Whether you’re just starting up your first website and you’re looking for some basic web optimisation tricks, or you’re a web development team with decades of experience that’s looking to lower your bounce rate, it’s vital that you understand why people are leaving your site.
There are plenty of technical and psychological tricks that you can play that will ensure you’re delivering your site users an experience that makes them want to stick around. In this article we’ll explore some of the very many reasons why your visitors are clicking the back button as soon as they see your homepage.
Don’t forget about mobile
The first thing you need to think about is whether your site is optimised for mobile. With a growing percentage of sites now mobile-ready – and some even mobile focused – if you’re not part of the trend you’re going to get left behind. Mobile is more important than ever.
There is a growing desire amongst private individuals and amongst businesses to move away from the tethers of laptops and desktop computers, and towards the more mobile-friendly smartphone and tablet. If your site isn’t responsive to smaller screens, you’re going to lose out on an ever-growing percentage of the market. Already, large e-commerce sites like Exchange & Mart are seeing the finance.
Clumsy navigation
The next reason somebody might leave your website is if it’s difficult to navigate. Challenging navigation means a number of things, but primarily, it means it’s hard to get around your site without having to backtrack or stop for a minute to get your bearings. Ideally, you want every page to have a simple, easy to read navigation that allows you to get to anywhere instantly. Without it, you’re going to make a lot of potential readers, visitors and customers tired of your site, and they’re going to leave.
And what about that content…?
Finally, if the content on your site is poor, there’s nothing for your visitors to stay for. If you can’t lure them in with a juicy, recently written blog post or a great explainer video, they’re going to hit the back button no questions asked.
Ultimately, these are just a small selection of the issues that people have when navigating websites. So whether you’re setting up your first blog or a large e-commerce site, make sure you don’t fall into these traps, and you’ll help to maximize your site’s traffic.
