The bounce rate of your website is the number of visitors who never make it beyond the first page of content and navigate away quickly. A high bounce rate means that your website is falling short of engaging visitors to the degree needed to hold their attention or move them to the next page. The problem all comes down to one of two things: You are either getting the wrong traffic to your site or your website doesn’t have the information it needs to keep visitors interested. Here’s what you can do to use web design to lower your bounce rate.

Don’t Give Too Much Information

Landing pages are designed to lead visitors into your site and then take action once they find what they are looking for, whether that action be placing an order or filling out a contact form. Valuable information that is presented in an organized way is quick and easy to find. Trying to pack too much into a single page will only make it more difficult to find what brought the visitor to your website in the first place. If they don’t see what they are looking for in a matter of seconds, they are more likely to back out of your site and look somewhere else.

 

Address Their Expectations

Nothing is more frustrating than performing a search and then going to the best match only to find that the website has nothing to do with what you were looking for. Bringing visitors to your site who are not interested in your product will not only make your bounce rate climb, it means that the right people probably aren’t finding your website when they search for it. It could be that the keywords you’ve optimized your site for aren’t the ones most people use to search for products or services like the ones you offer. Make sure that your site addresses its visitors’ expectations and they’ll be much less likely to bounce away from it.

 

Leverage the Internal Search Option

Visitors are more likely to stay on your site even when they don’t immediately find what they are searching for when the site has an internal search option. Internal searches are the fastest way to find something that they are looking for, and it’s a convenience that many people will be more than happy to use. Go a step further and make sure your search box is prominently displayed, above the fold and easy to see. The idea is to make it a convenient tool for your visitors to find what they are interested in on your website. It won’t work if they are unable to see it easily.

 

Structure Your Content Deliberately

People have a short attention span. Get to the point in the first couple of sentences or they will never get to it. Break up your content into small paragraphs and only insert useful info that will get and keep their interest. Remember, you want to make them take action or go to the next page, not just to read all your cleverly worded content.

 

Get to the Point

If you take the time to try and build suspense, you are going to lose most visitors’ attention. You have seconds to make a point and they aren’t going to spend their precious time trying to figure out what you are really trying to say. Let them know what you have to offer and why it is a better choice than that of the competition.

 

SEO continues to be an important factor in driving traffic to your site. But most businesses realize the value of getting the right traffic instead of worrying too much about the numbers. Focusing on SEO and keeping the keywords up-to-date with the things your visitors are looking is another way that you can bring your bounce rate down through website design.

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