You’ve put a lot of effort into your firm’s website, so you want to make sure people are looking at it. We install software on most sites that pulls in data from Google Analytics. It shows simple graphs of web traffic, pages viewed, and other data when you log in to your website. The first statistic is the bounce rate, which measures the number of people who looked at your homepage and then left without going further into the site.
Depending on your industry, and the type of site you are managing, you probably want to reduce the bounce rate. If you are marketing the services of your law firm, the pages you probably want visitors to read are the internal ones such as practice descriptions and bios. After all, why create a website if people aren’t looking at those?
We improved the bounce rate on one law firm’s website in several steps, by removing and simplifying content, and then by adding an image and a link.
This was a matrimonial practice with a bounce rate near 80%. The client wanted to be thorough in their presentation, but the homepage was too long. We removed a slideshow which was thematic and pleasant, but it probably pushed important content too far down on the screen. That improved the bounce rate by about 10%, but we went in again and cut a set of three bulleted paragraphs which, while they expanded upon the firm’s practice, duplicated content that was covered adequately on other pages of the site.
This resulted in an additional improvement. We then wondered if there was anything we could add that would also improve the click-through rate, and settled upon a small headshot of the principal attorney, along with a link to her bio. As hoped, this nudged the bounce rate even lower, as more people apparently clicked through to the bio.
Since we made these changes, the site’s bounce rate has consistently remained in the low-to-mid 60s.
If your website consists of a strong homepage that tells your story well, you may have no need for this type of work. But many websites place important content on inside pages, including practice descriptions, news or blog posts, and especially bios. Consider having your designer review your bounce rate, or reach out to us for a consultation.
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