Altogether too often, online merchants spend too much time trying to get visitors to their site. Somehow they miss the fact that if you can’t keep them there, there will be no conversion. The length of time a visitor spends on your site without interacting with other pages before bouncing off is considered the bounce rate.
The bottom line is just this. If you want to make a sale, visitors need to stick around long enough to view your merchandise. Here are some online marketing tips assembled from the pros that will help to reduce bounce rates in order to increase conversions.
Know Who You Are Targeting
There has been so much hoopla surrounding SEO (search engine optimisation) that somehow the purpose got lost in the shuffle. Getting people to your site is important, but if they don’t get there prepared to buy, why capture them? If you are going to use SEO, by all means make sure you are using keyword phrases that are relevant to your audience.
In the very beginning, so many websites were simply using competitive keywords that had nothing at all to do with their products or services. The unsuspecting visitor would land on the page and quickly bounce back off. If you want to sell something, doesn’t it make sense to capture a potential customer who is ready, able and willing to buy?
Organised and Sensible Web Design
Another major blunder is trying to do too much in too little space. Rather than cram everything you want to say or sell onto the homepage, why not organise content so that it can be easily accessed by clicking through? This can be done from menus on the header, links in the content or even links on the sidebars or footers. Just remember, keep it simple! If a visitor can’t find what he or she is looking for quite quickly, they are likely to bounce onto the next site suggested by the search engines.
Streamlining Page Loads
Another frustrating aspect of many websites is the time it takes them to load. Be cognisant of the amount of graphics you have on your site. It is all well and good to show pictures of your products, but perhaps thumbnails would be more suitable. Visitors interested in knowing more can click on the thumbnail and be taken instantly to a page with more detailed information and, of course, a better picture (or several!) of the product they are interested in. If a page takes too long to load, visitors may get frustrated and bounce right off.
Build Relationships
The use of social media in marketing has literally exploded over the past few years. By having built a following on social networks such as Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook, you become somewhat of an authority. Quite often followers will click a link to your site because you have used tweets or hashtags to draw them to you. Like minds think alike.
Sometimes those followers won’t even need to actually visit your main site but can purchase right from your social media property. With an innovative social marketplace script, followers can shop and pay right from the social media application. However, the point being made is that once you have attracted visitors, it is important to keep them there. These tips are just the very beginning, the tip of the iceberg, but they will help to reduce bounce rates in order to increase conversions. In the digital marketplace, it’s all about conversions.
