I keep hearing tons of bloggers whine about bounce rate. For those of you who don’t know, a bounce is when someone visits your website and then leaves without going to any other pages. People are complaining that traffic generating sites like Entrecard, BlogCatalog, MyBlogLog, StumbleUpon, etc. increase your bounce rate. Sure. It happens. But is it really a problem? It doesn’t have to be.
What really irritates me is when people say “No one is reading my site. They visit once a day and then leave to go elsewhere.” You have a blog, right? If you don’t update every day yet people are visiting once a day, do you really expect them to stick around and read more? And if you do update once a day or even more than once a day, are all of your recent articles, and the full text of those articles right on your front page? If so, why should the visitor click anything? They can read everything right there.
Want to stop bounces? Here’s a few tips for you:
- Content – “Content is King!” We all have heard this and it’s true. If you provide good content and not stuff that’s been repeated over and over or poorly written articles, then people will like your site and read it. They may even check your archives just to get more.
- No Tricks – Don’t try and trick your readers into reading stuff. It’s a very untrustworthy practice and people will never visit your site again. A specific example is those fake “Entrecard” images that people are using. People don’t like being tricked.
- Paid Links – How are your readers supposed to trust you if all you do is provide affiliate links and paid posts? They see you’re making money with the posts. They probably feel that if you are getting paid you can’t be honest about the product. If you truly love the product and want to post an affiliate link, post a direct link and an affiliate link. This gives them the option of whether to support you or not and because you’re willing to link without an affiliate link, they are likely to trust your opinion more. Don’t worry, most will still pick the affiliate link because they admire you for your honesty.
- Update – Don’t expect readers for a weekly update to show up every day and read. Update every day if necessary. If you’re using one of those traffic driving sites, then daily updates is required to grab those readers.
- Read More – Split up your articles so that the full text is not on the front page. Give a teaser and then a “read more” link so they can read the entire article. This only works with good teasers that are obvious enough to show that there’s more to the article. I don’t use this method to get clicks. I like giving my readers 3 articles on the front page with full text. But then again, I don’t whine about bounce rate either.
- Article Size – Average size of an article should be around 500-1000 words. Less normally means you don’t take the time to write it. More means people have to stick around too long to read it. You have to find that happy medium. As an example, this article is 570 words long.
There you have it. Stop whining and start giving people reasons to read more.
Written by Mike White of Saphrym.com
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Perfectly put! I have seen alot of talk about bounce rates and haven’t paid much attention.. Entrecard is getting traffic in, and do the majority of them come to drop..yeap..but I have gotten some loyal readers and met some very interesting blog writers.
Great post
No doubt, it’s all in the writing. Short posts, using other published articles don’t do you no justice. Be original and create a niche that everyone will read on. Be daring in your approach, say what you want and always be you.
My sentiments exactly. Thanks! My feeling is the reason you join social sites/ marketing sites is to increase your visitors. Then they visit, and you whine because they didn’t stay longer.
If you gain even just one extra reader from a site such as Entrecard or whatever then the FREE cost to join was more than worth it.
Thanks guys. Glad you all liked it.
@Susie - I’ve gotten quite a few loyal readers from the traffic, so I completely agree.
@blogzilla - “always be you” - Amen brother.
@Jeff - Loyal readers for FREE is always good.
I once worried about my bounce rates, which is more than 50%. But now I can take it easily as my blog content was not a popular one and only die hard supporters are staying to read my article about our team current situation
@Susie - It’s good you haven’t payed attention to “BOUNCE RATES” because it seems like it isn’t important to anyone now.
@Jason - Thanks!
@blogzilla - Well sad
@Jeff - Of course free traffic is good, but I still somewhat disagree with Saphrym’s post
@Saphrym - Thanks again
Maybe you can write for us again?
@shearyadi - Mine is around 70%, so don’t worry
I recently wrote about bounce rate as well.
Digg has to be the worst by far
Not a complaint just a fact lol
Word. Nice tips and Matthew’s right about Digg
People says Stumble traffic is much better than Digg’s
Yes, bounce rates are funny. People understand them like 50%, but complain about them 110%. Good work.
Yeah, I agree,
if you have great content, you will get more visitors,
as simple as that.
If your bounce rate is high, it probably just means you need better content.
well because stumble is better than digg
[...] in detail with those 2 terms because most people know what it means, but here’s a link to my bounce rate post. Check The [...]
I’m willing to bet that probably half of your bounce rates are because of bots and what not. The traffic is bad so there isnt really any reason to get worked up about it…unless 100% of your traffic was bounce back. Then you might have something to worry about