A bad bounce rate can mean the death of a website—and that’s especially true for e-commerce sites that rely on conversions to keep the business going.
*Updated 8/1/2024
The average bounce rate of e-commerce websites sits at around 45%; businesses with a bounce rate lower than 20% are considered exceptional, while those above 45% need to make some changes.
What Is Bounce Rate?
Bounce rate refers to the percentage of people who leave your site after visiting just one page. Several actions can be counted as a “bounce.” Most analytics trackers don’t distinguish between them.
For example, even if a customer just visited your About or Contact Us for information, got it, then left your site (i.e. he or she achieved his or her purpose for visiting), that will still be counted as a bounce.
E-commerce websites need to reduce their bounce rate to increase their sales. There are several ways to do this, including adding the best pop-up for websites from POWR.io to keep customers from leaving without buying anything.
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How to Calculate Bounce Rate
To calculate bounce rate, simply divide the total number of one-page visits by the total number of sessions or visitors on your website.
A benefit of B2B e-commerce, and one of the benefits of e-commerce to sellers in general, is that the bounce rate is typically included in your website analytics provided (e.g. Google Analytics). That means you don’t have to keep calculating it yourself each time.
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What’s a Good Bounce Rate?
A bounce rate below 20% is exceptional for an e-commerce business, though the average is at 45%. Aim to stay below the average, and try to reduce your bounce rate to the 20% to 30% range for optimal results.
How to Reduce Bounce Rate
The first step in reducing bounce rate is getting to the bottom of why customers are leaving your site so quickly. You could be attracting the wrong traffic, your website could have poor design or bad performance, or your customers are having difficulty getting the products they want.
Here are some ways to address those problems:
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Improve Page Performance and Usability
A lot of people leave websites that are either badly designed, perform poorly, or are hard to use.
Solve these problems with a website that’s designed under the concepts of user interface (UI) and user experience (UX). You want to make it easy for people to browse your page and finish a transaction.
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Optimize Landing and Product Pages
Make an impression from the very beginning by optimizing your landing pages so that they encourage your visitors to interact with the page. Add compelling calls to action and apply tactics that’ll make people want to keep clicking around.
Give the same attention to your product pages as well, since these are what will ultimately convert your customers. Give informative descriptions, add high-quality images, and include reviews.
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Use Pop-ups
Pop-ups are an effective way to keep people on your site, especially if you can personalize them with deals to offer your customers such as discounts, free delivery promos, etc.
You can easily add them to your site—even without coding knowledge—with POWR.io’s website pop-up plug-in. Just customize it, copy the code, and embed it onto your site. It’s done in just minutes!
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Design for Mobile
Many people shop using their phones. You must keep mobile optimization in mind when designing and developing your site so you can give the same seamless experience on tinier screens.
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Target the Right Keywords
Visitors might be bouncing from your site because your site comes up when they’re searching for something completely unrelated. When doing search engine optimization (SEO), make sure you’re targeting the right keywords so that you’re connected to the most relevant users.
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Beat the Bounce Rate
A low bounce rate can snowball into better site performance—the more people using your site, the more people (and search engines) trust you.
Even if you’re at the average bounce rate range, try to lower it by using strategies like adding exit pop-ups from POWR.io to your site to get that number down and your visibility and sales up!
