Bounce Rates, How important a metric is this?

When looking at the analytics for certain websites developed by VR3 Media there is always a metric that can ruin any day for us, the dreaded bounce rate. VR3 have a number of sites, all with varying bounce rates mainly due to the vast range of clients in our portfolio.

One particular client of ours runs an emergency plumbing and boiler repair company in North London. Google Analytic stats show a very high bounce rate, where visitors are landing on the homepage and exiting before clicking through to any other sections on the website. On this particular website the contact details are in a prominent position on the homepage and the content tells the visitor all they need to know about available services and how much they will pay.

Taking these factors into consideration and the fact that if you did have gallons of water flowing through your ceiling or your boiler had packed up in the middle of the coldest weather for 30 years, then chances of even bothering to go beyond a page with the relevant details are slim.

As important bounce rates are to websites with sales processes or multiple pages of information, sometimes the visitor can find what they need to know in order to commit to using a service on the landing page. Other metrics within Google Analytics can show whether users are engaging with the content. 'Average time on page' will show how long users are spending viewing the page, for example the home page of the plumber has an average of 2.27 minutes.

There are other factors that may effect the bounce rate such as the fact that as part of the marketing for the website we have set up a paid search campaign using Google's Adwords application. The text adds that appear in the search results include the telephone number as well as click-to-call on the mobile ads.