Bounce Rate at 45% - How to Improve?

[Prime85]

Good Morning...

I've been reviewing my G analytics to try and figure out how to convert better, and I see that my site's avg bounce rate is at 45%...

What's the best way to improve bounce rate on my site and help convert visitors to customers?

Please let me know if you need any additional info about my site to try and help me get to the bottom of this...

Thanks a lot!

[DavidKonigsberg]

I would need to see the site and where your traffic is coming from to try to help you.

Basically its either a problem with

1-your site and the user experience

2-Your traffic isnt targeted enough

3- Your industry//page has that type of bounce rate since they find what they are looking for quickly

4-Also see if some pages/ sources have a better bounce rate.

[Vanessa12]

Generally, bounce rate means someone landed on your site and left, without visiting any other pages. To improve bounce rate you have to figure out why people are leaving. FIrst scenario: Someone landed on your site and did not find what they wanted. Second scenario: Someone got to your site, got their answer and left. In the first case, you are not answering their query, which means your page is not relevant to their search. In analytics you can look at your top Content and see which pages are the most visited. I would start here in order to identify which pages have the highest bounce rate. Make sure those pages give users what they are looking for. Not sure what industry you're in but I don't think 45% is necessarily bad, and bounce rates vary depending if it's a legal site, ecommerce, etc.

In the second scenario, if people find what they want and leave, then identify the action you want them to take. Sometimes, the only goal is for someone to call you and if you have good call-to-actions then maybe this is what's happening. If you are not converting then you have to dig deeper and identify what's going on. (Not certain, but I think you can use Funnels in Analytics to identify how users interact when on your site.) Make sure there are other elements on the page for users to contact you, visit your Facebook page, sign up for your newsletter, etc. Also look at your top keywords and make sure they are on target (relevant) for your pages.

This is assuming your site has good design, structure, etc.

[Ben_Alvord]

You might also want to consider using Google Analytics virtual pageviews and custom events for tracking of interactions on your site which are not tracked by default.  This would include things like:

• Download of PDF or other 'non web page' files.
• Social media interactions ('likes' and 'shares')
• Clicks that show/hide content elements with CSS and/or JavaScript

Tracking these interactions in Google Analytics will lower your bounce rate, though obviously you would not actually be improving the user experience of your site.  I think though, that having your bounce rate be affected by meaningful user interactions on your site like these will give you a better sense of what your 'true bounce rate' is (meaning, the percentage of users who come to your site and literally do nothing).