Being one of the most important criteria for website analytics, bounce rate is definitely a thing that website administrator needs to pay close attention to. Visitors who bounce of the page in most cases didn’t find what they were looking for. Some of the most common reasons for high bounce rate are:
- Loading and Error Issues
- Poor Content
- Poor Design
In this article we are going to focus on web design issues and their influence on website’s bounce rate. We are also going to share some tricks that will cut bounce rates on your website.
Usual Web Design Issues
Your website is the face of your brand. Although most product wrappings and containers are being immediately discarded after certain product is put in use, their design is very important for increasing product sales. The same goes for the design in retail shops and boutiques, intuitive design solutions are appealing to customers and they make them shop in these hip places. Web design is no different, although it’s sometimes even more important for the popularity of a brand.
Intuitive website design attracts new visitors and increases commercial website’s conversion rate, and web design mistakes can make visitors bounce off. These are some of the most common web design mistakes that make website’s bounce rate high:
- Too much creativity – People expect standard layouts and too much images and weird color combinations don’t meet their expectations, therefore, they often bounce from these pages. Unconventional layouts are great, but only if you know how to use them right.
- Painful color combinations – Some colors simply don’t fit together.
- Lack of responsiveness – With the increasing number of mobile internet users, websites need to be responsive and easy to navigate to visitors who use smartphones and tablets.
- Above the fold area that’s not appealing enough – This is the area of a webpage that can be seen without scrolling and it is the part that needs to be well designed and appealing.
- Use of flash – This is an outdated technology that’s not SEO or user friendly. Instead of Flash, designers who want to create more dynamic layouts now use HTML5. Even free website builders got rid of flash.
- Too much ads and promotion – People don’t like this, even on commercial websites.
Tips and Tricks
Now when you corrected mistakes on your webpage, it’s time to use some designer’s tips and tricks to decrease bounce rate. This way your visitors will view more content which brings more orders and therefore higher conversion rate.
Present Your Content in a Flow
Most visitors don’t like thinking about navigation when they are browsing. They like the clear flow, where the end of an interesting page is also the beginning of the other. A website should have an automatic slideshows and there shouldn’t be any overlap in the website structure. One of the best examples of interactive flow is the Google Images page, where you don’t need to navigate yourself by clicking on small numbers at the bottom.
Choose Right Areas for the Ads
Too many ads turn off the visitors, especially if these are videos that automatically start, or annoying pop-ups. You should select only several ads, and put them as far from the website content as possible.
Link Your Content Together and Recommend Other Interesting Posts
This is a great way to prolong the time visitors spend on your website, and therefore cut its bounce rate. You should design elements that direct visitors to the related content and use lots of hyperlinks that direct them to other posts and pages.
Previews, Excerpts and Good Quality Featured Photos
Previews and excerpts increase visitor’s interest in your offer. This is especially important when it comes to Premium content and this way it can directly increase your conversion rate. Good quality featured photos with the same resolution are another good way to influence your audience and make them click on additional posts.
Hire Professional Web Designers
Hiring a skillful web designer will definitely pay off if you don’t have the time to implement all these tips and tricks by yourself. You can choose between freelance designers and designing firms and agencies. Be sure to check designer’s credentials and recommendations before hiring, and contact some of the previous clients if needed.
Many entrepreneurs think that just owning a website is enough to expand their business, but with the number of commercial websites that’s constantly growing, people need to find ways for their page to stand from the crowd. Intuitive design is a great way to do that, but there are also many other ways like: providing good-quality content, investing money in digital marketing or constantly updating it with fresh news.
