Case study: Reducing website bounce rates

For the purpose of the case study I have decided to analyse the website performance of a recent freelance project I completed with a local dentist in my area. The project involved redesigning their existing website and I set myself various goals such; improving visitor interaction, reduce bounce rates, and ultimately increasing lead acquisition.

Problem: Upon a thorough research of the websites internal data within Google analytics I could see that the company was losing visitors and potential conversions on a regular basis due to high bounce rates. The website was also receiving a lot of mobile traffic and the current site was not optimised for mobile users.

Objectives: On further inspection of the analytics I also noticed that a good percentage of unique visitors that visited the website were leaving the website when they eventually reached the appointment page — the vast majority of these visitors were using a mobile device and were leaving due to a poor mobile experience. The main objectives of this project therefore were to work towards improving upon the current user journey and experience for users on mobile devices.

Goals

• Make website responsive
• Improve calls to action and interaction throughout the website
• Consistent UI throughout website
• Design a new more efficient user journey
• Increase form conversions
• Increase phone call enquiries

Implementation

I began the work on this project by sketching a proposed layout for the website and user path and discussed with the client how this would help improve the current design problem.

After confirmation of the layout I worked towards visualising this design using sketch and creating some wireframes so I could visualise this thought process more clearly.

Once the wireframes for the layout were confirmed with the client I continued using sketch and worked towards creating some brand guidelines. I also mocked up some potential logo designs using photoshop and illustrator.

Making use of the brand guidelines and wireframes I produced previously I began the mockups for the website design. I later completed the design mockups for the website and met with the client to discuss the proposed mockups. I made various modifications to the design and after several passes they were confirmed and I was able to I begin the development stage of the project.

Results

The website went live on October 12th 2016 and since then there have been noticeable improvements in user interaction and behaviour, CTR, bounce rates, site speed and most importantly conversion rates.

The website rankings have drastically improved within the search engines results due to the onsite SEO work I conducted on the home and internal pages.

For a more in depth analysis of the improvements please take a look at the report below:

What’s the Average Bounce Rate?

As a rule of thumb, a bounce rate in the range of 26 to 40 percent is excellent. 41 to 55 percent is roughly average. 56 to 70 percent is higher than average, but may not be cause for alarm depending on the website. Anything over 70 percent is disappointing for everything outside of blogs, news, events, etc. The chart above plots out the number of websites that fell within a particular range from the sample set. The most common range (range being a 5% increment) is between 35 and 40 percent.

Existing bounce rate

The data provided from analytics shows a 48.40% bounce rate (see image below). This is a baseline figure and hopefully over time should improve further as the site continues to gain further authority. I’m quite happy with this figure as the data recorded is over a fairly short period of time. However it can always be improved upon and in time I can work with my client to A/B test and dig a little deeper. When I begin A/B testing I will setup goals and events so I can track where the conversions are coming from more effectively (I will keep you posted on this next case study).

Note: This data was recorded when the website went live with the new design to the current date (Exact dates for the record are: October 12th 2016 — May 29th 2017).

Data comparisons

From analysing the data for all users from previous years it is evident that there is a decrease of -25.52% in the bounce rate (original bounce rate 64.99%).

From analysing the data for mobile users from previous years it is evident that there is a decrease of -27.82% in the bounce rate (original bounce rate 65.01%).

Summary

Throughout this project and case study I have learnt several invaluable lessons which have been extremely useful in identifying what is required to design and develop a website or landing page which will convert effectively.

The goal of the user must always be the first point of call in any project and finding out what they are trying to achieve on your website as soon as they visit the home should be the main focus from the get go. Once these core values are identified and a UX solution has been confirmed the UI can be implemented alongside these findings.

Creating a clear concise methodical user journey whereby the user can find what they are looking for quickly and efficiently on all devices is paramount to increasing user interaction and lowering bounce rates.

Finally a clean modern, consistent UI should be used for buttons, input forms, headers etc so the user can clear navigate around the website. Including clear call to actions which are used strategically within the website which clearly direct the user to what they desire.

Designing with these factors in mind should always result in a positive outcome to the project.