Bounce rate calculation

[Grumpy_Carl]

Could anyone help out with a bounce rate query please. A website of mine, an affiliate website offering product reviews, has a bounce rate of 82%. I am puzzled a little as to how this is calculated. Is it only a bounce if the user goes from the search engine to my site and then back to the search engine? Or would search engine to my sites to the affiliates site via the link on my sites also count as a bounce? With a site of this nature the goal would be to get as many people visiting the merchant as possible and so a high level of bounce from me to them would be ideal

Thanks, Carl

[DeliaAssociates]

Google does differentiate between a link that takes  you to another page on the site vs. a link that takes you off site.  However, the affiliate links take you off the site, and therefore classifies as a bounce.

However, if someone goes to the home page, then another page on your site, then an affiliate, it is not a bounce.

I wouldn't worry about the bounce rate at all.  That doesn't seem to be an important metric for what you're looking at.

[AWCthreads]

What is Google Analytics telling you about those pages?

I would think not since the visitor took an action from a link on the page. Once the link on the page is clicked, it effectively closes the loop that was created when the page was entered. You might not have a high time on page, but hopefully you'd get "credit" for action taken and not be classified as a bounce.

Having said that, I don't know if Google differentiates between clicking on a page link that takes you to another page on the site versus a page link that takes you off the site.

I forgot to the attribute the above information to Google Analytics. You might dig around GWT to see if they offer more specifics.

I used to the think we get dinged in SERPS for bounce rate. But since a visitor may land on a relevant page and get all the information they need and then leave, it makes sense that very little if any importance would be attributed to bounces in Google's algorithm.

[Grumpy_Carl]

So, you feel that a user coming to a website via whatever method of entry and clicking from the site to a merchants via and affiliate link would still be classified as a bounce?

[AWCthreads]

Bounce Rate

The Bounce Rate is the percentage of bounced visits to your site.

A bounce is calculated as a single-page view or single-event trigger in a session or visit.

The following situations qualify as bounces:

• A user clicks on a link deep into your site sent by a friend, reads the information on the page, and closes the browser.
• A user comes to your home page, looks around for a minute or two, and immediately leaves.
• A user comes directly to a reference page on your site from a web search, leaves the page available in the browser while completing other tasks in other browser windows and the session times out.

Time on page will be 00:00 if no actions are taken on the page, no matter how much time or scrolling is done on the page.

[Grumpy_Carl]

I'm not sure if bounce rate is one of the user experience factors along with page loading time and time on page.

[DeliaAssociates]

There is no real evidence that I've seen, at least at this point, that Google considers bounce rate as a ranking factor.  I could be wrong, but I've never seen anything that supported that.  Don't worry about that at all.

Bounce rate, for sure, has nothing to do with SERPs, and is exclusively measured by someone landing on your site and not moving to another internal page.

[Grumpy_Carl]

Thanks that's along the lines of my thinking. Although given google considers the bounce rate as ranking factor I hope it's just the bounce rate from and to the serps and doesn't include affiliate links

[DeliaAssociates]

A bounce is any time someone comes to your site and leaves without hitting a second page on your site.  If they come to you and click an affiliate link, that's a bounce.

So, you really don't count a bounce rate to someone.  You should have some analytics tool for the affiliate which will help you see how much traffic you're giving them.  Bounce rate probably isn't something that you probably need to worry about.

That help?

-Adam