6 Reasons Why People Are Leaving Your Website

With what feels like an infinate number of places for Internet users to spend their time, why should they be frequenting your website?

It's likely that you and your team are spending a lot of precious time developing, designing, and creating compelling content to set your website apart from the competition, however things don't always go according to plan.

The truth is, even though there are a million and one ways to drive traffic to your website, there are equally as many reasons for your website visitors not to stick around. 

If your bounce rate feels a little steep, we've outlined 6 possible reasons why you're losing valuable website traffic, and what you can do to reverse the damage.

Your Visitors Have to Work Hard

While we encourage you to be innovative in terms of your website’s design, it is important that you aren’t diminishing the functionality of your site.

For example, the placement and performance of your navigation bar plays a huge role in your visitors ability to uncover the right content on your website.  Unconventional placement, misleading labels, and crowded drop down menus can all detract from your navigation bar’s level of usability.

Considering that your navigation bar is used to connect visitors with all of the content within your website, you want to place the most important information at the beginning, and make it easy for visitors to get from point A to point B.

You’re Asking For Too Much

Forms serve as a great way to collect valuable contact information to help your nurture and qualify your leads, however asking for too much information will stifle your conversions.

Often times the number of form fields your require correlates with the likelihood that a website visitor will complete and submit one of your forms. Contrary to popular belief, requiring a ton of form field isn’t going to make people give out the information that they aren’t willing to give out. If anything, they’ll wind up passing up the offer or filling in false information to avoid being spammed.

According to an infographic by QuickSprout, Imagescape was able to gain a 120% conversion increase by reducing their contact form from 11 to 4 fields.

If your website traffic is bouncing before they convert, consider how your business can scale down your lead capture forms.

The Value Is Unclear

Don’t leave your websites visitors unsure of whether or not they should pick you or the competition.

A well-defined value proposition will ensure that visitors of your site understand what your business is capable of delivering. By communicating the value of your product or service up front, you are inviting users to further explore what your website has to offer.

It’s important to keep in mind that you are likely to view your website’s homepage from a different perspective than your visitors. While you know what your business has to offer, they don’t, and they’re only willing to give you a few seconds to prove your worth. Choose your wording wisely.

There's A Lack of Personalization

Nothing says “welcome to our website” like a keyword stuffed homepage. What many businesses fail to recognize is that you must create website content for humans, not just search engines.

If your website content has an overwhelming keyword density, it’s likely that your visitors will have a hard time getting through it. The trouble with an over emphasis on keyword usage is that not only does it begin to diminish your business’ message, but it also fails to engage the reader.

Your website content should be well-seasoned with touches of personalization in order to create a user experience that will encourage them to return time and time again.

There's No Social Proof

63% of consumers indicate they are more likely to purchase from a site if it has product ratings and reviews. (Source: Search Engine Journal)

Whether it’s reviews, social shares, case studies, or testimonials, user statistics, user-generated content, or celebrity/industry influencer endorsements, social proof has the ability to shape the way visitors perceive your business.

By incorporating some form of social proof on your website, you are presenting your visitors with evidence that you’re capable of providing customers with the outcome they expect.

If visitor is visiting your website to compare it with one of your competitors, you want your content to make a purchasing decision in your favor. Social proof will help you build trust by providing insight into how others are interacting with or benefiting from your product or service.

You're Too Slow

Back in 2008 a study from the Aberdeen Group found that, “A 1-second delay in page load time equals 11% fewer page views, a 16% decrease in customer satisfaction, and 7% loss in conversions.”

With the average human attention span trailing behind the attention span of a goldfish, it’s likely that these numbers are steadily increasing with time.

Slow loading pages are placed at a higher risk for website abandonment, which has the potential to negatively impact your website’s ability to convert visitors to leads.

Believe it or not, 47% of consumers expect a web page to load in 2 seconds or less, so be mindful of your website’s load time to avoid losing valuable visitors.