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[Roger Crews Company: Mandura Contribution Level: 2]

I have been using the internet for 2 yrs, to improve my quality of life, by marketing various business opportunities that I see great promise in.

They where chosen from the perspective of product,service, and comp plan.

During this process, I like anyone else have studied the technics and methods of promoting my business interest at any given time.

There are many different ways to analyze your campaigns effectiveness. And one of these is called bounce rate.

My question is this. What all do you consider when analyzing your bounce rate?

Is it primarily what you would see from google or some other means of tracking?

Or do you dig deeper than what you see on the surface?

Do you ever consider testing/split testing your ads with different headlines,color format.

I am sure there are other ways of testing I may not have considered and would greatly appreciate your advice

[Ilka Flood Company: SendOutCards Contribution Level: 4]

Hi Roger,

This is an excellent question and one I'd like some answers to as well

What I do is, I keep a very close eye on the bounce rate on my blog. From my understanding, the
better your keywords the lower your bounce rate. Which kind of makes sense. Because when people
click through to your website (from Google or wherever they found you) they want to find the info
they are looking for ... or they'll click away the second they get there.

The more relevant your keyword or keyphrase is to the info they are presented with when they
click through the better.

There's a lot more to it though. So I'll be looking forward to some of the experts' answers

By the way, I use Google Analytics to check my bounce rate.

[Tom Leonard Company: Shaklee Corporation Contribution Level: 1]

Testing is the only way to learn what works with your audience. There is Google Website Optimizer, which can be useful but not a simple thing to figure out at first.

Here is a link to more information:
http://www.google.com/support/conversio ... swer=77161

At first I thought they were being clever saying that it can be done in only 5 minutes. I have found that it takes a lot longer than this. But if you are getting plenty of traffic it can be a good way to lower that bounce rate.

I also use Google Analytics as it provides so much information.

Good luck!

[Ilka Flood Company: SendOutCards Contribution Level: 4]

Richard,

Thank you, for sharing your insights on what 'bounce rate' is. I understand it a lot better now.

[Mike Cook Company: Talk Fusion Global Contribution Level: 2]

Hi Roger,

One thing we need to consider is the term "Bounce Rate" is used to define two different things.

A bounce rate relative to your website is different than a bounce rate related to an email campaign.

An email bounce rate is how many emails did not make it to their destination. In other words, an email that never made it to it's destination is defined as "Bounced" For example, if you sent 100 emails and 20 of them were bad email addresses you will have a 20% bounce rate.

A website bounce rate referrers to the number of visitors, notice I didn't say people, that came your landing page than left. In other words, they did not go to any other pages of your website.

As stated earlier, it could be because of the content. Some websites just don't take the customer to the next step. Boring or not interesting content or maybe just not interested. Bottom line, if it is a real person visiting your site and they left after visiting your first page then they were not interested or the web developer/manager did not present the content properly.

NOW, One thing internet marketers need to consider is traffic coming to their websites from bunk sources. Believe it or not there are thousand of websites that promise a large amounts of traffic but they are based on poor ethics. The traffic you get may be from someone trying to get extra points in order to get traffic to their website. For instance, for every site they visit (call this "surfing"), they will receive one visitor back to their site.

So, they are clicking the link then leaving your site. In the process, they will get the same poor traffic.

The stats we have seen coming from these sites have a very very hit website bounce rate. 95%-100%

And what about all the bots out there. These are non human visitors to your website. Some of the people who use traffic exchanges will use a computer program to do the surfing for them to rack up thousands of points. Now you are getting traffic to your website and they are not even people. You will see a 100% website bounce rate from these.

Anyway, I wanted to share this with most people because most people only think about content and not the other variables that contribute to high bounce rates.

If you want people to visit your site, you have to ask people to visit your site. And, if your website contains the correct content, you will see a lot lower bounce rate...and even a higher Conversion Rate, but that's another post

[Mike Cook Company: Talk Fusion Global Contribution Level: 2]

Q. What all do you consider when analyzing your bounce rate?
A. Where the source came from and the content on your website.

Q. Is it primarily what you would see from Google or some other means of tracking?
A. Google Analytics is a trusted and robust reporting tool but any website statistics will provide you with the website bounce rate.

Q. Or do you dig deeper than what you see on the surface?
A. Always dig deeper.

Q. Do you ever consider testing/split testing your ads with different headlines,color format.
A. Yes, but not for bounce rate...conversion rate.

[Ilka Flood Company: SendOutCards Contribution Level: 4]

Mike,

From what I understand then... there's no way to analyze your bounce rate correctly then because of all the variables involved? And the best thing to do is keep an eye on it and keep it as low as possible?

[Mike Cook Company: Talk Fusion Global Contribution Level: 2]

Mike,

From what I understand then... there's no way to analyze your bounce rate correctly then because of all the variables involved? And the best thing to do is keep an eye on it and keep it as low as possible?

Hi Ilka,

The bounce rate is a great indicator to evaluate the traffic you are sending to your website. And, the bounce rate will vary on each of your e-marketing campaigns. But you can analyze it correctly and use it properly and yes, yes, yes...keep your eye on it.

A Case Study: Many Internet marketers use the Mandura System Website to make money. Each of them may use different e-marketing techniques. Some push market using email campaigns. Some use traffic exchanges, link exchange or banner ad programs. Some people pay search engines to get traffic and some people personally invite people to the website by using business cards (face to face). We have found each of these have a predictable bounce rate. For instance, the very nature of how traffic exchanges work (self promoting) result in a 95-100% bounce rate and we consider it a waist of time or time that can be utilized in another form of getting higher quality traffic to your site.

We are able to see what campaigns work and what campaigns don't work, initially from the bounce rate. A high bounce rate is an indicator that something is wrong, but it's not always your content. Often it is the traffic you are sending to the website. I know if I send my Mom and Dad who enjoy classical music to a Heavy Metal concert, even it is one of the best heavy metal bands on the earth, they will walk out...Bounced!

So in summary and to shed some light, your website bounce rate is a great indicator to help you evaluate the traffic you are sending to your website. It can help you reduce the amount of time and money you may be spending in places that are not working. If you want to save money or time, evaluate the bounce rate of the websites driving traffic to your site. (evaluate the source)

PS. This is just another side to the bounce rate story and how you want to use it to evaluate your business. I brought it up since nobody else has. Richard brings up a valid point too, the other side of the coin…If your website doesn’t say what your visitor wants to hear they will leave too. There's more to the picture than meets the eye. but at least with a bounce rate of less than 40% you know you may be doing something right.

[Ilka Flood Company: SendOutCards Contribution Level: 4]

Not at all. Your users will be the best source of measuring bounce rate. If you know what action you want them to take then you can figure out how effective the page is by how many people are taking the desired action. If you want them to comment and you find your getting a high bounce rate and little action you might want to adjust the call to action or tweek your traffic getting method.

Analytics is an art because its about people. If your not delivering they won't respond. Same goes for sales. The thing about the internet is that everything is tractable.

Mike,

From what I understand then... there's no way to analyze your bounce rate correctly then because of all the variables involved? And the best thing to do is keep an eye on it and keep it as low as possible?

Thanks, Richard, that makes total sense! I appreciate it

[Jake McGreg Greg Contribution Level: 1]

Mike,

From what I understand then... there's no way to analyze your bounce rate correctly then because of all the variables involved? And the best thing to do is keep an eye on it and keep it as low as possible?

Hi Ilka,

The bounce rate is a great indicator to evaluate the traffic you are sending to your website. And, the bounce rate will vary on each of your e-marketing campaigns. But you can analyze it correctly and use it properly and yes, yes, yes...keep your eye on it.

A Case Study: Many Internet marketers use the Mandura System Website to make money. Each of them may use different e-marketing techniques. Some push market using email campaigns. Some use traffic exchanges, link exchange or banner ad programs. Some people pay search engines to get traffic and some people personally invite people to the website by using business cards (face to face). We have found each of these have a predictable bounce rate. For instance, the very nature of how traffic exchanges work (self promoting) result in a 95-100% bounce rate and we consider it a waist of time or time that can be utilized in another form of getting higher quality traffic to your site.

We are able to see what campaigns work and what campaigns don't work, initially from the bounce rate. A high bounce rate is an indicator that something is wrong, but it's not always your content. Often it is the traffic you are sending to the website. I know if I send my Mom and Dad who enjoy classical music to a Heavy Metal concert, even it is one of the best heavy metal bands on the earth, they will walk out...Bounced!

So in summary and to shed some light, your website bounce rate is a great indicator to help you evaluate the traffic you are sending to your website. It can help you reduce the amount of time and money you may be spending in places that are not working. If you want to save money or time, evaluate the bounce rate of the websites driving traffic to your site. (evaluate the source)

PS. This is just another side to the bounce rate story and how you want to use it to evaluate your business. I brought it up since nobody else has. Richard brings up a valid point too, the other side of the coin…If your website doesn’t say what your visitor wants to hear they will leave too. There's more to the picture than meets the eye. but at least with a bounce rate of less than 40% you know you may be doing something right.

Thanks for posting this case study. So you mean having lesser 40% is good? Well if that's the case, I'll target it for this new year though