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I would like to preface this post by saying that there are many many folks out there that know far more than I when it comes to metrics and analytics. This is another post in the Online Media 101 series that I do where I try to simplify and start with the basics on certain core areas of online marketing. I wanted to state that early because I can envision the kind of replies that I am going to get from this post. So now that the disclaimer is out of the way let’s proceed.
When it comes to analyzing what is happening on your web site and how well your marketing is doing there is an incredible amount of information available to you even if you do not have the money to pay for a analytics program. Google offers what I think is an excellent analytics program and you cannot beat the cost, it’s free and fairly easy to install.
Now depending on what kind of web site you have, you will have different success metrics. For an e-commerce site, you want users to buy; a lead generation site, you want users to fill out a form and for a content site, you want users to hang out and read your content. Though no matter what kind of web site you have, I believe there are a couple of key areas that everyone should initially pay attention to when analyzing your web traffic. I am going to start simply and focus on just one.
Bounce Rates - A bounce rate defined by Google is the percentage of single-page visits (i.e. visits in which the person left your site from the entrance page). Simply put, a bounce rate measures how many users landed on one page of your site (not necessarily your home page) and immediately left your site without clicking on any other link on your web site. They saw and hopefully looked at one page and then left by either clicking back on their browser, clicking on a bookmark, typing in a new URL or closing the browser window.
No matter if your web site is big or small, you want every page of that site to drive users to do that single goal we discussed earlier. Bounce rates have always shown me whether my web site is accomplishing that single goal I am striving for. When I come across a web site of my own or a clients with a high bounce rate, it is telling me that I am not doing a good enough job selling the value of this web site. If I am seeing a bounce rate of over 85%, I immediately want to take a look at which specific pages on the site have the highest bounce rates and find ways on how I can decrease that number.
The first three things that I look at is the web sites look and feel, navigation and content. Is my look and feel appealing to my target market? Do I look credible? Do I have sound navigation that users can easily find what they are looking for and does my content speak appropriately to the market I am looking to reach?
I would love to hear from you on what you have done to combat high bounce rates and what has worked and not worked for you, let me know.
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Technorati Tags: analytics, Online Media 101, online marketing, analytics program, success metrics, e-commerce, web traffic, Bounce Rates, bounce rate
I’ve been thinking about bounce rates some lately and I’m sort of headed down the path that too low a bounce rate might be more of a problem that too high a bounce rate for a blog.
If the bounce rate is too low it might be an indication that you are not bringing readers back to your blog very well.
Anyways, it’s always important to remember that none of these numbers exist in a vacuum.
Dane,
I totally agree with you that none of these number exist in a vacuum. The way I approached this was for someone just starting to work with analytics, where is a good place to start instead of just focusing on hits and page views. Thanks for the comment.
Cord, to tack on to numbers not existing in a vacuum, it makes sense to look at bounce rates as it relates to time…specifically for content sites/blogs.
For example, if your site shows up in search results and I click and read an article, then you’ve met my need and I can leave. That’s certainly not an unsuccessful user session. Same deal if I go to your site directly or from my RSS reader.
So, when you look at bounce rates, take into consideration the goal of the page. 85% might bounce. But if 60% took 3 minutes to read through the content, then you have much less to worry about.
Hi Cord
Long time, no comment
I have a pretty atrocious bounce rate on my blog, but I really think it’s the nature of the beast. Say a regular subscriber clicks through, then more than likely they are only going to stick around to read that one post. Similarly, a “search and run” from Google, which may or may not provide the info a searcher is looking for.
Not sure if you’re familiar with Avinash’s Occam’s Razor, but he explains blog analytics really well.
Nice to see you back
While my main goal is to increase my average time on site stats (good comment Jeremy), I recognize that decreasing the bounce rate and increasing average page views factor into that.
I am doing a redesign right now to help hit my target. Here are the 3 design elements that focus on bounce rate:
1. Related Posts with each post (adding to RSS feeds too)
2. Top Posts and Featured Post above the fold.
3. Excerpts… my posts are usually long (I notice you do this too Cord).
There are 2 issues that affect a site/page bounce rate.
What’s on the page and where the user came from.
In most cases, the rate alone is a useless metric. For example. I run a life insurance site for a client with a number of different traffic sources.
On PPC, we see a 30% conversion rate on lead gen and for Banner Media its more like 5%. Media is now is 50% of our site traffic and our bounce rate is sky high compared to when we just had the PPC running.
The trick is to understand what a bounce rate means for a site not just based on on site issues but also from a traffic source perspective.
If your blog (since you guys love to talk about blogs) gets a ton of stumble or digg traffic, don’t expect meaningful intel from your bounce rate analysis unless you consider it by source.
Just wanted to fill in that little gap in coverage.
Back into work-is-kicking-my-ass oblivion.
Thanks again for a post worth comment.
I agree that Google Analytics is a good friend for investigating bouncing users.
I tend to take a look at the characteristics of the visits that bounce. Where did they come from? What search terms or which referrers?
Then try and get into the head of the users that came from that direction. What were they looking for? What was going through their head? What ultimately turned them off when they landed on my site?
Thinking through your key user scenarios is invaluable stuff here :]
For bounce rate metrics try http://www.pagealizer.com/
Pagealizer helps site owners get insight on how powerful their site content is. Pagealizer shows you in great detail how long people stay on your page (effective bounce rate), how far they scrolled down the page and where they clicked.
With such a great variety of users (different platforms, bandwidths, security levels, etc.), it’s almost impossible to build a site that won’t push away some people for reasons beyond content. However, in general, it’s best practice to format your site in a way that it engages a visitor in the most relevant content within 7 seconds. This primarily involves knowing who your audience is (not an easy task), and what they are coming to your site to find.
In general, I think that haviing a limited number of clear options for browsing helps ensure that the site effectively engages its visitors.
Jeremy Gregg, Editor
The Raiser’s Razor
http://theraiser.blogspot.com/