Need to learn how to reduce bounce rate on your website? Good news, you’re in the right place?
One of the essential barometers in your digital marketing performance is bounce rate. That’s because it can be an indicator that your e-commerce website is not user friendly.
Any website that is not user friendly can miss many opportunities to drive conversion and generate sales. Bounce rate can also hurt your search engine optimization efforts, affecting your search engine rankings.
Hence, if you want to boost your sales and get the most out of your online store, it is essential to understand what bounce rate is.
What Is a Bounce Rate?
Imagine this scenario: You walked into a store only to walk out. You did not buy anything, did not inquire to a salesperson, did not check their products. No nothing.
If you translate that walking out online, that would be a bounce rate.
Why do some website visitors bounce, you ask?
There could be many reasons why a user decided to leave your website without taking any action. However, the most common reason is that your e-commerce website is not intuitive.
That said, the key to reducing your bounce rate is to make your website user-friendly. And here are 13 actionable tips that help you achieve it today:
To Reduce Bounce Rate: Improve Your Page Loading Speed
Of all the things that we’ll probably list in this post, a slow loading site is perhaps the most damaging of all. According to Neil Patel, 40 percent of desktop users will bounce from a site if it takes more than three seconds to load. Meanwhile, 53 percent of mobile users will also do the same.
Furthermore, speed is also one of Google’s most important ranking factor. Meaning, no matter how your store’s products or content, this hardly means anything if what you offer isn’t delivered quickly.
Apart from that, a slow loading page is one of the main reasons buyers tend to abandon their carts. Mind you, every second you delay can lead to a 7% drop in engagement.
Now, given this data, there’s undoubtedly a clear link between bounce rates and page loading speed.
Here are also some helpful tactics that you can employ when you make an e-commerce website:
- Decrease image sizes
- Streamline the checkout process of your site
- Get rid of unnecessary plug-ins
Invest in a Great Design
Another thing that you need to do is to invest in a great design. That’s because proper web design can boost your sales.
Get a proper theme, and maintain consistency throughout your site. That way, it will be easy for users to maintain and navigate your site.
You can browse through a host of available themes on WordPress if you have a site running on WordPress.
Build Strong Call to Action (CTA)
A call to action or CTA has an action word that tells users to get what they want. Having an unclear (or not having a CTA at all) will eventually ruin the UX of your website.
So, why is CTA so crucial in the first place?
Well, these are actions that a user can take once they land on your site.
By using precise and persuasive CTAs, you aren’t hard-selling users. Instead, what you do is helping users to get what they want without being distracted.
Here are some of the best practices that you can incorporate when building a strong CTA:
- Use it above the fold. See to it that visitors see it as soon as they land on your site.
- Make it stand out. Use bold, contrasting colors if necessary. It should be evident on your page.
- Ensure that you both use action or power words to persuade your visitors to click the CTA. Utilize words such as free, get, download, or reserve to encourage users to take action.
- Split test your CTA. To know the right CTA for your buyer persona, you need to A/B test it to test out different variations.
Use White Space
Adding enough whitespace on your page allows users to focus on the most critical parts of your website. Having whitespace in your site makes it easy for the essential elements to be identifiable.
Meanwhile, having a cluttered site can look untidy, making it hard for users to notice things. You can also use whitespace to separate various elements in your site.
Let’s say you want to add whitespace to your CTA button and headline. Doing so will make it look like it’s two different elements. But if you get rid of the whitespace, then it will just merge into a single component.
Furthermore, you can also add whitespace to the essential parts of your site. That way, they’re easily identifiable, making it easy to capture your visitor’s attention.
Make Your Website Mobile Responsive
The number of users who are accessing the internet using their smartphones is rising. So, ensure that your site looks great on various devices and shapes.
Apart from that, your site layout should also look great on both tablets and smartphones. As for your CTAs, they should be large enough that users won’t have a hard time tapping on them, but not too large that it takes too much space.
If your site is text-based, ensure that your site is easy to read and the text blocks there are highly optimized.
Make Search Obvious and Easy to Use
It doesn’t matter how intuitive your site navigation is. The thing is, you’re going to meet people who couldn’t search for what they’re looking for that way.
That’s why, if you don’t want to lose site visitors, here are a couple of helpful tips:
- Ensure that your search functionality is prominent across all pages.
- It’s simple and easy to use.
- It provides visitors with the most relevant results possible.
It would also be best if your site blog also has separate search functionality. That way, they can look through your blog with more relevant content much easier.
Make Sure Your Landing Page is Relevant
Another thing to check, when the goal is to reduce bounce rate, is whether your landing page meets the needs of your target market or not.
Having high bounce rates on your website can eventually lead to misalignment in your marketing and sales. That’s why you need to make sure that your marketing strategies bring in the right kind of traffic.
This is something that you need to consider if you want your customers to stick around. When it comes to UX design, relevancy is essential.
Optimize Your Product Pages
Crafting product pages can be tricky. If you’re offering too much information, then you might overwhelm prospects. Offer very little, and they won’t know they have enough data to make an informed decision.
So, suppose you’re spending a lot of time looking at various product pages. This can be an excellent opportunity for you to discover parts of your online store that you can optimize. Doing so can reduce bounce rate and boost your conversion rates.
Here’s the thing: Site visitors will not buy your products unless they are ready. And it is not just because of the price, but it’s probably because you lack the information they need. Another reason could be that you lack the right call-to-action buttons.
So, if you see high bounce rates on your product page, consider optimizing your product description and CTA buttons. If you are unsure whether a CTA button will work, consider running an A/B test.
Another tip is to use social proof. This can be in the form of customer reviews and security icons. That way, your customers can ease their qualms and think of your brand as legit and trustworthy.
Lastly, ensure that your FAQ, Terms of Service, and Return Policy are easy to find and read.
Fix Irrelevant Copy
Your words do matter. If you are clear, informative, and highly engaging, this will cause visitors to take action.
This can include reading the next blog post, sending you a message, or buying your products. If you have a poorly written copy that doesn’t answer critical questions, users might quickly click away from your site.
To fix your copy, you first need to identify the parts of it that work. This area is where you’ll receive direct feedback from customers:
Come up with a survey on Hotjar and make it appear halfway down the page.
Ask the user some specific questions on the nature of the page.
- Product page: What do you think is the product information on this page?
- Information page: Can you quickly find the information you’re looking for?
- Any page: What’s the single thing that you want to change on this page?
Utilize High-Quality Images
As long as they’re used properly, images are a powerful tool in increasing engagement and reducing bounce rates.
For one, a human brain can process images 60,000 times faster than text. As for e-commerce, high-quality images are the next best thing to having a feel of the product.
Aside from aesthetics, a product image is the closest thing that a customer can do to investigate your products. Hence, you will need a high-resolution image that will not be pixelated when zoomed in. It is also ideal to upload a 360-degree view of your product.
Another thing you can do is add a human element to your product images.
For instance, you are selling an electric kettle online. Consider uploading a picture of a man holding the kettle and pouring hot water in his cup of coffee.
Do you want to bring your visual game up a notch? Consider using cinemagraphs.
Build Internal Links
Internal linking is the process wherein websites link to other pages within the same site. Internal links guide users through an area, passing the SEO juice from one page to another.
But to decrease the bounce rates, one should focus mainly on two key areas:
- The anchor text’s relevancy.
- Much older content still receives a lot of traffic.
Ideally, your anchor text should be relevant to the content of your page.
For those older content that still manages to drive in clicks, you need to revisit these pages to update them (if required.) You might then want to include links to newer pages to encourage users to click through your site.
Furthermore, you should also ensure your site employs external links strategically- both in the header and footer. That’s because these are the usual places wherein they would anticipate essential pages.
Use Exit-Intent Popups
Whether you believe it or not, this is your call. Popups can be useful in the whole conversion optimization process.
However, these need to be used strategically and not in a pushy manner.
Well-timed (and tailored!) exit popups not only decrease your bounce rates but help build your email list as well.
Format Your Content Properly
Have you ever clicked on a site or blog post, only to discover later that it is filled with huge chunks of texts?
If this is the case, then you know how discouraging it can be. Even if your content is incredibly unique and valuable, this won’t matter, as it will scare off the majority of your readers.
Correctly formatting your page is one of the best ways to reduce bounce rate. Meaning, the less time it takes for the user to get what they want, the more likely they are to stick around.
So, don’t fill those pages with lengthy paragraphs. What you can do instead is to make your content more digestible by using enough whitespace.
Here are some additional tips to make your content look less intimidating to readers:
- Regular use of subheadings
- Using the right images
- Using headers appropriately
- Using bulleted lists
Adding these elements to your content makes it easier to read. Meaning, your site visitors can opt to skip other parts of the content that don’t matter and focus on what information they need.
The Bottomline
If you want to generate as many sales from your e-commerce website as possible, it is imperative to reduce bounce rate. And the key to making it happen to focus on providing an excellent user experience.
That’s because an online store with great UX could mean making it easier for your site visitors to transact with you.
Need help with your website? Get in touch with us today and ask about our WordPress website design services. We’d be honored to partner with you!
