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[Adam Goldman Contribution Level: 2]

Hey guys,

I've read Jason's last post about 404 page and broken links,
and I installed the pluggin that notifices you when someone goes to a broken link.

As it turns out,
I get more than 20-30 broken links a day.
And I have a bounce rate of 60%.

Anyone here experiencing the same problem?
Got an Idea how to fix this?

And what is bounce rate exactly?

Thanks a lot for all the help guys!

Adam

[Jacob Perry Contribution Level: 1]

Im curious to know what bounce rate is also.

[Shirland Carrington Contribution Level: 2]

Bounce rate is how long a visitors stays on your blog or website. When you enter a site that have absolutely nothing to do with your search you automatically get off that site. If you find content that is relevant to you search then you will spend some time on that site. This looks good in the eyes of Google because people are finding good information and not leaving your site immediately.

[David Johnson Company: Numis Network Contribution Level: 2]

The way I understand bounce rate this is the percentage of people who come to your website, but do not click on your website. This could be bad or good, depending on the purpose of you website. If you are just giving information, this could mean they found what they wanted to know and left. It could also mean that they did not find what they wanted to know and left.

One way I have found to decrease the bounce rate in almost half is to use a plugin called Post Teaser. This puts only part of your post on the front page. If they want to read the whole post they have to click on the more link. Since I started doing this my bounce rate has decreased.

Recently I moved my blog to a new hosting company and lost all my older posts. I found a very cool plugin called Smart 404. If someone comes to a page that no longer exists, the plugin does a search on your posts and tries to come up with a match. It works great.

When I changed my blog hosting company I changed the permalink structure also. Some of my old links would give the user a 404 error, but with the plugin it takes them to correct page.

[Adam Goldman Contribution Level: 2]

Hey david,

yeah I use smart 404 too.
and also I use the "more" button,
it comes with wordpress, no need for the plugin

Thanks for the response!

Adam

[Erica Jones Company: Talk Fusion Global Contribution Level: 3]

Hey Guys
You can also get around broken links if you have changed your permalink structure or moved your site using deans permalinks migration plugin. This brilliant little plugin fixes your bad links and sends people to your new link.
You can find more info if you google it.

Cheers
Erica

[Adam Goldman Contribution Level: 2]

Hey ercia,

Thanks for your answer!

I'm not losing any visitors,
my problem is entirely with search bots.

This pluggin won't help me with that I think

[Steven Downward Contribution Level: 1]

Hey Adam

I have never experienced a lot of brocken links myself but I do not have that plugin that you are talking about that shows them too you for your own blog.

In the way of what a bounce rate is, as far as I know and understand, it's the amount of time a visitor spends on your site. If a visitoris only on your site for a second, they obviously did not find your site useful. But if they were there for a while, they must like your site. Google tracks this in the way of a bounce rate. So the lower your bounce rate, the better your site looks to Google in the way of the relivence of your content.

Hope this makes sense and thanks for mentioning about Jasons post on the 404 plugin.