Ever land on a website and then hit the back button right away? That’s called bouncing, and it happens a lot more than it should—in some cases, up to 90% of the time!
Let’s talk about why this happens—and four things you can do to stop it.
1) Don’t Break Your Promises…
Ruin trust and you’re already on thin ice.
Your leads didn’t just stumble onto your site. Whether they saw an ad, a link, or a search result, they came because they were expecting something specific—so make sure you provide it.
I see a lot of companies use overly provocative ads or metadata. This can be great for getting clicks, but if your site doesn’t deliver on the expectations you’ve set, visitors will bounce. You can’t promise someone you’ll cure cancer in an ad and then try to sell them vitamin gummies. The expectations need to match. And if Google sees a lot of bouncing, it’ll charge you more to show your ads and downgrade you in search results.
(If you’re wondering about “metadata”—that’s how you tell Google what to say about your site when displaying it in search listings. If you don’t send this to Google, it will pick random text from your site and you will also miss out on clicks—reply to this email if you want me to take a look at what metadata you are sending now.)
2) …And Deliver on Them Quickly
Most people come to your site to solve a problem, not read a novel. Especially on mobile with short attention spans, your site needs to get to the point within the first few seconds. If visitors don’t see that they’re going to get their problem solved quickly, they will bounce.
If you’re selling generic socks, this is easy—just send them to your product page and call it a day. But most businesses are more complicated than that, where you do need to explain your product or service. In such cases, these techniques will help:
- Make sure it’s obvious within the first 3-5 seconds what problem you solve, who you solve it for, and at least a hint at why you’re credible to solve it.
- If you need to convey a lot of information, break it up. Use several smaller linked pages instead of one long one. Or, if you use a long page, include a table of contents with internal links at the top.
- Use images, charts, and videos where possible to break up walls of text.
- Focus on what’s important for your customer. That you’re a family business with 50 years of history is nice, but not the first (or second) thing they need to know about you. The point isn’t to talk about how great your company is; it’s to talk about how your product or service can solve their problem.
3) Get Out of the Way
Don’t make your leads hate you before they even get to know you.
We’ve all been there—trying to read something online when chatbots start pinging, videos start blaring, and pop-ups attack the screen. It’s frustrating, right?
Here’s the thing—literally no one designs a website to do this. But so many websites end up in this state. Why? Because every decision along the way makes sense… until you add them together.
A chatbot’s a great idea. Popups for your mailing list can help. Banners to highlight a sale add value. But when you do these all at once… you become the Vasa.
(The Vasa was a Swedish warship built with so many cannons it could dominate any other ship… except it was so loaded down by its own artillery that it sank before it could even leave the harbor.)
So, audit the user experience. Use a Chrome browser in incognito mode to see your site as your users see it, or try services like UserTesting and Userlytics. And don’t forget to test on mobile devices—most traffic comes from mobile, and Google primarily indexes based on mobile performance.
4) Drive Users to the Next Step
Ok, you’ve got someone to your site and delivered on your promises… what then?
Again, sometimes this is easy. Gym socks need a checkout button and you can call it a day, but more sophisticated products require more sophisticated user journeys. After whatever they got from your landing page, make sure you have a next step planned for their journey. More info? Sign up for a demo? See some case studies? These may even be different answers for different customer segments or different stages of the buying process.
Good analytics and experience turning traffic into sales becomes crucial here. We recently helped a SaaS company boost its conversion rate from 5% to 12%—that’s almost 2.5x more sales without spending an extra cent on ads or generating traffic.
Let’s recap.
Reducing bounce rates is tough but doable.
Here’s a checklist to make sure you’ve got your bases covered:
- Align your promises: Make sure your ads, links, and meta tags reflect the content on your site.
- Get to the point: Communicate what you offer and how it solves your customer’s problem from the get-go.
- Respect the user’s journey: Avoid intrusive plugins—anything that might disrupt the user experience. Test the flow from a visitor’s perspective.
- Guide the next step: Provide clear paths for users to follow after they’ve engaged with your initial content.
P.S. It’s tough to do the first time, but with experience you’ll see the patterns to look for. If you’ve got a webpage you’d like us to look at, you can book a time to chat with me here.