When looking at your traffic tracking software to see what your bounce rate is, have you noticed that when a visitor comes to your website, they immediately leave? (using Google Analytics, Get Clicky, etc.)
Do you know why?
Let’s look at some of the common reasons and see if any of below could be the culprit of your high bounce rate. So, what can make the visitors leave your site?
- The site/page content doesn’t reflect the site/page name and meta description that visitors see in the SERP
It’s an obvious issue, why people instantly leave your page site. If a person is seeking for some topic, problem solution, service or product, he is looking at the page name and snippet below it. If they meet user’s needs, he, of course, click on the result. But if the page is about some other things or doesn’t directly reflect what the visitor is seeking for, he closes the site. So, make sure that all your page title, meta description tags are relevant to the page content. You always should look what users search and then depending on it build your blog content plan.
One more tip you have to answer the one reader’s intent on the one page and at the beginning of the article. Because everybody loves to find the answers quickly.
- Music on Autostart
Do you think a person at work or holding a sleeping baby wants to go to a website and all sudden music starts? What is the first they do? Close the window because it’s the fastest way to make it go away. They don’t have time to turn down their speakers or find the settings to turn it off on your site so do not make them.
- Videos on Autostart
Did you read #1? If so, this one requires no explanation.
- Poor Navigation
A few years ago there was a report that said if your visitor cannot mentally navigate your site within 5 seconds or less, they are gone. Look at your website and see if the site makes sense. Perform some A/B testing to improve the site navigation making it easy and logical.
- Poor Article Layout
While graphics & photos are great (because people love visuals) sometimes they need a little more. Keep it clean and always keep it consistent with your site. If a reader is coming back again and again, you want them to be in their comfort zone.
The next questions you should care about while preparing your blog post:
- Does your visitor have to scroll… and scroll… and scroll?
- Is your header so large that it takes up most of the page?
- Are your photos overwhelming the site?
- Are you switching between centered text, left align and then right?
- Poor content:
Broken sentences that make no sense, poor grammar and misspellings are easy ways to make a person not want to read what you have written. And, what is worse — you might be penalized by search engines for spelling errors. Oh, wait, what is worse is the visitors thinks you have the education of a 3rd grader.
- Links
Are all your links leading to another site? Do you have any internal links within your content encourage other pages? If you have your related posts plugin, it’s ok. But pay attention that all link you place will be really connected by the subject. One more kind of link inserting is a list for reference at the bottom.
- Open in New Window
When you add a link to your site that leads to another page/post on your site do you have it open to a new window? If so, this could be considered a bounce with your traffic software.
- Too Much Advertisement
If you place the ads from AdSense, make sure that banners don’t take too much place on the page don’t interfere the reading. Pay attention that advertisement will be relevant to your site content and don’t irritate readers. These tips are also applied to the ads within the content. So, don’t break your content with a lot of promotional materials.
Like I said before, these are just a few of the “common issues” that might be making a person leave your site as soon as they get there. We will discuss other ways on how to improve your bounce rate as you progress with your blogging.
