounce rate on my paid search?

Metrics such as bounce rates are generally left for the web design team to figure out or the paid search term to obsess about without any clear strategy. Are you remarketing to the people that have already been to your website? If not, start!

Are the keywords you are paying for really the right ones? Just with SEO, you need to make sure that you are targeting your keywords properly, if someone clicks on your ad but doesn't convert, you've wasted both money and time. When you see high bounce rates in paid search, it is usually due to one of a few reasons such as; The keyword is very broad and has an ambiguous intent, the landing page does not match the ad, or the user experience on the landing page is poor.

When was the last time you tested the load speed of your website? If the site loads slowly, improperly, is ugly or is hard to navigate then you've not just lost a customer, you had to pay for the privilege. People who click adverts are well aware they've clicked just that, an advert so you need to send them to a clear, easy to use and/or engaging page that offers them something the other adverts didn't.

Direct Traffic Bounce Rate is quite high

Direct traffic is a valuable source of website visits, as it includes visitors who have bookmarked your website or have typed in your URL directly into their browser. However, if your direct traffic bounce rate is high, this could mean that visitors are not finding what they are looking for on your website and are leaving quickly.

Have you removed any URLs but forgotten to redirect them to the new page? Maybe you haven't set up any 301 redirects at all. This could be the reason why your website is experiencing a high bounce rate from direct traffic.

Sometimes, having Google Analytics installed improperly can cause massive issues with direct traffic with Google either over or under-reporting traffic.

Why is my referral traffic so high?

If you are getting a lot of traffic from referrals in Google Analytics, there is likely one or more links on other websites that mention your website. The next thing to do would be to find out who these people are by checking the landing pages for referral visitors and seeing what kind of content they have been reading.

We do believe that this is one area of bounce rate that Google really does use to work out if your content is good, or understand why a website has linked to your pages. If you are experiencing a high referral traffic bounce rate, it is likely because the content on the landing pages is not engaging enough for visitors. It could be that the website sending you traffic isn't related to your website at all. What is the purpose of the link?

Be warned, the referral traffic section in Google Analytics could be spam; a few years ago, there was a massive problem of spammy affiliates faking traffic to someone's website in the hope that a user would visit the website. Make sure you have some security system!

Keep an eye on your bounce rate?

It really is simple, check your Google Analytics every few days! If you don't check something, how will you know what to improve?

Check the traffic sources tab, top referrals, direct traffic and bounce rate. This is where you will find out what to improve on your site.

Not only do you have Google Analytics but maybe Google Webmaster Tools or even Bing webmaster centre - all of these check to see how well your website performs in the eyes of search engines and, more critical use this data to improve your client base!