Are Click-Through rates & Bounce Rates as Ranking Metrics ?
-
There are lots of articles around but I would prefer to see what everyone here has to say about it.
Are they ranking metrics ( directly or In-directly )?
If they are then how to get it right?
Can i depend on Google In-page analytic?
What is an acceptable Bounce rate for a home page ?
What is an average click through rate for your landing page ?
thanks
-
There are ways to use math to balance CTR based on position (simple ratio and proportion), and search engines may or may not do so. Depends on who you believe.
But, if you look at Dr. Pete's post in Feb on The 2 Metrics that Matter for SEO you will see how dwell time may be more important.Interesting stuff this SEO.
Best
-
And it's only half the story. We changed the page design for a certain page and while the bounce rate has decreased, our conversion rate has also hit the bottom. This is a high-degree equation with so many variables, and you don't even know some of them. I guess that's why there is the A/B testing.
You will have to keep testing.
As for R. Fisher's answer, I would guess (and hope) Google to not take every page on 1st page the same way. We know most searchers don't even scroll (or look) to see beyond top 4-5 results on SERP's. It is normal for any site between 6-10 to have a lower CTR than the sites at 1-5.
-
While they may not be using metrics from your analytics (bounce rate) I would suggest that which sites get clicked in the SERPS and which sites result in visitors returning immediately to the SERPS to click on another result are used by Google. We know that they can detect people returning to the SERPS as they sometimes/used to present you with the option of blocking the site.
From an SEO's perspective this means that it's not just important to rank, but to rank for the right keywords, where the intent and users expectation are going to be satisfied by the page your providing.
Bounce rate can be a bit of a fickle metric - a high bounce rate could mean that the visitor lost the "information scent" when they visited your page (what's in it for me!) or found that the page quickly and efficiently answered their question.
Either way, if the site owners goals is to get the visitor to accomplish some addition action/goal beyond providing information then it's probably not a good sign.
If you page isn't getting the clicks it deserves in the SERPS then, as Robert said, it's time to take a look at the Title/descriptions to make them as compelling as possible and convey the reasons why the searcher needs to click on your entry!
-
Thing is bit scare to change the page layout, if the data is unreliable it could cause the bounce rate to increase and it would cost the client design and development hours. Is there a more accurate tool in the market.
Thanks
-
If you are saying use those analytics to change outcomes, I say do it. Will it necessarily improve the page rank, I don't know that it will. But, if a site owner focuses solely on rank and ignores conversions, what is ranking worth?
-
Dan,
I've seen Matt's piece on this but still see it as a bit counter - intuitive. I think at some level, (maybe not PR per se) I still see a site with bad CTR to a page as moving down. So something is affecting it.
Good answer though,
Robert
-
Thanks Robert,
What do you think about using in-page analytics to improve your page, ive heard that its not reliable. what are your thoughs?
regards,
-
Yes and most likely are the best answers:
Yes in that if you put a new site up and due to freshness a page is on page one, but the meta description does not fit the query and no one is clicking on the SERP link, therefore little or no Click throughs, you are going off the page quickly.
Obviously, especially with black hat SEO, when someone misleads with a meta description and you land on a page that is no where near what you were looking for, you leave in a heartbeat or less - you bounce. So, one mechanism that Google has is to see that for what it is and count that against you. But, if your bounce rate in your vertical is normally around e.g. 50% and you are close to that number, you are likely ok. If you are a bit better you are likely improved.
So, you want good meta descriptions so that you get people to the page and you want great content to keep them there.
We took on a new client about 6 months ago and he was ranking in top 2 to 3 for almost every major kw in his vertical locally. After a new site, better content his CTR is improved by about 25% and his bounce rate by roughly 5 to 10% (45 to 35-40). His pageviews doubled (images I think) and his time on site is up by over a minute.
He now ranks first for almost everything. I think the CTR and Bounce are huge in that result
hope that gives you a reasonable idea.
-
Google claim that they do not use click through rates or bounce rates as ranking metrics. Also, no Google Analytics data is used in the ranking algorithm. Matt Cutts confirmed this in this YouTube video - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLmO1GE4GvI
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Does Google need Analytics installed to create metrics?
Hi Mozers, Does Google know time on site, number of page visits, bounce rate, etc. even if Google Analytics is NOT installed? Does it measure all that stuff anyway, and if you install the GA code on your site, that is so that YOU can see those metrics? OR can Google only see those metrics if you install GA on your site? Thanks! Jane
Reporting & Analytics | | CalamityJane771 -
What's more accurate? GA queries data or Moz/SEMRush keyword data for rankings
What do you guys think? What's more accurate? GA queries data or Moz/SEMRush keyword data for rankings? Any thoughts appreciated.
Reporting & Analytics | | znotes0 -
Bounce Rate: what is it EXACTLY?
Hi everyone: we all know the term 'Bounce Rate'. I'd like to think i have a good idea of what BR is....but some things are not really clear to me. Time to call in the experts. Question #1: What EXACTLY will stop Google from considering the visit as a bounce? As discussed not too long ago in this topic https://moz.com/community/q/will-this-fix-my-bounce-rate
Reporting & Analytics | | BasKierkels
Ruben wrote: "..what it basically means is that someone clicks on your SERP, and then clicks back to google? But, it doesn't matter if they spent 10 minutes on your page or 10 seconds" Jessica Conflitti wrote a reply in which she basically said that it might be a good idea to have visitors click to a different page OR a PDF-file. That's where my confusion has been for some time now: Clicking on a PDF-document, an image in the page that opens with Fancybox, a link to a different domain? Or can it only be a different URL on the same domain? The way i would expect it to be:
Pages contain the GA-tracking code. So am i right by thinking that Google needs to have the same GA-tracking code to be loaded twice? Because only at that point will they have two datapoints. And only then will they be able to tell that the visitor hasn't left. By clicking a PDF-document - as described by Jessica - you wouldn't load the GA-code twice. So I would expect that clicking a PDF does not make a difference for the BR. Don't get me wrong: i like the article but it is this detail that throws me off. IF Google can read or capture these clicks, what other elements can be used to reduce bounce rate? Clicking on a YouTube-video embedded in the page? I'm asking this because i want to get this right. Question #2: how much weight does BR have on Time on Page, Engagement, etc? We know Google is taking a lot of things into consideration when calculating the value of a URL or domain. So how much should we care for BR if we know the Time on Page is good and a large percentage of people are frequently returning? How about your experiences or knowledge on that? Really looking forward to your replies and help on clearing this topic for me. And perhaps some other readers as well! Bas0 -
Does anyone know where in Google Analytics I can find the number of clicks/Facebook Shares?
I'm trying to track in Google Analytics how many people are clicking the Facebook "share" button. I'm not sure if I have it properly set up. Here's the link that I followed to set up the tracking in analytics: http://www.simoahava.com/analytics/google-tag-manager-track-social-interactions/
Reporting & Analytics | | EPICcreative0 -
Reach local driving up bounce rate...
Hi all! I have a new client that I did a website for. After a month, looking at the analytics, it shows that while the site visits from reach local is more than the organic google, the reachlocal traffic is bouncing, causing the overall website bounce rate to skyrocket. Organic bounce rate is 47.62% and the reachlocal is at 84.25% driving the overall bounce rate to 68! Duration of the reachlocal traffic is at :56 vs 3:41 for organic. (SEE ATTACHED IMAGE) I'm guessing this all means that the reachlocal traffic is obviously not quality, so does that mean they are targeting non-relevant keywords? I don't have any experience dealing with reachlocal. Should I recommend my client to drop it? And if so, how to stop that traffic from coming to the site? I'm sure this is an easy one for you pros! Thanks! ~BB MUW959h.jpg
Reporting & Analytics | | BBuck0 -
Ranking accuracy
On one of my campaigns the ranking in SEOMoz for a search term at Google UK is 34, but when I run an analysis using different software it gives a ranking of 8. Search the term on Google and 8 is correct, not 34. Why should this be?
Reporting & Analytics | | Beemer0 -
Ranking on page 1 position 3 but hardley any visits
in one of my projects the expected vistors is around 23000 weve got the keyword onto the first page position 3 and weve only recieved 30 vistits this month, my qustion is why? are the local searches from google analtics that tell you thier are 23000 searches for that keyword false please can someone shed some light on this, my client is totally over the moon with his ranking but cant believe that hes only recieving 30 visits this month from what we thought was a million dollar keyword
Reporting & Analytics | | Westernoriental0 -
Bounce Rate
Howdy Mozzers Does anyone know if the 'average time on site' in Google analytics is calculated with bounce rate included? For example if you have a 50% bounce rate and your average time on site is 2 minutes the actual time would be 4 minutes as the 50% bounce rate time is classed as 0. I hope that is clear! Cheers
Reporting & Analytics | | CraigAddyman2