Why is Bounce Rate important for SEO?

Posted 20-04-2012 by Joseph

What is Bounce Rate?

In the world of digital marketing the term ‘bounce rate’ is associated with traffic to and from webpages. If a website has a high bounce rate it implies that consumers are simply clicking on the site from a search and then going straight back to the search engine screen without checking any of the other pages on the site.

The reason it’s important for SEO

One of the main reasons bounce rate is important when conducting SEO on a website is it’s a good indicator to whether customers think the information on the site is relevant. If the bounce rate is high for a particular webpage it could mean a number of different things; firstly it could mean that the landing page has poor usability which could deter potential customers from staying on the webpage. A further reason a webpage may have a high bounce rate is because the landing page is not optimized to meet their needs. For example if a customer enters an online sports site looking for a pair of trainers and once they enter the webpage there are no clear links to the location of trainers or the content is inappropriate they may be inclined to leave and enter a site where they can easily find the product they are looking for. This is how bounce rate can be important for SEO as it can signal that the webpage may have some problems that need fixing and therefore may need to undergo a website audit to boost its optimization and therefore increase its ranking in Google.

How much of a factor is bounce rate for SEO?

Google Analytics expert Avinash Kaushik states,"My own personal observation is that it is really hard to get a bounce rate under 20%, anything over 35% is cause for concern, 50% (above) is worrying”. This shows that bounce rate can factor in as very important to SEO for if consumers are not staying on the website long enough to buy the products or services then the business is going to have a big problem. Some of the ways a business can counter having a high bounce rate on their site is by using a good webpage layout and design with organised content to make it as user friendly as possible. Ensure the meta tags and the headers are relevant to the context and each page is well optimized for at least one or two keywords in important areas of the content. And finally try to get some good links pointing to your page. Make sure they contain the correct anchor text. You can lure other webmasters to link to your pages by placing good content in your pages. All of these strategies can help decrease the bounce rate of your webpage which can ultimately lead to customers staying on your site longer and potentially increase the conversion rate of your site hence enhancing sales and profits.