Blogs and Bounce Rates - What You Need to Know

Lots of bloggers get concerned about their ‘bounce rate’ when they begin to look at statistics around people reading their blog.

Bounce rates refer to the number of users who visit our websites and bounce right back out.  They don’t engage with the site or visit any new pages.

Bounce rates are of real concern when looking at data about your site as they demonstrate the percentage of traffic that does not find your site appealing.  This can lead to discussions about the look and content of your home page and how you market yourself to internet users.

But for blogs it is not this simple, and if your data is telling you that you have a high bounce rate, there may be a simple reason.  And it has nothing to do with the quality and usability of your site.

Many visitors to a blog will be following a link.  That link may have been found on a search engine, via an email subscription, or shared through social media.  That link leads the user to a particular page or entry on your blog.  One page only.

What a bounce rate doesn’t take into account is how blogs are accessed by readers.  Often, a reader who comes in and looks only at the page that the link led them to HAS DONE EXACTLY WHAT WE WANT THEM TO DO. They looked at the new entry on the site, and went back to their day.  This one page keeps them up-to-date with what we wanted them to know.

A high bounce rate on a blog may not be the end of the world.  You may have a number of very keen readers who read regularly and only need to keep updated with the new posts.  Instead, look at how your traffic has come to your blog. Are they coming from social media or email subscriptions? Perhaps this will explain your bounce rate, and will give you some other indications of areas to focus on.

This post was original published on www.mypersonalblogger.com.au