Checked Analytics and my bounce rate is 83.22% Seems very high to me when my site is packed full of original content and is a fairly new blog. Will this end up hurting me in terms of SERPs?
Currently I don't think Google uses bounce rate data in its algorithm. Many people believe that they will eventually use bounce rates in the ranking algorithm. So in time this high bounce rate could hurt your rankings. I think a lot of blogs would have a high bounce rate because the homepage is packed full of so much text. A user can read through your homepage and know if you have the information they need. They don't have a need to click deeper into your website. To improve bounce rates for your blog here are some things you could try: -clip each post on the homepage and have a 'read more' link -limit the number of posts on your homepage -add enticing internal links throughout your posts and navigation -get more links to individual pages so that people land on those posts more often and end up going to your blog's homepage too
high bounce rate indicates that the user has performed a asearch and not found the information they have searched for. look at the time your visitors spend on site and if it is a long time say in to order of 5-10 minutes then people are actually reading the content, if it is short in terms of seconds or 1-2 minutes then clearly your keywords are incorrect
Bounce rate is particularly high in cases where one indulges in traffic exchange program. I feel such efforts are truly waste of time and money as it just reflects in your traffic stats without substantially benefiting you in any manner.... If you are able to catch organic traffic, then you are sure to have a lower bounce rate... Regards, RightMan
I believe Google absolutely do use bounce rates when determining rankings in the search engines. They are all about relevant content, and they want to give the users (searchers) the content they are looking for. A bounce (back arrow click) is a vote for content (a negative vote). If you think about it, it is user moderation to a degree (and open to abuse). But from a programming point of view, it would be quite easy to implement, so I absolutely think they do take it into account. The fact that google analytics track bounce rate is no co-incidence One of these days I am going to test this on a range of IP addresses, and see if I can "influence" web site rankings by bouncing. Cheers Tim
Bounce rate is becoming a ranking factor, so you definitely should take care of it. Firstly, just looking at the over all bounce rate is not helpful. You need to dig deeper Is this ppc or natural seo? Now look at the bounce rate of individual pages and bounce rate of key terms. The bottom line is your key terms are either not completely relevant to the landing page, or your page is just not interesting enough for visitors to stick around
I agree that bounce rate will factor into SERPs. How much a factor it will play depends upon how reliable the data set. Is it plentiful, consistent, noisy, easily manipulated, spammable, etc? But regardless of whether or not bounce rate affects SERPs, you should always strive to lower it. What good will it do you to rank #1 for your keyword if nobody engages with your site? Some things that affect bounce rate: Relevance (keyword, title, description, link text) Integrity (you are what you say you are) Ascetics (do you have ads all over the place? are you web 2.0 or do you look outdated? color scheme. readability) Load Time Engagement (what can i DO on your website? - read, explore content, shop, video, communicate, use a widget, play games, etc) Navigation (will visitors find what they are looking for using your navigation structure? do you have a good CMS?)
To add up, design of the site also affect the bounce rate percentage. I agree that search engines count bounce rate to their results but it is just a small part of it.
mine bounce rate is around 60%... and i think that ranking and bounce rate are directly proportioanl to each other
If your bounce rate is high then you have to check these points Title tag relevancy with your content The Keywords you are optimizing Is the content is appealing think like a general visitor and think are you able to find each and everything Take a look though which keywords visitors are coming to your site and on which page they are coming compare the relevancy again Hope you understand.
To reduce the bounce rate concentrate on content, design, links of website. Content should be informative, fresh and appropriate to your service. website design should be user friendly and links should not be broken.
Here are some simple tips on how to lower bad bounce traffic. * Make sure your site is compatible with at least 5 major browsers (Firefox, IE, Opera, Safari, Netscape) * Make sure to select a host than can load your site in not more than 5 seconds. * Have a good site design. Have your site reviewed by other people in Namepros,Sitepoint, Digitalpoint, or Warrior forum. Ask their opinion about your layout and overall design. Ask them about your site's speed as well. * Analyze your traffic daily, know the sources, and remove those advertising practices that brings you bounce traffic. * Enhance your advertising method that brings real and low-bounce traffic. * Always put hyperlinks in your articles. You may highlight important keywords and link it to your other related articles. * Write great contents (I cannot explain how but you know it already when you are not copying someone's article). - Jopson
You said that you have alot of original content, but have a high bounce rate. Is there any misconceptions with your traffic source that could be contributing to the higher bounce rate?