How to reduce eCommerce bounce rate for your online store

 A high bounce rate can be an online store killer, and as your traffic demonstrates that it isn't liking what it sees your ability to turn this around is crucial for your business revenue. Your conversion rate has no hope if your bounce rate is high, just because you can be found on google search doesn't mean that visitors are impressed with your approach to having that engagement. The user experience must be considered when arriving on your site, capturing their attention, and taking them through to what they are looking to find. Search engines work on keywords, and google analytics helps you understand the user experience in traffic, sessions, session durations, and bounce rate - this needs reviewing frequently, and improving it.

Bounce rate - what it is

The definition is when a visitor arrives on your site, then leaves after visiting that one page - this means what they saw on the page did not capture their interest beyond that page. This is what happens:

• The visitor clicks on the back button after seeing your page.
• The browser is shut down after seeing your page.
• The user clicks away from your page to another site.

The average bounce rate for an online store is 45.68% which directly reflects your brand, your value proposition, your visual design, user experience (UX), or product and service.

The first step in improving your conversion rate is to be convincing enough to keep them on your page by capturing their attention. Either from a landing page or a product page, the content and user experience have to be such that it will engage to enquire further. Your ranking is affected directly based on the bounce rate - a high bounce rate lowers your authority. What has been deemed acceptable in eCommerce bounce rate ranges from 30-55% for the number of visitors. The type of page that the audience arrives at will vary the type of content being consumed, and that will inherently vary the bounce rate. Blog Posts will have a different user experience than a product page, while landing pages may depend much on call-to-actions. User Experience design is a crucial component when it comes to engagement, which also considers usability testing and visual design.

Bounce Rate is only one component

Browser tabs bring a new variable when it comes to shopping affecting the bounce rate. When a shopper uses several tabs considering the product they are looking to purchase, they are comparing specifications, reviews, price, and delivery. When they decide not to purchase from your online store, yet considered your brand and your value proposition the type of bounce isn't the same as arriving on your page and bouncing off without interest. They actually did engage, spent time reviewing what you had to offer, and then make a decision. A true bounce is when they have arrived on your page and the content did not meet their expectations, or what they were looking for - taking seconds to move on to something else.

Dealing with the True Bounce

The type of pages you have on your online store directly affects your bounce rate. Blog posts by nature have the highest bounce rate, since they may have content that was deemed information when it comes to insights, it may have satisfied the curiosity and the user moved on to another site. Information pages run the risk of being high bounce rate pages for that reason. Therefore having cross-links, and a call to action within the page is important to lower the bounce rate. The quality of content and your ability to capture interest within the page is just as crucial as the type of page it is. A Blog post that covers "Customer Support user research" is more engaging when interactive examples that may include the use of live chat and other tools, with links to deeper dives into these additional tools will reduce the bounce rate - than just covering a few paragraphs on customer service methodologies.

Product pages are a totally different animal when it comes to bounce rate just by the nature of shopping behaviors and comparative shopping. Having an all-encompassing page might have all the keywords and Q&A with reviews on the page, however, if it keeps the customer on that one page when considering the item without the user navigating elsewhere it has a higher risk of being recorded as a bounce rate.

Optimising your product page

Organisational skills are required for a good layout of your product page. Customer reviews, distinct add-to-cart to stand out, your product descriptions easily found, good imagery for customers to see the item, FAQs in some cases can help as well as additional information that may be relevant to help customers make a good decision. The colors for add-to-cart have to stand out and be in view of the customer even if they scroll down the page. Reviews and their stars should be easily accessible and can increase conversion by up to 20%. Even though reviews are curated by most online stores, having honest feedback can help customers click the add-to-cart button with greater confidence; 77.3% of consumers say that reviews influenced their decision. Your product copy is probably the most important investment as well as your photography on your product page. Without an inspiring good description that captures the audience, and the imagery to show its features and function - the customer will bounce pretty quickly. It may sound shallow, but expectations are being met at that level, especially when it comes to a higher-priced item that's not a commodity.

Segmenting your Email marketing

What segmenting your emailing list does is to personalising it further based on categories of products, level of interest in the purchasing cycle as well as the way you might want to promote to them. The purchasing cycle has many touch points and to achieve a good conversion rate, remarketing techniques with conversion tracking provide good analysis to encourage a return and further engagement. Interaction design in your Email templates can greatly enhance the click-through rate to your landing page, almost like a preview of your page, to which you can enlist further engagement. Email segmentation increases the click-through rate, as they are more relevant to the audience and drives the right type of interest.

Exit intent pop-ups on your pages

The one last ditch effort to avoid a bounce is an exit intent pop-up which can increase conversion up to 20%. These pop-ups give customers a discount on the store, or may even offer free shipping when placing an order "now!". Given the user is looking to leave, you got nothing to lose aside from them changing their mind and having another look to see if they can be converted. It may look desperate, but then, that still adds conversions and engagement with your brand.

Conclusion

Much needs consideration on your pages when it comes to content, how it is organised and what is engaging. Bounce rate is a natural process, however, minimising it is a continuous effort especially when it comes to seasonality, sales events, trends, and changing economic environments. When managing your online store, keep the content concise yet have the right number of call-to-actions. Do not try to push customers through to several pages since for good campaign conversions the reduction of pages favours add-to-basket. If you would like to review and discuss best practices for your pages on your online store, feel free to write to us at wish@thegenielab.com